People want a console but also:
- A wider game library (Missing on Playstation and Xbox)
- No subscription (missing Playstation and Xbox)
- a working 10 foot UI (missing in windows)
- controller os navigation (missing in windows)
- no bimonthly fullscreen nags to use edge, office365, onedrive, etc. (missing in windows)
- Working ACPI sleep states. (Missing on most cheap mini PCs)
- Backwards compatibility for older titles and not needing to rebuy games when upgrading (Missing on PlayStation)
Microsoft could probably build an XBox that fixes the first problem but would probably fill it with nag screens.
People with technical skills can probably run Bazzite on a minipc but might hit issues with sleep depending on luck while purchasing.
People without technical skills just want a package that works
People WITH technical skills just wany a package that works. I don’t want to fix every single fucking piece of technology I own, constantly - even if I am capable.
Exactly, I would add the emulation part. Steam deck and I bet the box, too, are great for emulation of older games.
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It’s a console for people who like PCs
Exactly. I have a PC and a Steam Deck but I’ll buy it if the price isn’t completely off-putting. It’s just perfect for the living room.
It’s a PC Console for people who DON’T like PCs.
I want one because I don’t have a modern PC that can run games. I have a PS5, Switch 2, and a MacBook. I hate windows, I don’t want to deal with Linux or assembling a PC from components. I’m missing out on a lot of Steam games that I want to play. I don’t want to sit in my office and play games, I want to relax on my couch in my living room and play them.
This is for people like me. There’s a lot of us. We’re the ones that find piracy too much effort so we keep giving money to streaming services.
You’d think those people would already have a PC…
Not one hooked up to their TV
May I introduce you to Sunshine and Moonlight.
No, I’m not asking you to open your curtains. Long as you have a good connection between your PC and TV, and some small TV device, you can play a lot that way.
This is cool, how do controls work? Do you use a Bluetooth kbm/controller connected to the main PC?
This concern exists regardless of what device is running on the TV.
If you have a wireless keyboard that’s comfortable on the couch, use that. Otherwise, just use a controller and launch in Steam Big Picture mode (now basically looks like Steam Deck’s main screen).
Good launchers (not all of them) also take controller input.
EDIT: But I think to reinterpret your question, yes, the device on the TV generally should have the input connected directly. That can be done with Android TV and I think Apple TVs.
What I’m wondering is whether controls have to be still directly connected to the main PC (ie moonlight is casting the display only), or if moonlight also handles controller communication to the PC.
Assuming its the former, I would imagine using a Bluetooth controller connected to the main PC, which would probably limit the physical range that I could leverage this solution.
EDIT: Rereading your comment, perhaps the remote device can handle controls. I will look into this more later when I can research it better. Thanks for sharing!
They don’t, I set moonlight up on my friends kids switch for streaming from their pc. Super easy, slick as hell
Yeah but its a pita sometimes with controls and stuff.
Why don’t they hook it to their TV then?
It’s in the other room
Ever heard of an HDMI cable?
Obligatory fuck HDMI, but yeah
My computer is at least 12 years old by now and according to the Steam hardware survey the majority of people on Steam has a PC that is worse than the Steam Machine. I might get one as my new desktop if the price is not too high.
You can pretty easily just build an itx system and install linux on it. It might be a bit bigger, yes, but it’d also be easier to fix and upgrade. I believe the only thing you can change in the steam machine is the storage.
More developers will specifically test on your setup if you have a Steam Machine.
Most developers don’t test on my setup and games have always worked fine. Adjusting game settings is not rocket science. Worst case scenario, you use the low/medium/high presets.
You’re lucky if changing graphics presets is the worst case scenario. Maybe check out the recent Gamers Nexus video on Linux GPU benchmarking to see a variety of performance issues on different cards for different games e.g., frame delay spikes, super low 1% rates and sometimes just overall bad performance.
Isn’t that an Nvidia issue? AMD gpus work fine.
Unlike your itx system, the steammachine is going to be reference hardware, much like how games got a Steamdeck profile, there will be games with a Steammachine profile.
That’s literally not a selling point imo. Also, I’ve literally never used a “steamdeck” preset on my steam deck.
You don’t think games optimized for a Steam Machine isn’t going to be a selling point?
And just because you haven’t manually used a Steamdeck preset, I’m willing to bet that the game did it for you.The settings are optimized, not the game itself. There’s quite a big difference between those two. Why are you assuming that there would be special versions of games for the steam machine if there aren’t any for the steam deck?
And no, if I tell you that I’ve never used a steam deck preset, it’s because I haven’t. I always tweak the settings myself or at the very least check them.
Sorry but you can easily do that. The average person cannot. Most people would have to do multiple weeks of research into what different parts of a computer even are to have any hope of building a PC. Lemmy is one of the most out of touch places I’ve ever seen as far as tech literacy goes. The average person likely couldn’t even tell you what an operating system is, let alone know what Linux is.
If you don’t want to build it just buy a prebuilt. It’s not that hard.
Ah, maybe they could make some cool prebuilt with Linux already built in. Hmm and make it small enough to fit under a TV in a small shelf 🤔
And if only that machine could use OEM parts so that people could upgrade and fix it 🤔
I don’t think you could get OEM parts that would actually fit in that space tbh. Also the guaranteed software support from valve, and set spec list allowing devs to optimize for it are some pretty huge bonuses over other prebuilts. I’m not saying building your own comp is a bad idea, but for the average user who just wants to be able to game at medium settings in most games, this has some pretty major advantages.
Well, no. That’s why they used custom parts. I’d rather have a slightly larger machine that I can actually maintain though.
Also why are you so confident devs will “optimize” for the steam deck? That’s just wishful thinking and I highly doubt it would happen. I also don’t know what you’re talking about when you mention “software support”. Every pc component I’ve bough has had software support from its manufacturer.
There’s not even a cost advantage. We don’t know the price but valve already said that it should cost about the same as building a similar pc.
it’s smaller and comes with a touchpad controller for running desktop/waydroid apps, and it has hdmi cec
Not to mention the OS is way better and easier to use as an HTPC than anything else out there. That won’t be fully out until the steam machines release anyways.
You can just buy a steam controller, hdmi cec is minor feature imo and I’m not really sure what you mean about the OS being so much better than “anything else out there”. Install bazzite and you’re most of the way there.
I’d rather have a machine that’s slightly more incovenient to use but that can be upgraded and is also easier (and cheaper) to repair.
I want to just buy games and have them work on my machine. So a console.
Microsoft is surrendering the console war.
Sony has already put malware in their products and I will not be their customer again.
Nintendo is super locked down.
Valve has always shown me excellent customer service.
Nintendo has made it better to buy a fucking steam deck and pirate their games. I think the steam deck and the GabeCube will splash the market with better performance than other consoles, better use cases and usability, and therefore make other companies make there consoles better.
As a Nintendo fan, Nintendo is like all of our toxic boyfriends. But if Nintendo either a) licensed their games to other devices or b) allowed there devices to run linux/pc games I would step (a lil bit) back on the Nintendo train.
The use case is it’s going to introduce gamers to Linux. And it’s going to prove that in PCs, just like consoles, you don’t need Microsoft to game.
I’m not a Linux person, but Microsoft, big corpos and oligopolies generally, are really starting to irritate me. I am looking at more and more ways to get them the fuck outta my life.
And maybe Linux is the way for tech stuff.
That seems like a nice start to adopt Linux to the mainstream market. If there are more products, it maybe will be like with Android phones. I’m happy there seems to be more alternatives nowadays. Just installed one of my Steam games on my now semi Linux PC and I find it pretty cool that I can now play on that. Before, with just an emulator, it doesn’t really feel the same.
I mean yes, jack of all trades master of none. But then again a mass produced hardware which will run all modern AAA games (Meaning cheaper), running on Linux (Linux being used mainstream in a user friendly sense is better than not Linux) and still being user friendly is overall a company doing something I like, and adding competition to the console marketplace.
I bought Helldivers and BG3 on PS4 for in total like $150 and I sold my PS5 and now I can’t even play those games anymore. With it being linked to a steam account, this isn’t a problem anymore they can access there paid games on any device, which I like.
Well what if i want something like a console but hate the big tech and dont enjoy someone spying on me? this is the only option. What if i want a console that i can modify and use as a pc or a server if i damn want to? this is the only option. What if i want a true console like experience but want to play a title that just isnt on any consoles? this once again is the only option. This thing will have so many usecases, just maybe a little specific ones… :D
Bro preach. I’ve been out here doing real linux work on an old panasonic microwave. If you really liked linux, you’d be running it on something with less than 16 MB RAM.
Other than “not seeing the use case” I think the meme is right on. People hate Windows but don’t want to deal with Linux, people hate being trapped in the walled gardens of Microsoft or Sony consoles, but don’t want to deal with a full-on gaming PC. Kinda like how when iPads came out people where like, this is worse than a phone and worse than a laptop, who are these things even for?
As someone who’s tried several PC-in-the-livingroom solutions, just try building a PC with good specs at that size and you’ll appreciate the niche that is being filled.
Arch with KDE is for people who don’t like Linux?
Got my hands on a steam deck. First thing was installing bazzite.
Price!
We can argue about it all we want, but basically everything hinges on its street price.
If it’s cheap, all those critiques are irrelevant.
Expensive? “It’s cute, I like Steam, I like how it mostly works OOTB,” gets real niche, real quick.
Regardless of the box cost, there’s no arguing with the price of games in a Steam sale!
I don’t think I’ve paid more than £15 for a game in years and years.
Unfortunately, not everyone has the cash to spend up front. Paying more over time is easier.
Or they just get lured in by a cheap sticker price.
And again, price is still relevant. If this is well over $1K, it starts to negate the Steam storefront cost savings.
Fair enough. If they’re cash poor, grabbing one of those cheap games consoles is a good plan. 😟
It’s a pretty nice custom designed PC that is guaranteed to work well with Linux. The only downside, really, is that you can’t upgrade it beyond storage and RAM.
The GabeCube could hit the market at $1000 and still be a major success. Think about the RAM prices and there‘s not really a way to build yourself a cheaper PC that‘s convenient for couch gaming.
It’s for the people who can’t afford to build their own PCs these days. Graphics cards went up in price, hard drives went up and now RAM.
This kinda blew up. For the record, there are probably decent use cases. I’m just befuddled by its popularity. The best I’ve seen is PC games on a TV more easily than moving an entire setup. But the form factor removes a lot of the upgradeability and repairablity that makes PCs so great, it has standard hardware like a console but still traps you in a (admittedly slightly better) ecosystem, it has Linux but masks it so well most people won’t notice or care. If it pushes gaming to a more linux-friendly place, great, but it feels like it’s packaging it to the point that it won’t push the player-base, only devs. It feels like it packages almost all of the limitations of the 3 groups with very few of the best benefits. Truly do hope I’m wrong, I often am.
I thought you were listing all the positives and pretending not to get it. The whole point is that it is a steam console designed for a primary purpose of playing steam games, and also has the full functionality of a PC which other consoles don’t.
I plan on getting one in addition to my PC for playing games in my living room that will be more fun in that format.
Steam doesn’t trap you into an ecosystem. You can even add non-steam games to to the launcher for convenience!
This. It’s an Xbox with access to the Steam library instead of Game pass.
I think there will be some PC folks who get one, but I bet that won’t be the biggest audience. Their target audience is console players who are currently putting their cash into Sony and Microsoft.
It answers the (console player’s) question: “why can’t I just buy a box that let’s me play steam games from my couch on my nice big TV?”
it has Linux but masks it so well most people won’t notice or care.
That’s the best sales pitch for linux I’d ever heard!
Idk, to me it’s like veggie bacon. Stop spending so much time trying to make plants taste like meat when you can just… make the plants taste good. I’d rather be shown the advantages and explore the reason for a switch than have it try to be what I wanted to avoid in the first place. Maybe this is just a natural in-between step towards more universal adoption, it just kind of feels like the first step towards enshittification. Maybe I’m just jaded and cynical at this point, I’d just rather have something that is proudly itself rather than something trying to shamefully hide what makes it unique
It’s a fully functional Linux distro though?
Hooking a whole desktop to a TV is intrusive with most desktop form factors.
Most people who want a console don’t care about upgradability or repairability, and that’s certainly not the main thing that “makes PCs so great.”
Most people gaming on PC are equally “trapped in an ecosystem.” This has a desktop mode if need be, but hardly anyone does games outside of Steam.
“It has Linux but most users won’t notice or care” is a double positive.
“It won’t push the player base, only the devs” is a double positive.
The point of a console isn’t to make people into more technical proponents of open source projects. It’s to play games.
And if it’s competing in the console market, especially for people who aren’t terribly interested in the “Call of Duty” type AAA titles of today, it seems like a perfect fit.
