Comment by glenstein
3 days ago
It truly is, and it's the culmination of a long history of development to get to this point. Back in, I want to say 2016 or so, we had Steam Machines, which were a series of hardware partnerships with various vendors for a console-style form factor of essentially PC hardware running on the first version of Steam OS.
It was an incredible idea, but at the time rather frustratingly, I think some people came down with what I like to call The Verge Syndrome, which is to judge things on whether or not they're an overnight success, and otherwise deemed failures. So, according to some people, the fact that there were fewer Steam Machines than PlayStations in the world meant that the project as a whole was a failure.
And so the Steam Machine was not successful (by that metric at least), but it got the ball rolling on increasing sophistication in developing the Linux ecosystem and the understanding of hardware that culminated in the Steam Deck, which is a triumphant rebalancing of the PC gaming universe, away from dependence on Windows. But try telling that to someone in 2016.
I'm happy to sing the praises of Valve, but I think a particular distinguishing virtue they're holding on to is being willing to play the long game and not giving up in the absence of overnight success.
The Deck is so transformative that if Microsoft were serious about XBOX at all, the next XBOX would be a handheld.
> The Deck is so transformative that if Microsoft were serious about XBOX at all, the next XBOX would be a handheld.
Or they’d realize that the Deck is successful because it’s open and bring Steam to the Xbox.
I think they're too hung up on GAME PASS [1] to do so, on the other hand, GAME PASS might be more fun if you could use it on a portable.
[1] Personally I remember how bundling ruined the brands of Cable TV which makes GAME PASS seem like a disaster to me, but objectively, the Cable TV ecosystem resisted change for 30 years and only really broke when Tubi came along, so maybe they'd be happy to be the new cable.
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Far more likely they'll fully support GamePass/Xbox on SteamOS
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And kill Steam Deck just like they did with Netbooks, why get Proton translation of the real XBox experience.
Gamers that reach out to handelds in Nintendo Switch numbers don't care about what OS their consoles use, and won't be buying Steack Decks "because Linux!".
They might not care which OS their consoles use but they probably care about whether their games cost $10 (Steam/PC on very frequent sales) or $80 (Switch 2), and whether they need to buy all of their games again with every generation.
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The next Xbox is a handheld.
There are rumors about an Xbox handheld https://www.pcworld.com/article/2656008/leak-more-evidence-o...
Valve should acquire Framework and have them do Steam Machine 2.0.
I'd much rather a partnership than an acquisition. Valve is great, but open, repairable hardware is not their core mission. I think Framework needs to stay independent to maintain that.
But also, Valve is doing a decent job of it on their own already, with the steamdeck being quite repairable and upgradeable, especially in comparison to the competition. I'd rather there be a greater number of companies all independently demonstrating that repairable hardware can be a commercial success rather than the market takeaway being "oh that's just that weird Framework thing, it won't work for us".
Please no, all due props to Valve but they really can't count to 3.
Tends to be a lot of Holy Grail fans at Valve one would surmise.
I love the idea in one sense, which is that I think they're two great companies working in areas that could plausibly converge and be quite complementary. I do have to imagine there's something about their different respective business missions or business cultures, and the ethos and philosophies that inform them that might not make it work in practice. Although I definitely see a place for a framework laptop that's happy to run SteamOS.
I think perhaps that's the goal is that there's any number of companies that we feel are pretty great that are phenomenal at serving a specific vision of gaming and computing that's oriented around Linux and that are quite happy to talk to each other in effective ways and so I wouldn't necessarily say that the culmination of that should be a merger between those companies but an ecosystem that thrives with deeply compatible hardware and software.
The Framework Desktop is what you would want for a Steam Machine 2.0. But the price is around $1,186 and I think that price is too high for a game console. As a PlayStation 5 Pro is $700. Maybe they could reach that price with a second-gen chip? Or when they introduce a new chip and this machine gets discounted.
I do think Linux-based experience for a TV based game console is still lacklustre. There are rumours that Valve integrating either Google TV/Chrome OS. And it would be nice for a game console to also be used as a media center for Netflix and others.
>So, according to some people, the fact that there were fewer Steam Machines than PlayStations in the world meant that the project as a whole was a failure.
I mean, there's no metric short nor long term where we call the steam machines a success. It was an experiment and some neat tech (hardware and software) came out of it. Valve is still a business at the end of the day.
But yes, a business that can salvage the good and iterate is apparently 1000x better than what we get nowadays in this late stage capitalism, where something sells millions and the company still cuts back and lays off staff, while milking it to the ground.
>a particular distinguishing virtue they're holding on to is being willing to play the long game and not giving up in the absence of overnight success.
Gabe learned it straight from old school Microsoft. I don't know what happened to Microsoft in that time.
Breaking the seal and demonstrating the capabilities, and getting it into the hands of consumers set the conditions for the Steam Deck's success. The Steam Deck exists because the Steam Machine existed, and it's in this context that the Steam Machine succeeded. You don't need overnight instant success for the program itself to succeed.
Dark souls exists because Demons Soul existed. But if you ask Sony or even FromSoft, they'd never say Demons Soul was a success. It just didn't bomb so dosasteroisly as to prematurely cancel an entire sub-genre.
You can have disappointments and even failures while Also admitting they lead to successes by not giving up. That was all I was saying.
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