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Not really, Steam Machines were just a PCs running Linux at a time when Linux was in a far worse state for gaming than they are now (and almost all of Steam Mac
by badsectoracula 7y ago
Not really, Steam Machines were just a PCs running Linux at a time when Linux was in a far worse state for gaming than they are now (and almost all of Steam Machines produced either had weak Intel-based graphics or AMD GPUs when their drivers were still woefully broken). There was never any standard for hardware or even controller and most machines were overpriced, ugly, huge or all of that.
So of course they flopped.
Steam Machines should have used standardized hardware (even if it was in terms of "levels" like "entry level" or "high end level"), software and peripherals the developers could rely on and Valve should have made sure that the hardware actually fit their respective levels.
But Valve never did that and while they still slowly update SteamOS, they have been long sidetracked by VR so there are low chances for them trying a second time.
- mjevans 7y agoThey'd have been better off defining a standard with something vaguely like a year, or pinned against a console generation as a reference point.
- badsectoracula 7y agoThat could help some but IMO the most important part would be to have stable drivers and standardized hardware. What sort of hardware that would be and when they'd updated it isn't that important (though i disagree about the year part - updates should be much less frequent than yearly, otherwise it defeats the purpose of having standardized anything as a year is too short of time span).