Who would have thought everyone uses valve mostly because they have no other choice. :shrugs:

*I edited this post to be much less negative. :P

The Steam machine bombed, and I kinda figured it would, but that Steam Controller is doing well, and I'm thinking about getting one myself.

Not too surprising imo, it's hard to pinpoint a market it targets.

As for SteamOS, I don't see a reason why I'd replace Windows for it, it just limits my options. Might've used it on a Steam machine I guess but, no need for that.

The walled garden thing though, I find it too early to be saying 'that never happened'. Microsoft isn't even done getting people to cross over to Windows 10 yet. Once the 'Upgrade for free' period ends, that's when I would expect changes and possible limitations to start trickling into Windows 10 (or horrible advertising or whatever they have planned)

If I had a living room I might have considered a Steam Controller since it does appear to be quite useful, but as it is I'm always behind a PC anyway

In a nutshell they're licensed mini-PCs running SteamOS in Big Picture Mode so that you can hook them up to your TV like a console and play your Steam games on the couch.

However there are several fundamental flaws:
– essentially being PCs they come with a wide variety of hardware setups and a decent one costs about as much as an actual PC.
– SteamOS being a Linux distro severely limits the number of games you can actually play with it.
– there many ways to play your games on your big TV screen which are much cheaper and not limited to Linux games. One of them being Steam's own In-Home Streaming capability.

In other words, how anyone at Valve thought that this concept would work beggars belief.

LOLOL

Trying to compare this to a PS4 or any other console is the first problem. The idea might be to use them like consoles but they most certainly AREN'T consoles. The console big boys all have well established exclusive franchises. Even if nothing third party was ever released on them they would still sell millions of units. Anybody else trying to introduce anything new in that kind of market is going to have a long hard road ahead of them.

The only way Microsoft was able to break into the market with the first Xbox was by losing billions and billions of dollars. Between the costs of development, the costs of deploying everything for Xbox Live, buying developers and paying them to make games, a ton of expensive advertising, and seliing the hardware at a loss they dug and absolute moneypit. They didn't make up the costs of the Xbox until several years after the 360 came out.

Most companies wouldn't ever consider that sort of strategy let alone be able to finance it. Valve isn't exactly strapped for cash but they aren't stupid enough to blow billions on a product launch in hope of having it be profitable 10 years later. They makes games and they run a content delivery platform/store. They don't have a big money vault to swim in with decades of profits from defacto lock ins with vendors.

You can ask pretty much anybody if they know about Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo and what they make and they will immediately be able to answer. They might be fuzzy about the details or not have a clue as to the extent of what each of those companies has their hand in, but they at least know of them and have some idea. If you ask anybody who isn't a PC gamer who Valve is they are probably going to make a guess related to plumbing supplies. They simply don't have that kind of huge brand recognition.

They have a little under 170 million registered accounts but that doesn't necessarily mean anything since accounts are free and for some reason some people like having multiple accounts. For the last 2 weeks they had a bit under 34 million users logged in doing something. Again, that counts people with accounts with nothing paid for on them, but at least it is somebody who knows about them. But if you compare it to consoles things start to fall apart. Sony has Sold over 40 million of the PS 4.

And again, it comes down to throwing around money. I never saw a Steam Machine advertised anywhere. That doesn't mean they weren't, but I never saw any of the ads. I never saw one on demo anywhere. You can walk into even a Walmart and find of a demo unit for a PS4. But guess what? Walmart also had Steam Machines stocked. But nobody knew what they were. There wasn't even anything on or next to the case they were in with even a quick blurb. I don't think even the employees knew anything about them.

In other words, the only people who know anything about Steam Machines are people who follow tech and PC gaming news sites and thus probably already had a PC to play games on. And that is exactly what these things are, PCs meant to hook up to a TV. Take that into consideration and while the numbers don't seem like anything to crow about they aren't a complete failure.

Once upon a time Apple tried to release a game system that ran MacOS. They managed to sell less than 50K worldwide in 2 years. The Amiga CD32 only sold around 100K total. The TurboGrafx-16 sold 10 million worldwide in 7 years and was considered a success given that it was competing against the SNES that sold over 49 million in 9 years.

So when you get down to it, 500K in the first year with little to no advertising and the majority of your potential customer base already having a machine to play the same games on is nothing to sneeze at. If they could figure out how to effectively advertise and set up demos it would make a huge difference. But then there is the other major problem.

Stores that know about it don't really want these things to be successful, especially Gamestop. Plaeny of PC games still have retail boxed copies available. But you will have a hard time finding them at Gamestop. Most of their profits come from acting as a pawn shop and selling used items. Once games started having activation keys and online activations they couldn't sell used copies so they have mostly stopped selling anything for PCs at all. A console/computer where not only can they not sell you used games but all the new copies are sold online giving them no money, that is their worst nightmare. Most other stores are going to have the same attitude. They make a lot of money selling games, hint books, etc...

If Valve wants to make these things successful in stores they need boxed games on shelves even though that is exactly the opposite of what they have been doing. Make premium or deluxe versions of games with publishers. Have a game box be nothing more than a compact slip case with a Steam redemption code and a manual. Then the Deluxe version be a more traditional style box with a little bit of goodies the way IndieBox is doing things.

Offer store exclusive costume DLC codes if you buy a game at a certain store and other nonsense like that the way console game have been doing for years. Different physical goods at different merchants or limited releases to encourage preorders. Game related figurines and stickers to display near the game for people to pick up while waiting in line. And the most important part to go with all this. An actual display case at the store where people can at least watch a demo reel of various games and preferably play at least demo version of some of them. A display case where they can look in and see all these games. And then they see a sign saying all these games are available and hundreds more. Something that makes people notice it rather than just another electronics box on a shelf.

The only walled garden on Windows 10 is the MicroSoft Windows Store with UWP.

You can still run gog.com or Steam to purchase the PC versions of video games from those digital distribution retailer stores.

You can also develop PC versions of video games using DirectX 12 to not need to use UWP and sell those video games on gog.com and on Steam.

I'm never going to purchase anything from the MicroSoft Windows Store. If MicroSoft releases PC versions of video games exclusively to sell on their Windows Store I will make a wishlist in the video games wishlist section in hopes that MicroSoft will one day release their video games for sale on gog.com.

For the shortest answer I will just tell you I'm putting my money where my mouth is and that is investing exclusively on gog.com.

I also hope Electronic Arts (EA) releases more of their exclusive video games for sale on gog.com as well.

They're right here:
http://store.steampowered.com/sale/machines/

The Steam machine was Doomed early on.

VALVe well and truly shafted the companies that actually made Steam machines.

Firstly they delayed the SteamMachine release at the last minute, by which time companies that where going to sell the machines had already invested time and money into small custom cases. Some (mostly Alienware) where able to recoup some of that with windows based machines.

Then just as the where about to official release Steam machines, VALVe introduced the SteamLink.

Think about this.

The primary audience for the SteamMachine were cash rich PC played unable or unwilling to lug their existing rig into the living room. So VALVe created a solution (The SteamMachine) which cost £600+.

But just as SteamMachine makers were about to sell these expensive PC-console hybrids, VALVe release the Steam Link. A Sub £100 bit of kit which allowed user to use their existing killer rigs on the big screen.



Given we're talking 1/2 million Steam controllers, I'd say a fair number of them where bought either controller only or with the SteamLink. I wouldn't be surprised if the actual number of SteamMachines sold was less than the 100'000 Nintendo VR Gloves.

Sold like a lound noise?
Odd.

I won't go that far. I'll treat it like most platforms. I'll buy a game if I really really want to play it, and it's exclusive to them, because in the end, it's about getting to play the games for me. Any games I can get elsewhere I'll buy elsewhere. I've seen no reason to buy a game on the Windows Store over anywhere else and several reasons why I shouldn't.

and as for walled garden.

I shall save you from this Evil walled garden by creating this other Garden. No they're not walls over there, its an impenetrable force field. Much cooler than walls, look it pulsates with energy. And you see those laser turrets? Those blast you to nonexistence when your try to play two different games at the same time.

Ah, I see. Thanks for explaining.

I bought Rise Of the TombRaider via the windows Store. Personally I'd like to have known about the limitaions of UWP apps before hand.

But I would have bought it either way. At least I have an alternative to Steam for some AAA games.