Valve announces operating system Steam OS
After some teasing, Valve has finally announced yet another piece of its living room takeover — Steam OS. Steam OS is a living room UI that is clearly the spiritual (and more sophisticated successor) to the company’s Big Picture product. Released last year, Big Picture allows any Steam user to play their games on a television with an enhanced UI and controller compatibility.
A big feature of Steam OS is its in-home streaming, which utilizes a home network to run games located on any computer to the TV. Valve has also confirmed the presence of Family Sharing. Announced earlier this month, Family Sharing allows users to share their owned games with friends and family digitally, through the cloud. There will likely be media partnerships for both music and video in the coming months.
It’s been a long time coming, but Steam OS is the first taste of Valve’s efforts to bring the PC experience to the living room. While it’s not yet clear what the next two pieces of puzzle will be until later this week (the next announcement is slated for Wednesday), it’s a good start.
The dividing line between PC and console gamers has only gotten thicker over time, especially as independent developers have found much greater success selling their products on Steam than a proprietary console platform like Xbox Live Arcade or PlayStation Marketplace. Steam OS will give those developers the opportunity to create a console experience for their games without the difficulty of working with multiple platforms.
It’s a great first step for Valve, but the additional hardware announcements will likely fill in the details of how the company envisions its place in the console world alongside Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo.
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Needless change? If Nintendo said that in 1984, we would not be here talking about games. Maybe we should still be playing FPS games with just a keyboard alone, nothing like playing a 3d world with up/down keys.

New experiences in gaming is always needed, how else do we ever evolve from just sitting there at a desk with multiple peripherals just to perform the most basic virtual tasks. How else do we get PC gamers to talk using headsets like they do on xbox? How else do we move away from a lonely desk into the living room?....change, that's how.
I have been tiring of manually doing everything on PC, from sharing vids to downloading individual drivers to countless tweaks..etc. Push of a button like on consoles is refreshing but the benefits of mods..etc for PC's does make SteamOS enticing even though I'll personally be moved to PS4 by then most likely.
Hate to tell you but eventually the rest of the world will move on farther away from PC gamers as time goes on as consoles introduce more and more new experiences and ways to play and interact with games. We need more companies like Valve to evolve as well....and they are not forcing you to throw away your kb anyway but if you continue in the comfort zone, you will eventually hate everything cause stuff like WIndows 8 is never going back to 7 and that goes for everything else as well.
Senior Member
Posts: 11835
Joined: 2011-12-31
I'm surprised at all the hate they're receiving just for a game which people will end up hating on because it won't live up to a decade's worth of expectations! Bring it on Valve! I'm very curious to see what they've got

People did say they were crazy for TF2 becoming F2p and look how that turned out

Senior Member
Posts: 22075
Joined: 2008-07-14
Needless change? If Nintendo said that in 1984, we would not be here talking about games. Maybe we should still be playing FPS games with just a keyboard alone, nothing like playing a 3d world with up/down keys.

New experiences in gaming is always needed, how else do we ever evolve from just sitting there at a desk with multiple peripherals just to perform the most basic virtual tasks. How else do we get PC gamers to talk using headsets like they do on xbox? How else do we move away from a lonely desk into the living room?....change, that's how.
I have been tiring of manually doing everything on PC, from sharing vids to downloading individual drivers to countless tweaks..etc. Push of a button like on consoles is refreshing but the benefits of mods..etc for PC's does make SteamOS enticing even though I'll personally be moved to PS4 by then most likely.
Hate to tell you but eventually the rest of the world will move on farther away from PC gamers as time goes on as consoles introduce more and more new experiences and ways to play and interact with games. We need more companies like Valve to evolve as well....and they are not forcing you to throw away your kb anyway but if you continue in the comfort zone, you will eventually hate everything cause stuff like WIndows 8 is never going back to 7 and that goes for everything else as well.
You're right, new experiences are needed. These days, every game is nothing but a rehash of previously released games. There's really nothing new coming out. It's all been done before and redone multiple times.
My first issue with SteamOS is the fact that they took the "walled garden" approach and the only way to buy games, is through Valve....which is among the things people were raging over with Windows8 (being forced to buy all software through the Windows Marketplace, even though that was never going to be the case). Why is it that it's perfectly fine for Valve to do it with SteamOS?
My second issue is that they're presenting this as being for Gaming and Entertainment. Well, they've gimped it as far as entertainment is concerned. You'll be stuck using only the st.reaming service(s) that Valve wants you to use, unless of course you "hack" the OS yourself and add browser support back to it. Valve has taken a historically open platform (Linux) and turned it into a "walled garden" controlled solely by Valve/Steam. Unless you own a Windows or OSX based PC, your game choices will be very limited....so this can't even act as a console or desktop replacement. I might be more inclined to support the idea....if Valve hadn't gone about things in the manor they have. It would really make more sense to me to download Ubuntu, OpenSuSE, Fedora, Mandriva, etc...do a custom install. At least then you're not being controlled by a company who's only real goal is to monetize your entertainment even more than it already has been.
Other than those 2 issues, change and choice is good imho....
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Needless change? If Nintendo said that in 1984, we would not be here talking about games. Maybe we should still be playing FPS games with just a keyboard alone, nothing like playing a 3d world with up/down keys.

New experiences in gaming is always needed, how else do we ever evolve from just sitting there at a desk with multiple peripherals just to perform the most basic virtual tasks. How else do we get PC gamers to talk using headsets like they do on xbox? How else do we move away from a lonely desk into the living room?....change, that's how.
I have been tiring of manually doing everything on PC, from sharing vids to downloading individual drivers to countless tweaks..etc. Push of a button like on consoles is refreshing but the benefits of mods..etc for PC's does make SteamOS enticing even though I'll personally be moved to PS4 by then most likely.
Hate to tell you but eventually the rest of the world will move on farther away from PC gamers as time goes on as consoles introduce more and more new experiences and ways to play and interact with games. We need more companies like Valve to evolve as well....and they are not forcing you to throw away your kb anyway but if you continue in the comfort zone, you will eventually hate everything cause stuff like WIndows 8 is never going back to 7 and that goes for everything else as well.
It's funny because I already play console games and use Windows 8. What Valve is doing here is the very definition of unnecessary change, because..
You're right, new experiences are needed. These days, every game is nothing but a rehash of previously released games. There's really nothing new coming out. It's all been done before and redone multiple times.
My first issue with SteamOS is the fact that the only way to buy games, is through Valve....which is among the things people were raging over with Windows8 (even though that was never going to be the case).
My second issue is that they're presenting this as being for Gaming and Entertainment. Well, they've gimped it as far as entertainment is concerned. You'll be stuck using only the st.reaming service(s) that Valve wants you to use, unless of course you "hack" the OS yourself and add browser support back to it. Valve has taken a historically open platform (Linux) and turned it into a "walled garden" controlled solely by Valve/Steam. Unless you own a Windows or OSX based PC, your game choices will be very limited....so this can't even act as a console or desktop replacement. I might be more inclined to support the idea....if Valve hadn't gone about things in the manor they have. It would really make more sense to me to download Ubuntu, OpenSuSE, Fedora, Mandriva, etc...do a custom install. At least then you're not being controlled by a company who's only real goal is to monetize your entertainment even more than it already has been.
Other than those 2 issues, change and choice is good imho....
This is basically spot on. Valve is using their muscle to create their own walled garden, in response to Microsoft doing it.
Gaming is fragmented enough already, this is just going to add to the platform bias that's already stupidly common. I can see it already, new Valve games being SteamOS exclusive. Because how else are they going to get people to migrate? And having to have a dual boot with SteamOS is worse than EA games being Origin only.
I'm far more excited for the prospects of Mantle than the idea of SteamOS.
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Joined: 2006-10-14
I hope it all succeeds just to piss you guys off. You guys could stand to get out of your comfort zone for once. That Windows PC pacifier you all been suckling on has left some of you too stuck in your old grandpa ways to try new things and experiences. I'm just saying it would be very sad if a potentially great gaming experience goes unnoticed due to the time it takes to get accustomed and comfortable with it all because of pure stubbornness like a kid who says he hates a veggie before ever tasting it.
I remember when the original NES gamepad was a vast difference to the joystick. No one new what the D pad was about or how it could function until we actually tried it. A lot of that early stuff was very new and strange but now that is mostly forgotten as even the oldest of us takes it for granted.
Naturally most young kids would very quickly adapt to Valves new offerings as they have never settled to specific comfort zones yet and I'm certainly the few older gamers not afraid to try new things as I know it's possible to adapt to anything...it's all about making and breaking the comfort zones.
This.
Also how can you guys call Valve arrogant?! Isn't it arrogant of you guys to say that it will undoubtably fail in the first place?