Seems Valve really are expecting big things from the SteamOS 3 Linux-powered Steam Deck handheld, according to a new report from PC Gamer. Originally due to be launching this month, Valve ended up delaying it until February 2022. Due to all the worldwide shortages, many were worried about another delay but Valve appear confident in hitting that new date.
In the new report Valve sound very bullish, with designer Greg Coomer mentioning how different their shipping will be compared to traditional consoles. Valve don't need to ship masses of boxes around to traditional stores, as it's only sold in the one place - Steam.
Valve won't give out numbers but it seems they expect millions to have a Steam Deck by the end of 2023:
"We're going to have a launch that looks like a significant number of users right out of the gate, and then build that over time, rather than having the biggest splash on day one and then generally declining after that," he said. "If you extend the timeline out through 2022 and all the way to 2023, we expect to be building on our numbers constantly throughout that whole time, to the point where there's many millions of customers if things go the way we think they will, who are using Steam Deck by the end of that year or so, through 2023."
The good news is that their own production of Steam Deck units is not a bottleneck, just getting the parts is. Hopefully that will improve over the next year, as it's the same issue other hardware vendors also have.
According to Playtracker, they seem to think that somewhere around 700,000 people may have put down a deposit for a Steam Deck.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
If they keep a fair price, promote the console and maintain the OS and the hardware properly it will be a huge success. It's not like there is much competition and there is absolutely no company that can provide what they can (being the owners of the biggest (by far) gaming store and all that).
But it's Valve, their attention span is almost as bad as Google's and they seem to believe that their products need no promotion, for some reason.
Let's keep in mind that Steam OS has been in a pretty poor state for a long time, Half Life Alyx came out almost 2 years ago and we haven't heard from them about VR games since then (although everything points to them being in the middle of the development of a new game but they are always in the middle of something that never gets released) and their controller was discontinued, probably because of the mixed reception it got. On the other hand I think people are happy with the Valve Index, it's difficult to say since they don't allow reviews of it.
So... I hope they succeed but it depends on them. We'll see.
Comandante Ñoñardo Dec 17, 2021
Quoting: saturnoyoOn the other hand I think people are happy with the Valve Index, it's difficult to say since they don't allow reviews of it.
I wondered what you talk about. I guess it's Steam reviews, because of course there are reviews about it out there.
Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoIf Valve doesn't allow other companies from around the world to make official clones, this will be a megafail.
You mean, like PlayStation and Xbox?
Why?
People obviously want it. If I'd sell something and meet such an interest, I'd be happy.
Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoIf Valve doesn't allow other companies from around the world to make official clones, this will be a megafail.They will, they said back when it was originally announced they would expect others to follow and they've confirmed repeatedly SteamOS 3 will be released as a standalone. Any vendor will be free to make their own device but the Steam Deck is the only "official" Valve one.
Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoIf Valve doesn't allow other companies from around the world to make official clones, this will be a megafail.I don't see how that works. What do they get from official clones?
Quoting: Purple Library GuyQuoting: Comandante ÑoñardoIf Valve doesn't allow other companies from around the world to make official clones, this will be a megafail.I don't see how that works. What do they get from official clones?
Obviously, Valve would get people buying games on Steam.
I don't see though how not having that would make Steam Deck a fail.
Quoting: EikeI mean, they can't really stop unofficial clones even if they wanted to, it's an open platform. Anyone in an appropriate industry could make a tiny PC with a controller running some kind of Linux with Steam preinstalled. But nobody not expecting to profit from the game sales could match Valve's price point, I would think, so I'd expect anyone doing it wouldn't get nearly as big results. Just seems likely to be a kind of marginal phenomenon.Quoting: Purple Library GuyQuoting: Comandante ÑoñardoIf Valve doesn't allow other companies from around the world to make official clones, this will be a megafail.I don't see how that works. What do they get from official clones?
Obviously, Valve would get people buying games on Steam.
I don't see though how not having that would make Steam Deck a fail.
Quoting: Purple Library GuyI mean, they can't really stop unofficial clones even if they wanted to, it's an open platform. Anyone in an appropriate industry could make a tiny PC with a controller running some kind of Linux with Steam preinstalled. But nobody not expecting to profit from the game sales could match Valve's price point, I would think, so I'd expect anyone doing it wouldn't get nearly as big results. Just seems likely to be a kind of marginal phenomenon.
I'm not sure about the "Steam preinstalled" part - which would be important - without Valve's agreement. But as they did agree...
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