13 ms·

Valve is making a Switch-like portable gaming PC

190 points by signa11 5y ago

fwsgonzo 5y ago
That's very interesting to hear. Not least because Steam hosts your multiplayer sessions for any game now, so it could potentially be very seamless. There is so much potential here! I hope they work hard on their voice chat feature too, and get everything right from the start. And finally, Linux, using Vulcan I assume!
- me_me_me 5y ago
  This is very complicated and interconnected market segment. You cant just play games on this device out of the box (some games yes) you need some game devs to adopt it and have releases on this yet another platform. Valve would have to have a dedicated support team and long term strategy for it to become a switch rival. And with Valve track record it will be an abandonware from the get go.
  - croon 5y ago
    What support is needed outside of controller support and whatever OS it runs (I'm assuming linux)?
    - viraptor 5y ago
      And Steam have been collecting that data for a while now - each game is tagged with no/partial/full controller support. They know what will work OOTB.
    - me_me_me 5y ago
      They need to secure games on it. Even if this console ends up being PC in small form factor. I dont have switch but if i were to buy a console it would be switch, not steam console. I can play my games on PC, if i get console I'd rather have games made specifically for that form factor, plus Nintendo has amazing catalogue of exclusives. If you judge Valves actins in response to Epic agresively taking their already entrenched market - basically nothing. What chance do they have to compete with Nintendo, or mobiles? I might come across negative, but Valve doesn't make it easier.
      - croon 5y ago
        I understand getting a Switch for the exclusives, but outside of that I wouldn't get a portable console for access to games I couldn't play otherwise, but access to games outside of the normal environment (my desktop PC). If you look at the metacritic list of best games for Switch: https://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/switch/filtered https://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/... Most games are just ported PC games, which would be playable on a Steam portable console (assuming they're available on linux).
        me_me_me 5y ago
        Most games are made for consoles first, rarely other way around. Anyhow, you can play on your screen with docked switch. You can play on your couch with steam link, or pc hooked up to tv. I am just not seeing a competitive edge for this device.
        croon 5y ago
        > Most games are made for consoles first, rarely other way around. Except in the actual case I mentioned with the list, where almost all of the cross-platform ones are made for PC first, from Divinity to Hades to Undertale to Inside, Steamworld, Shovel Knight, Hollow Knight, Ori, Bastion, Dead Cells, Into the Breach, Fez, etc etc etc. Seeing how basically all games that aren't first party or specific exclusives are lighter (hardware wise) PC games actually speaks to a huge market for those games on a portable device. > Anyhow, you can play on your screen with docked switch. You can play on your couch with steam link, or pc hooked up to tv. Playing on the couch would be competing with Xbox and Playstation, not Switch, which as you said is already a solved problem. This would be for anywhere you play your Switch undocked, and you don't want a Switch for whatever reason (likely more indies, emulators, "apps").
        me_me_me 5y ago
        > This would be for anywhere you play your Switch undocked, and you don't want a Switch for whatever reason (likely more indies, emulators, "apps"). And now we came the full circle. Back to the original point. I don't believe Valve is capable of competition at this point. I would require serious people and money effort to create this 'whatever reason'. Because I gave you a big one for Switch and I don't see one for Valve (obscure small indie games that don't get ported to Switch is hardly a selling point).
    - imtringued 5y ago
      People buy consoles because they expect a perfect out of the box experience. If you try to play a GPU intensive 3D shooter on the handheld the performance or graphical quality will be terrible. The game must support full screen and the UI shouldn't be too small to become unusable on a small screen.
libertine 5y ago
I wonder who will be the target for these devices, because a great part of portable consoles strategy was: to be a gateway for kids to buy into the "big-boy" consoles down the line. Basically win their hearts and trust early, so they can become loyal throughout their life. So these devices had to check some boxes, one of the main factors being the price. These devices had to be cheaper then regular consoles (among other things) - though they shared the same kind of price strategy between each other: sell almost as cost (or at loss in case of the PS3), to make up later with game sales. Nintendo blurred that line into one device with the Switch, but they still check the box of the device being affordable. With that said, there were already some approaches to Nintendo Switch like hardware for the PC market, some with waaaay better performance then the switch (with both intel or AMD socs), yet they are failing in what I believe is crucial for these devices: price. They are expensive. I'm not saying they aren't wonderful pieces of engineering, but clearly they aren't meant to even compete on the same level. They can't sell at cost/loss, because they can't make it up with licensing or their own IP, so they have to make money on the hardware itself. Therefore I always assume these devices are for a very particular small set of gaming enthusiasts who are found of the idea of playing PC games on the go (even with limited battery life), and are willing to pay more then a full fledged console for this experience. I'm curious to see how Valve will tackle this, or if they are fine with that (which they seemed to be in other hardware releases).
- txdv 5y ago
  Slap steam on it and take the Steam cut?
  - libertine 5y ago
    That's the tricky part, if these devices aren't locked to a proprietary OS/marketplace, users can shop around and you're basically helping your competitors while taking all the losses.
    - easton 5y ago
      If it's running SteamOS (and it will be, even if there's Windows compatibility Valve probably doesn't want to pay for licenses), it might as well be locked to Steam for 90% of people. Epic's launcher doesn't have a Linux version (since they've claimed as have many other developers that the Linux community is 1% of users and 90% of complaints due to distro differences), nor does EA, Ubisoft, etc. They could port it, but by time they had something user friendly and working (which may be difficult since you probably won't get more than Steam Big Picture which doesn't have support for installing non-Steam applications at the moment) Valve would've sold a boatload of these and a bunch of Steam games. Edit: not to mention anti-cheat, which is a whole other kettle of fish when you have to integrate into a entirely other kernel with different plumbing. Valve's anti-cheat doesn't rely on kernel modules or a ton of client side software at all, so they have a cross-platform advantage there too.
Ziomislaw 5y ago
Making a PC like console might backfire. PC games are full of botters and cheaters (not saying you can't cheat on console, but I see 1-2 cheaters in a year on console compared to 50% of PC games population). It's the main reason I play games on console only.
- viraptor 5y ago
  Not everyone is into multiplayer games. There's a lot of single player market available.
  - morsch 5y ago
    And non competitive multiplayer. And multiplayer within a group of friends.
- jamesgeck0 5y ago
  “50% of the population is cheating in PC multiplayer games” is wild. Can you cite a source for this absurd claim?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Frenchgeek 5y ago
Sounds like the Aya Neo...
- ToniCipriani 5y ago
  If only it also had a Thunderbolt for an eGPU.
Ekaros 5y ago
Seems like I finally found some use for my CS:GO junk and selling them... Might as well pick up reasonable device for some mobile use. It probably supports bluetooth stuff and steam controller, so shouldn't be too horrible experience.
ToniCipriani 5y ago
Seeing how there is now the Aya Neo and the Onenotebook Onexplayer, this might actually work. Have a handheld with a powerful enough laptop chip and a Thunderbolt, when at home it sits in an eGPU dock and use it like a traditional desktop, and on the go either connect the game controllers or a keyboard to use as a laptop.
ArkanExplorer 5y ago
A portable gaming PC means optimization - in terms of performance and interface - is going to be critically important. But knowing Valve, they will keep the same old exorbitant 30% commission which makes it uneconomical to actually launch great titles targeted at this device, same as for the Index VR device. By the way, on Switch the effective commission is 25%, given that customers are rebated 5% of their eshop spend. Nintendo also bothers to apply curation and quality control to their store, which Steam does not.
- awakeasleep 5y ago
  Good analysis, but you harm your credibility by saying Nintendo curates eshop titles. This is only technically true, and no layperson would be able to tell. 99% of the eshop is ports of shovelware android ‘games’ that consist of little more than cover art.
  - ArkanExplorer 5y ago
    I have two titles on Switch and Steam. What you are saying is incorrect. The process to get approved and launch on Switch is substantially more difficult than Steam, and the quality of titles is as a result much higher. Because of the lack of curation and quality control, I make a lot more revenue for the same product on Switch than on Steam.
kogepathic 5y ago
Valve's track record with non-VR hardware is, to put it politely, not good. Seven years after launching the Steam machine (2014) initiative, there are no Steam machines available for sale. [1] Both the Steam Controller (2015-2019) and Steam Link (2015-2018) are discontinued and cannot be purchased, despite consistently positive reviews from users. [2] As other commenters have noted there are already numerous "Switch-like, but x86" products that exist, and it's unclear to me what innovation Valve can bring to the space. IMHO if Valve wants to be taken seriously in the hardware market, they need to stop pulling a Google and actually support/iterate/not discontinue their existing hardware products (before someone adds that they did support these through firmware updates, I mean updating the hardware to keep up with the times, Steam Link with apps or 4K, etc). [1] https://store.steampowered.com/sale/steam_machines https://store.steampowered.com/sale/steam_machines [2] https://store.steampowered.com/search/?category1=993 https://store.steampowered.com/search/?category1=993
- schmorptron 5y ago
  That being said, they did support both the Steam Controller and Link for a very long time, and the Steam Controller continues to be used by many (The configurator and services for sharing the configurations work all the same today). Steam Link has mostly been replaced by software solutions like an Android App, or it being straight up built into some TVs.
  - chimpansteve 5y ago
    I've got a hardware Link - it's still being supported now. It had an update a couple of weeks ago.
    - alias_neo 5y ago
      Yes, but I've had 4K monitors and 4K TV for almost as long as the Link has existed. It very quickly became useless to me the moment I upgraded to a 4K TV. The Steam controller is also an utterly horrible UX so the pair were just a waste of money that sat in a drawer until I stuck them on eBay. A 4K Steam Link should have been an obvious iteration, and a controller with actual buttons and sticks (I half-joke about the controller, I know some love its touch nature, I just hated it, could never keep my thumbs in the right spot).
SirLotsaLocks 5y ago
A lot of consoles are sold at a loss, where costs are made up by people buying games through the console on the makers store, I wonder how valve will go about this because I don't see a lot of people getting this that didn't already have steam on another device.
- moron4hire 5y ago
  It also really doesn't seem like they have anyone with the skills in their wheelhouse to do good by this. A big part of differentiating a console from a PC is building an operating system that prioritizes the game process uber alles. It's not just a fancy window manager slapped onto a commodity PC. Even the original Xbox had a lot of custom OS work done to it, stuff that would eventually serve as the test bed for developments in DirectX. Does Valve even have any operating system developers? I thought their core dev body was mainly focused on screwing modders and getting kids addicted to slot machines.
  - majewsky 5y ago
    They are doing a lot of work on Wine as part of Steam Proton (the Wine distribution built into the Linux version of Steam), so I'd imagine they have at least some of this type of developer on staff.
- majewsky 5y ago
  > A lot of consoles are sold at a loss I don't believe that's the case anymore. Newer console generations have moved on from exotic ISAs and the like towards using a lot of off-the-shelf parts for smartphones or PCs. The Switch, for instance, has been sold at a profit from day one [1]. [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20170131084504/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-31/nintendo-beats-profit-lifts-forecast-on-pokemon-ahead-of-switch https://web.archive.org/web/20170131084504/https://www.bloom...
  - lights0123 5y ago
    The Switch also has very little power compared to gaming consoles. It's the same price as an Xbox One S, but with far less processing power.
wpdev_63 5y ago
Just picked up the new macbook air m1 and I am staggered to find that I can play starcraft 2 and bioshock decently on a laptop that draws 30watts and is capacitivily cooled... Really just unbelievable. So if valve could someone get ahold of some cutting edge arm processors in the next few years then this could be very viable(though I doubt they will get it out before the next version of the nintendo switch).
- schmorptron 5y ago
  Valve has money, but not Apple or Microsoft money. I doubt they'd be able to source a high-power arm chip + the necessary hard/software features to make something like the rosetta compatibility mode possible.
  - wpdev_63 5y ago
    Not necessarily right now but a few years down the road when it actually releases(though no one knows when they'll actually release knowing valve's track record). Not sure why people are downvoting me....
    - schmorptron 5y ago
      According to the article they are shooting for a late 2021 release date if nothing goes wrong. Fingers crossed they'll say more at E3, which they're attending this year. Not sure why people are downvoting you either though.
est 5y ago
I am surprised nobody mentioned GPD yet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNfbfPhOiE0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNfbfPhOiE0
- CivBase 5y ago
  There is also the Aya Neo[0], the One Xplayer[1], and even the (now quite old) Razer Edge[2]. [0] https://www.ayaneo.com/aya-neo https://www.ayaneo.com/aya-neo [1] https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/onexplayer-best-performing-handheld-game-console https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/onexplayer-best-performin... [2] https://www2.razer.com/gaming-systems/razer-edge https://www2.razer.com/gaming-systems/razer-edge
fotad 5y ago
Why not making a phone and enter mobile market?
- swiley 5y ago
  Phone manufacturers are all just selling tweaked Qualcomm reference designs. Unless you want to go the route Pine64 or purism are going or have the resources to build your own SoC like Apple or Nvidia did you will have no control over the device. This is why even high end Android phones have such short support periods.
ibaikov 5y ago
They have tried to make a tabletop console thing for l4d where 4 players play l4d as usual and the 5th player would spawn zombies or items on them. I suppose this console is related to that
fanatic2pope 5y ago
I personally really like the idea. I'd love to be able to casually play PC games on the road without having to drag a laptop around. Of course unless it has something particularly appealing, it will have to be priced around the switch/lite level.
mastrsushi 5y ago
What IP does Valve own that could run on a portable device? Do they think people want to play Portal 2 on the go? As if indie developers want to put resources into porting their content on some niche handheld. Valve has really lost the plot. They don't have any assurance in hardware. Steam, while successful, isn't the only contender on PC gaming. It's not 2007 anymore, there's Epic Games, Origin, and I'm sure a bunch of other platforms all hosting a small set of popular titles. They're out of touch, which is sort of ironic given the company was founded by ex-Microsoft employees in the 90's. They went from a Game Development Studio into one of many Game distributors. They're better off sticking with that, or at the most, pushing their platform onto the Switch. Get with the times.
- icegreentea2 5y ago
  Depends on their model... but a very large selection of PC games already ship with gamepad support (I mean, a huge selection of PC games already run on other consoles for example). I mean, that's really it. If you have gamepad support and can run acceptably on the hardware, then you're good to go - basically no extra dev required.
  - mastrsushi 5y ago
    The device will run on Linux, depending on the existing title, that might not be a breeze. Not to mention the optimizations developers will have to make to scale their games down to run on this thing.
jakearmitage 5y ago
So... basically GPD Win? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPD_Win_3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPD_Win_3
peanut_worm 5y ago
I worry that it would get abandoned rather quickly given how Valve has released hardware in the past.
- Hamuko 5y ago
  What about the HTC Vive and the Valve Index?
  - peanut_worm 5y ago
    I suppose their VR hardware would be the exception. SteamOS, Steam Machines and their controller all got abandoned even though they all seemed like pretty good ideas.
    - jamesgeck0 5y ago
      Those are still getting software updates even though they aren’t on the market anymore. Additionally, they spawned the “Big Picture” mode, an absurdly robust controller mapping feature, and a Wine variant that benefits all Linux gamers. Every time Valve makes a hardware product, Steam gets some new killer feature.
bob1029 5y ago
Why did Valve get out of the AAA game development business? It seems like hardware has largely been a mistake for them. Sure, I can have 20 different variants of an x86 computer and various HMD interfaces, but if all the games suck ass what's the point? Valve is still surfing on the inertia of their initial software-based innovations, and is only continuing to cruise along by siphoning off others in their (lightly) curated market. How much money is sitting in the coffers at Valve Software? What practical force prevents leadership from allocating just 1% of that pile of cash to something like TF3? It almost feels like we are being intentionally suffocated by our entertainment industry these days. It's the exact same story at Blizzard/Activision, EA, etc., but at least in those cases you can blame the publicly-traded aspect of the organizations.
- schmorptron 5y ago
  Artifact was a good card game only killed by really dumb marketing and monetization decisions. Half-Life Alyx is almost universally hailed as the best VR game and as good if not better than the previous Half-Life games. That being said, you're right about them neglecting a lot of their IP. Specifically a TF3 might be really cool to see, along with more love for Counter-Strike.
  - Sleepytime 5y ago
    Alyx is fun to play but the jokes and dialog are really bad. Previous half life games did a lot more with a lot less.
  - anthonypasq 5y ago
    Artifact was just straight up a trash game. I hate this new idea that every failed game is just "bad marketing"
    - ThatMedicIsASpy 5y ago
      I would argue that games lasting 30-60min was an issue as well (for a 1v1 card game)
  - 5y ago
egypturnash 5y ago
Honestly at this point I kinda feel like Valve is to the Steam store what Google is to search/ads. I do not trust either of them to follow through with any amount of support for any project they announce outside of the massive money spigot that is their core business.
schmorptron 5y ago
AMD recently patented their DLSS competitor (albeit with a really dumb name, "Radeon Gaming Super Resolution").[1] If this launches on RDNA2 as rumored, it could be very interesting to see it maybe having a 1080p screen and just upscaling a 720p rendered image to that native resolution to save on computing power. [1]https://www.techradar.com/news/amd-patents-gaming-super-resolution-to-take-on-nvidia-dlss https://www.techradar.com/news/amd-patents-gaming-super-reso...

190 points by signa11 5y ago

That's very interesting to hear. Not least because Steam hosts your multiplayer sessions for any game now, so it could potentially be very seamless. There is so much potential here! I hope they work hard on their voice chat feature too, and get everything right from the start. And finally, Linux, using Vulcan I assume!

me_me_me 5y ago
This is very complicated and interconnected market segment. You cant just play games on this device out of the box (some games yes) you need some game devs to adopt it and have releases on this yet another platform. Valve would have to have a dedicated support team and long term strategy for it to become a switch rival. And with Valve track record it will be an abandonware from the get go.
- croon 5y ago
  What support is needed outside of controller support and whatever OS it runs (I'm assuming linux)?
  - viraptor 5y ago
    And Steam have been collecting that data for a while now - each game is tagged with no/partial/full controller support. They know what will work OOTB.
  - me_me_me 5y ago
    They need to secure games on it. Even if this console ends up being PC in small form factor. I dont have switch but if i were to buy a console it would be switch, not steam console. I can play my games on PC, if i get console I'd rather have games made specifically for that form factor, plus Nintendo has amazing catalogue of exclusives. If you judge Valves actins in response to Epic agresively taking their already entrenched market - basically nothing. What chance do they have to compete with Nintendo, or mobiles? I might come across negative, but Valve doesn't make it easier.
    - croon 5y ago
      I understand getting a Switch for the exclusives, but outside of that I wouldn't get a portable console for access to games I couldn't play otherwise, but access to games outside of the normal environment (my desktop PC). If you look at the metacritic list of best games for Switch: https://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/switch/filtered https://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/... Most games are just ported PC games, which would be playable on a Steam portable console (assuming they're available on linux).
      - me_me_me 5y ago
        Most games are made for consoles first, rarely other way around. Anyhow, you can play on your screen with docked switch. You can play on your couch with steam link, or pc hooked up to tv. I am just not seeing a competitive edge for this device.
        croon 5y ago
        > Most games are made for consoles first, rarely other way around. Except in the actual case I mentioned with the list, where almost all of the cross-platform ones are made for PC first, from Divinity to Hades to Undertale to Inside, Steamworld, Shovel Knight, Hollow Knight, Ori, Bastion, Dead Cells, Into the Breach, Fez, etc etc etc. Seeing how basically all games that aren't first party or specific exclusives are lighter (hardware wise) PC games actually speaks to a huge market for those games on a portable device. > Anyhow, you can play on your screen with docked switch. You can play on your couch with steam link, or pc hooked up to tv. Playing on the couch would be competing with Xbox and Playstation, not Switch, which as you said is already a solved problem. This would be for anywhere you play your Switch undocked, and you don't want a Switch for whatever reason (likely more indies, emulators, "apps").
        me_me_me 5y ago
        > This would be for anywhere you play your Switch undocked, and you don't want a Switch for whatever reason (likely more indies, emulators, "apps"). And now we came the full circle. Back to the original point. I don't believe Valve is capable of competition at this point. I would require serious people and money effort to create this 'whatever reason'. Because I gave you a big one for Switch and I don't see one for Valve (obscure small indie games that don't get ported to Switch is hardly a selling point).
  - imtringued 5y ago
    People buy consoles because they expect a perfect out of the box experience. If you try to play a GPU intensive 3D shooter on the handheld the performance or graphical quality will be terrible. The game must support full screen and the UI shouldn't be too small to become unusable on a small screen.

libertine 5y ago

I wonder who will be the target for these devices, because a great part of portable consoles strategy was: to be a gateway for kids to buy into the "big-boy" consoles down the line. Basically win their hearts and trust early, so they can become loyal throughout their life. So these devices had to check some boxes, one of the main factors being the price. These devices had to be cheaper then regular consoles (among other things) - though they shared the same kind of price strategy between each other: sell almost as cost (or at loss in case of the PS3), to make up later with game sales. Nintendo blurred that line into one device with the Switch, but they still check the box of the device being affordable. With that said, there were already some approaches to Nintendo Switch like hardware for the PC market, some with waaaay better performance then the switch (with both intel or AMD socs), yet they are failing in what I believe is crucial for these devices: price. They are expensive. I'm not saying they aren't wonderful pieces of engineering, but clearly they aren't meant to even compete on the same level. They can't sell at cost/loss, because they can't make it up with licensing or their own IP, so they have to make money on the hardware itself. Therefore I always assume these devices are for a very particular small set of gaming enthusiasts who are found of the idea of playing PC games on the go (even with limited battery life), and are willing to pay more then a full fledged console for this experience. I'm curious to see how Valve will tackle this, or if they are fine with that (which they seemed to be in other hardware releases).

txdv 5y ago
Slap steam on it and take the Steam cut?
- libertine 5y ago
  That's the tricky part, if these devices aren't locked to a proprietary OS/marketplace, users can shop around and you're basically helping your competitors while taking all the losses.
  - easton 5y ago
    If it's running SteamOS (and it will be, even if there's Windows compatibility Valve probably doesn't want to pay for licenses), it might as well be locked to Steam for 90% of people. Epic's launcher doesn't have a Linux version (since they've claimed as have many other developers that the Linux community is 1% of users and 90% of complaints due to distro differences), nor does EA, Ubisoft, etc. They could port it, but by time they had something user friendly and working (which may be difficult since you probably won't get more than Steam Big Picture which doesn't have support for installing non-Steam applications at the moment) Valve would've sold a boatload of these and a bunch of Steam games. Edit: not to mention anti-cheat, which is a whole other kettle of fish when you have to integrate into a entirely other kernel with different plumbing. Valve's anti-cheat doesn't rely on kernel modules or a ton of client side software at all, so they have a cross-platform advantage there too.

Ziomislaw 5y ago

Making a PC like console might backfire. PC games are full of botters and cheaters (not saying you can't cheat on console, but I see 1-2 cheaters in a year on console compared to 50% of PC games population). It's the main reason I play games on console only.

viraptor 5y ago
Not everyone is into multiplayer games. There's a lot of single player market available.
- morsch 5y ago
  And non competitive multiplayer. And multiplayer within a group of friends.
jamesgeck0 5y ago
“50% of the population is cheating in PC multiplayer games” is wild. Can you cite a source for this absurd claim?

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Frenchgeek 5y ago

Sounds like the Aya Neo...

ToniCipriani 5y ago
If only it also had a Thunderbolt for an eGPU.

Ekaros 5y ago

Seems like I finally found some use for my CS:GO junk and selling them... Might as well pick up reasonable device for some mobile use. It probably supports bluetooth stuff and steam controller, so shouldn't be too horrible experience.

ToniCipriani 5y ago

Seeing how there is now the Aya Neo and the Onenotebook Onexplayer, this might actually work. Have a handheld with a powerful enough laptop chip and a Thunderbolt, when at home it sits in an eGPU dock and use it like a traditional desktop, and on the go either connect the game controllers or a keyboard to use as a laptop.

ArkanExplorer 5y ago

A portable gaming PC means optimization - in terms of performance and interface - is going to be critically important. But knowing Valve, they will keep the same old exorbitant 30% commission which makes it uneconomical to actually launch great titles targeted at this device, same as for the Index VR device. By the way, on Switch the effective commission is 25%, given that customers are rebated 5% of their eshop spend. Nintendo also bothers to apply curation and quality control to their store, which Steam does not.

awakeasleep 5y ago
Good analysis, but you harm your credibility by saying Nintendo curates eshop titles. This is only technically true, and no layperson would be able to tell. 99% of the eshop is ports of shovelware android ‘games’ that consist of little more than cover art.
- ArkanExplorer 5y ago
  I have two titles on Switch and Steam. What you are saying is incorrect. The process to get approved and launch on Switch is substantially more difficult than Steam, and the quality of titles is as a result much higher. Because of the lack of curation and quality control, I make a lot more revenue for the same product on Switch than on Steam.

kogepathic 5y ago

Valve's track record with non-VR hardware is, to put it politely, not good. Seven years after launching the Steam machine (2014) initiative, there are no Steam machines available for sale. [1] Both the Steam Controller (2015-2019) and Steam Link (2015-2018) are discontinued and cannot be purchased, despite consistently positive reviews from users. [2] As other commenters have noted there are already numerous "Switch-like, but x86" products that exist, and it's unclear to me what innovation Valve can bring to the space. IMHO if Valve wants to be taken seriously in the hardware market, they need to stop pulling a Google and actually support/iterate/not discontinue their existing hardware products (before someone adds that they did support these through firmware updates, I mean updating the hardware to keep up with the times, Steam Link with apps or 4K, etc). [1] https://store.steampowered.com/sale/steam_machines https://store.steampowered.com/sale/steam_machines [2] https://store.steampowered.com/search/?category1=993 https://store.steampowered.com/search/?category1=993

schmorptron 5y ago
That being said, they did support both the Steam Controller and Link for a very long time, and the Steam Controller continues to be used by many (The configurator and services for sharing the configurations work all the same today). Steam Link has mostly been replaced by software solutions like an Android App, or it being straight up built into some TVs.
- chimpansteve 5y ago
  I've got a hardware Link - it's still being supported now. It had an update a couple of weeks ago.
  - alias_neo 5y ago
    Yes, but I've had 4K monitors and 4K TV for almost as long as the Link has existed. It very quickly became useless to me the moment I upgraded to a 4K TV. The Steam controller is also an utterly horrible UX so the pair were just a waste of money that sat in a drawer until I stuck them on eBay. A 4K Steam Link should have been an obvious iteration, and a controller with actual buttons and sticks (I half-joke about the controller, I know some love its touch nature, I just hated it, could never keep my thumbs in the right spot).

SirLotsaLocks 5y ago

A lot of consoles are sold at a loss, where costs are made up by people buying games through the console on the makers store, I wonder how valve will go about this because I don't see a lot of people getting this that didn't already have steam on another device.

moron4hire 5y ago
It also really doesn't seem like they have anyone with the skills in their wheelhouse to do good by this. A big part of differentiating a console from a PC is building an operating system that prioritizes the game process uber alles. It's not just a fancy window manager slapped onto a commodity PC. Even the original Xbox had a lot of custom OS work done to it, stuff that would eventually serve as the test bed for developments in DirectX. Does Valve even have any operating system developers? I thought their core dev body was mainly focused on screwing modders and getting kids addicted to slot machines.
- majewsky 5y ago
  They are doing a lot of work on Wine as part of Steam Proton (the Wine distribution built into the Linux version of Steam), so I'd imagine they have at least some of this type of developer on staff.
majewsky 5y ago
> A lot of consoles are sold at a loss I don't believe that's the case anymore. Newer console generations have moved on from exotic ISAs and the like towards using a lot of off-the-shelf parts for smartphones or PCs. The Switch, for instance, has been sold at a profit from day one [1]. [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20170131084504/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-31/nintendo-beats-profit-lifts-forecast-on-pokemon-ahead-of-switch https://web.archive.org/web/20170131084504/https://www.bloom...
- lights0123 5y ago
  The Switch also has very little power compared to gaming consoles. It's the same price as an Xbox One S, but with far less processing power.

wpdev_63 5y ago

Just picked up the new macbook air m1 and I am staggered to find that I can play starcraft 2 and bioshock decently on a laptop that draws 30watts and is capacitivily cooled... Really just unbelievable. So if valve could someone get ahold of some cutting edge arm processors in the next few years then this could be very viable(though I doubt they will get it out before the next version of the nintendo switch).

schmorptron 5y ago
Valve has money, but not Apple or Microsoft money. I doubt they'd be able to source a high-power arm chip + the necessary hard/software features to make something like the rosetta compatibility mode possible.
- wpdev_63 5y ago
  Not necessarily right now but a few years down the road when it actually releases(though no one knows when they'll actually release knowing valve's track record). Not sure why people are downvoting me....
  - schmorptron 5y ago
    According to the article they are shooting for a late 2021 release date if nothing goes wrong. Fingers crossed they'll say more at E3, which they're attending this year. Not sure why people are downvoting you either though.

est 5y ago

I am surprised nobody mentioned GPD yet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNfbfPhOiE0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNfbfPhOiE0

CivBase 5y ago
There is also the Aya Neo[0], the One Xplayer[1], and even the (now quite old) Razer Edge[2]. [0] https://www.ayaneo.com/aya-neo https://www.ayaneo.com/aya-neo [1] https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/onexplayer-best-performing-handheld-game-console https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/onexplayer-best-performin... [2] https://www2.razer.com/gaming-systems/razer-edge https://www2.razer.com/gaming-systems/razer-edge

fotad 5y ago

Why not making a phone and enter mobile market?

swiley 5y ago
Phone manufacturers are all just selling tweaked Qualcomm reference designs. Unless you want to go the route Pine64 or purism are going or have the resources to build your own SoC like Apple or Nvidia did you will have no control over the device. This is why even high end Android phones have such short support periods.

ibaikov 5y ago

They have tried to make a tabletop console thing for l4d where 4 players play l4d as usual and the 5th player would spawn zombies or items on them. I suppose this console is related to that

fanatic2pope 5y ago

I personally really like the idea. I'd love to be able to casually play PC games on the road without having to drag a laptop around. Of course unless it has something particularly appealing, it will have to be priced around the switch/lite level.

mastrsushi 5y ago

What IP does Valve own that could run on a portable device? Do they think people want to play Portal 2 on the go? As if indie developers want to put resources into porting their content on some niche handheld. Valve has really lost the plot. They don't have any assurance in hardware. Steam, while successful, isn't the only contender on PC gaming. It's not 2007 anymore, there's Epic Games, Origin, and I'm sure a bunch of other platforms all hosting a small set of popular titles. They're out of touch, which is sort of ironic given the company was founded by ex-Microsoft employees in the 90's. They went from a Game Development Studio into one of many Game distributors. They're better off sticking with that, or at the most, pushing their platform onto the Switch. Get with the times.

icegreentea2 5y ago
Depends on their model... but a very large selection of PC games already ship with gamepad support (I mean, a huge selection of PC games already run on other consoles for example). I mean, that's really it. If you have gamepad support and can run acceptably on the hardware, then you're good to go - basically no extra dev required.
- mastrsushi 5y ago
  The device will run on Linux, depending on the existing title, that might not be a breeze. Not to mention the optimizations developers will have to make to scale their games down to run on this thing.

jakearmitage 5y ago

So... basically GPD Win? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPD_Win_3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPD_Win_3

peanut_worm 5y ago

I worry that it would get abandoned rather quickly given how Valve has released hardware in the past.

Hamuko 5y ago
What about the HTC Vive and the Valve Index?
- peanut_worm 5y ago
  I suppose their VR hardware would be the exception. SteamOS, Steam Machines and their controller all got abandoned even though they all seemed like pretty good ideas.
  - jamesgeck0 5y ago
    Those are still getting software updates even though they aren’t on the market anymore. Additionally, they spawned the “Big Picture” mode, an absurdly robust controller mapping feature, and a Wine variant that benefits all Linux gamers. Every time Valve makes a hardware product, Steam gets some new killer feature.

bob1029 5y ago

Why did Valve get out of the AAA game development business? It seems like hardware has largely been a mistake for them. Sure, I can have 20 different variants of an x86 computer and various HMD interfaces, but if all the games suck ass what's the point? Valve is still surfing on the inertia of their initial software-based innovations, and is only continuing to cruise along by siphoning off others in their (lightly) curated market. How much money is sitting in the coffers at Valve Software? What practical force prevents leadership from allocating just 1% of that pile of cash to something like TF3? It almost feels like we are being intentionally suffocated by our entertainment industry these days. It's the exact same story at Blizzard/Activision, EA, etc., but at least in those cases you can blame the publicly-traded aspect of the organizations.

schmorptron 5y ago
Artifact was a good card game only killed by really dumb marketing and monetization decisions. Half-Life Alyx is almost universally hailed as the best VR game and as good if not better than the previous Half-Life games. That being said, you're right about them neglecting a lot of their IP. Specifically a TF3 might be really cool to see, along with more love for Counter-Strike.
- Sleepytime 5y ago
  Alyx is fun to play but the jokes and dialog are really bad. Previous half life games did a lot more with a lot less.
- anthonypasq 5y ago
  Artifact was just straight up a trash game. I hate this new idea that every failed game is just "bad marketing"
  - ThatMedicIsASpy 5y ago
    I would argue that games lasting 30-60min was an issue as well (for a 1v1 card game)
- 5y ago

egypturnash 5y ago

Honestly at this point I kinda feel like Valve is to the Steam store what Google is to search/ads. I do not trust either of them to follow through with any amount of support for any project they announce outside of the massive money spigot that is their core business.

schmorptron 5y ago

AMD recently patented their DLSS competitor (albeit with a really dumb name, "Radeon Gaming Super Resolution").[1] If this launches on RDNA2 as rumored, it could be very interesting to see it maybe having a 1080p screen and just upscaling a 720p rendered image to that native resolution to save on computing power. [1]https://www.techradar.com/news/amd-patents-gaming-super-resolution-to-take-on-nvidia-dlss https://www.techradar.com/news/amd-patents-gaming-super-reso...