Steam OS

mogwins

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So Valve's bid to bring PC gaming to the living room also involves developing their own (Linux-based) OS. Interesting. It's supposedly very "open" (though I don't think they explicitly say "open source") and free. No reason not to give it a go by dual-booting when it's finally released - Valve's "coming soon" can have a legion of possible meanings!

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamOS/
 
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Who cares for meanings?
1. Publishers happy as Steam=DRM
2. Publishers even more happy - they can now sell nonwin games over Steam
3. Players happy - they don't need to buy and install windows to play games
3.5. Players so happy - PC sells better, consoles die

That's probably an overoptimistic thought. But it all comes to advertising and persuasion. If Steam doesn't present the thing in a way it looks as a next step in gaming, it'll fail miserably.
 
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Who cares for meanings?
1. Publishers happy as Steam=DRM
2. Publishers even more happy - they can now sell nonwin games over Steam
3. Players happy - they don't need to buy and install windows to play games
3.5. Players so happy - PC sells better, consoles die

That's probably an overoptimistic thought. But it all comes to advertising and persuasion. If Steam doesn't present the thing in a way it looks as a next step in gaming, it'll fail miserably.

Well said - totally agree.

I suspect it will be like a minimal linux client type system that it can set itself up, otherwise not many people are familiar with 'dual booting', and Micro$oft will not make it any easier.
 
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All I'm seeing here is Steam getting larger than it already is. The only good thing out of this is you may not need windows in the future.

That's a good thing in my book after win 8.:)
 
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Google grew from humble beginnings as well.
 
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I suspect it will be like a minimal linux client type system that it can set itself up, otherwise not many people are familiar with 'dual booting', and Micro$oft will not make it any easier.

That is easy to learn and it's even easier to find some who knows to set up dual boot if they have strong enough reason, and that reason will most likely be Steam OS exclusive Half life 3 and/or Portal 3, Left4dead 3 or they just can make DotA 2 Steam OS exclusive that will bring lot of users.
 
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Meh, another Linux fork. I've more than had my fill of open source software the past few years. No thanks.
 
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I see no use for this for me at all, tbh. I like my tv shows and football on my big tv, and my computer stuff on the pc. Never watched tv shows or movies on the computer and sure wouldn't play games on the tv, lol. I don't get the appeal but if it works for some people, more power to 'em.


-Carn
 
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I know very little about computing, but don't most (graphically intensive) games use DirectX, and doesn't DirectX require Windows?
 
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I know very little about computing, but don't most (graphically intensive) games use DirectX, and doesn't DirectX require Windows?
From what I know based on the internet Linux uses Open GL, and you can use other software to emulate Direct X.
 
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I still think a little box - like the recently shown Playstation Vita TV - running Steam OS with Bluetooth keyboard & mouse and controller support would be pretty awesome for the right price.
 
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Yeah, I could get behind that. I think this also opens the door for handheld streaming of Steam games (a la nVidia Shield).
 
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As long as developers don't railroad me in to a controller since it's "for the living room"
 
I know very little about computing, but don't most (graphically intensive) games use DirectX, and doesn't DirectX require Windows?

Yes, but it's more of an issue of if you're programming for Windows, then you might as well go direct x, rather than it having a massive advantage over opengl.
 
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I see no use for this for me at all, tbh. I like my tv shows and football on my big tv, and my computer stuff on the pc. Never watched tv shows or movies on the computer and sure wouldn't play games on the tv, lol. I don't get the appeal but if it works for some people, more power to 'em.


-Carn

The appeal is simple... playing from my bed is more comfortable than playing from my chair :)
 
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This is a catastrophe for desktop PC gamers. Valve was pretty much the last bastion for us PC gamers to get our games and to show publishers that PC game(r)s are still a force to be reckoned with.
Now Valve are going their own way with their own closed system (= their own console) for the living room just like the Xbox and the Playstation.

Valve is effectively pulling a Microsoft here. The PC gamers made them big, strong and successful and now they are screwing us over by trying to force us to switch from the desktop PC to the living room Steambox. Just like Microsoft's evil plot with the original Xbox.
Gabe Newell has learned his lessons very well from his ex-employer. Well played, Gabe.

Sickening to think that PC gamers dug their own grave all along because Valve is doing this with the money they made from all of us on Steam. Also explains why they never did Half-Life 3. Probably to save it up as an exclusive for the Steambox. As a system seller extraordinaire. People will be buying Steamboxes like mad if it's bundled with HL3.
And then we have another big player in the living room competing with Sony, Microsoft and to a lesser degree Nintendo.
It doesn't take too much imagination to figure out how much "serious" (desktop) PC gaming is going to matter in a couple years if/when all of that happens.
 
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Uhhh Moriendor? Steam OS will run on PCs just fine, you don't need a Steam Box for it.

The OS has some possibilities. If I could boot up my PC sans all those Windows services that I don't need at all while gaming and just play my game, I could get a decent performance boost and a little bit of extra memory. Then, when I needed my PC for email/browsing/work, I could just reboot back to Windows.

I don't know if that's what it will be, though. They're talking about invading the living room (where I do *not* have a TV, by the way) and streaming and blah blah blah. I'll have to wait and see what it ends up really looking like to see if it's worth the bother (and risk - how are those Valve firewalls?) of installing the thing.
 
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@Moriendor (and zakhal): Yeah, why waste time actually reading about something when you can just immediately assume the worst and whine about it? Also, try to remember that Valve are not your friends, they're a company. They make products you like and products you buy, but that doesn't mean they owe you a scrap of loyalty. That doesn't make them evil or sickening. It makes them a company.

As Zloth says, what we know about Steam OS is that it's a PC OS -- and quite an open OS, in that's free to install and free to licence -- running on a PC. If -- or more likely "when" -- the SteamBox is announced, it will almost certainly be a PC, capable of running Windows, etc.

Now there probably is a discussion to be had about whether this is the thin end of the wedge towards some kind of "closed console," and whether it's likely to lead to develops requiring a controller (I personally don't see either happening in the short to medium term). But the out-of-hand dismissal of anything new or different is a bit sad. You know what will definitely signal the death of PC gaming? If it never evolves or changes. Take that from a dedicated Spectrum and Amiga fanboi!
 
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