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Geek Culture / Steam Operating System Announced!

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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 24th Sep 2013 00:22
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http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamOS/

In a continuation of Valve's steady waltz into the Living Room, they've announced the SteamOS that's been long teased to be the core of their "Steam Box" demographic.

It's an interesting development on their part, and shows them really doubling down on GabeN's...umm, intense dislike of Windows 8 and beyond.

Details are naturally a bit scarce at times, but it's free, it's Linux-based, and it's seemingly still aiming for a standardised console OS for the PC platform

I wonder how much market share this could pull from Microsoft, actually, if most Steam users opt to switch. Or consoles, though far less noticeable, I've noticed a lot of disillusioned gamers deciding to opt out or get a PC after the PS4 and XB1 faceoff.

I mean, most importantly - your back catalogue will be safe. There's no details on how it'll handle non-Linux games atm, but I imagine Valve will be putting a lot more effort into that a lot more publicly.

One to watch, I think. Valve have been talking of retaining the modding, content creation and other hijinks that PC gamers find so rewarding. That on a console platform in a compelling format could really carve a place for itself.
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Blobby 101
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Posted: 24th Sep 2013 00:49
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Could be an interesting move, I'll wait to see how it turns out before jumping on any bandwagons though.

I've thought for ages though that from Valve's perspective, one of the best things they could do would be to announce an actual first-party Steambox console (not just some outsourced thing like the Piston), and at the same time announce Half life 3... as a Steambox exclusive.

It wouldn't buy them much popularity, but you can bet anything they would sell a ton of consoles right off the bat afterwards xD

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Wolf
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Posted: 24th Sep 2013 01:36
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Well wow!
Valve certainly is a capable bunch. Lets just hope they don't bite off more than they can chew

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TheComet
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Posted: 24th Sep 2013 02:17
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Great, yet another operating system I have to take into consideration when developing cross-platform games.

TheComet

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budokaiman
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Posted: 24th Sep 2013 02:21
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I for one, an very excited to try this. I'd like to benchmark it upon release, as I'm sure the speed improvement would be fairly significant. If it worked well as an OS and most games were supported, if probably just keep my games on the stream OS and windows for everything else.


"Giraffe is soft, Gorilla is hard." - Phaelax
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Phaelax
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Posted: 24th Sep 2013 02:24
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Yay, yet another linux distro.....

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Dar13
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Posted: 25th Sep 2013 15:23
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Quote: "Great, yet another operating system I have to take into consideration when developing cross-platform games."

Games can stream from your Windows box to the SteamOS box. So no worries there.

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The Zoq2
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Posted: 25th Sep 2013 16:25
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Personally im really glad this is happening. I have been considering moving to linux for a while now and the only thing that has kept me from doing it is the lack of supported software. If the steam linux game catalogue grows and I can stream windows games to my linux computer, I would make the change.

Say ONE stupid thing and it ends up as a forum signature forever. - Neuro Fuzzy
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Seditious
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Posted: 25th Sep 2013 20:58
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Can't really see it working, unless developers all suddenly switch to Linux (not going to happen). Driver support isn't all that great either. But it's a nice concept at least.
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Wolf
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Posted: 25th Sep 2013 21:15
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Quote: "But it's a nice concept at least. "


Exactly...a nice concept. I'm a bit skeptical about how they'll pull this off.



-Wolf

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Libervurto
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Posted: 25th Sep 2013 21:54
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I'm glad to see Valve "breaking out", it's bringing a lot of interest to Linux, which will benefit everyone in the long run.

Quote: "Can't really see it working, unless developers all suddenly switch to Linux (not going to happen). Driver support isn't all that great either. But it's a nice concept at least. "

Solve one of those problems and the other solves itself, and this could be the thing to push people to doing it.


Formerly OBese87.
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budokaiman
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Posted: 25th Sep 2013 22:18
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Quote: "Driver support isn't all that great either."

On a related note to this:
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/09/nvidia-seeks-peace-with-linux-pledges-help-on-open-source-driver/


"Giraffe is soft, Gorilla is hard." - Phaelax
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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 26th Sep 2013 01:05
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Part 2 announced. Basically a beta program for Valve's first "Steam Machine" prototype. The Last FAQ hints to the next release being related to Input options. With Valve letting slip that they're working on "biometrics" a few times lately, I think we'll see something along those lines on Friday...

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamMachines/
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Dar13
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Posted: 26th Sep 2013 01:25
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Driver support is going to get pretty good with Valve actively backing the platform. Especially with Nvidia starting to open up and AMD basically open-sourcing theirs.

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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 26th Sep 2013 01:40
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NVidia doesn't exactly make anything on consoles, so it has to hold onto PC as well as make its push into mobile. If Valve build it, they will come.

AMD too, if a new ecosystem comes up, it's in their interest to throw parts at it in exchange for money.
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Le Shorte
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Posted: 27th Sep 2013 22:33
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I'm sure everyone's heard by now, but the Steam Controller was announced. It looks...interesting.

Yes, I live in Wisconsin. No, I don't live on a farm.
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Mobiius
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Posted: 27th Sep 2013 22:53
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Touch only thumbsticks....



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Dar13
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Posted: 27th Sep 2013 23:01
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With haptics so advanced they can be used as speakers as a parlor trick! I'm excited! Plus you can kinda sorta use it as a WiiU controller with the small screen in the middle of it.

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Libervurto
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Posted: 27th Sep 2013 23:16
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The controller looks brilliant!
http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamController/

I read an article that said, "the obvious design flaw is the lack of thumbsticks...", who the hell are you!? It makes my skin crawl when people come out with such uninformed arrogant crap like that when they haven't even held the bloody thing in their hands! It doesn't look exactly the same as an XBox controller so immediately it's bad? I'm glad we don't have to rely on these snooty dullards or our technology would never improve.


Formerly OBese87.
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Phaelax
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Posted: 28th Sep 2013 09:24 Edited at: 28th Sep 2013 09:25
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I'm still wondering when the thumb stick first became popular. Was it the N64 that started the craze? Personally, I think these control pads look better, but I'd still have to feel it myself to say for sure.

Although, back in my day, controllers required more than just a thumb on the joystick!


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Chris Tate
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Posted: 28th Sep 2013 22:43
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That joystick looks pretty slick; my one was a brick with a stick pointing out

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Thraxas
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Posted: 28th Sep 2013 23:43
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I think the controller looks interesting, but until I actually have a go with one I'll reserve judgment about how good it is. I don't care about the lack of thumb sticks but just because something looks different and the company who created it says it's awesome doesn't mean it actually is.

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Seditious
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Posted: 29th Sep 2013 19:59
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I'm not convinced with the controller (seeing as Valve have no experience with making controllers, versus the console creators who have had decades), but we'll see what it's like when it's released.
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Libervurto
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Posted: 29th Sep 2013 21:57 Edited at: 29th Sep 2013 21:58
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Quote: "I'm not convinced with the controller (seeing as Valve have no experience with making controllers, versus the console creators who have had decades)"

Sony's Playstation controller is garbage: it's too small, unergonomic, the sticks are horribly positioned, inaccurate and convex, the triggers are virtually designed for your fingers to slip off them. It's a terrible controller. Microsoft has had far less experience designing console controllers and their XBox controller is far superior.

Track-pads replacing thumbsticks is a potential paradigm shift in controller design. Thumbsticks are notoriously inaccurate and difficult to control, since the thumb is constantly having to adjust to different angles and resistance independent of the rest of the hand, whereas with a joystick there is far greater stability and control since the entire arm is used. Trackpads bypass the issue of stability since there is no resistance or moving parts. Potentially they could offer far greater precision, which I assume is a major goal for Valve since the Steam Box will be streaming PC games designed for use with a mouse.


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gamerboots
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 00:06
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This should prove to be very interesting.

they will never know what bit them until its too late...
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Inflictive
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 00:57 Edited at: 30th Sep 2013 01:01
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The main problem with this is, imagine trying to map all the controls for a game like Arma 3 or WoW to a weak little gamepad. It would be impossibe; those games are designed for a 104-button keyboard and 5-button mouse. You might say, just don't play those type of games, play games like Battlefield 3 instead, but at that point you should just buy a console since you've pretty much lost all the advantages to pc gaming. Consoles are cheaper and much easier to plug-and-play.

Will I uninstall windows 7 in favor of linux (losing tons of software compatibility) and trade in my keyboard and mouse for a weird looking xbox controller? Definitley not, and I don't think many other pc gamers will either.

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Blobby 101
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 01:27
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@Inflictive, That's not what they're suggesting you do though. They're not saying this will replace traditional PC gaming at a desk with a keyboard and mouse, they're posing this as an alternative to consoles in the living room.

Personally, if this performs as well as they say it does, I'd happily swap out the 360 pad I currently use for some PC games for one.

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gamerboots
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 01:36
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I wouldn't either.
Just a curious question I have for those of you who would know - how many libraries or drivers does windows use that are Linux if any?

they will never know what bit them until its too late...
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Libervurto
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 02:04
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Quote: "Just a curious question I have for those of you who would know - how many libraries or drivers does windows use that are Linux if any?"

I don't have any direct experience with developing operating systems so probably best to take this with a pinch of salt, but as far as I know... Linux is a kernel for GNU, which is a free-software Unix-like operating system (GNU stands for "GNU is Not Unix"). The majority of GNU is based on Unix, but Windows is a completely different architecture and as such does not share any libraries or drivers with Unix or GNU. You can probably find out a lot more from wikipedia.


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Seditious
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 02:27
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Quote: "Sony's Playstation controller is garbage: it's too small, unergonomic, the sticks are horribly positioned, inaccurate and convex, the triggers are virtually designed for your fingers to slip off them. It's a terrible controller. Microsoft has had far less experience designing console controllers and their XBox controller is far superior."


I disagree.

Quote: "Track-pads replacing thumbsticks is a potential paradigm shift in controller design. Thumbsticks are notoriously inaccurate and difficult to control, since the thumb is constantly having to adjust to different angles and resistance independent of the rest of the hand, whereas with a joystick there is far greater stability and control since the entire arm is used. Trackpads bypass the issue of stability since there is no resistance or moving parts. Potentially they could offer far greater precision, which I assume is a major goal for Valve since the Steam Box will be streaming PC games designed for use with a mouse."


You make good points. It'll be interesting to see what the accuracy will be like compared to thumbsticks.
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Inflictive
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 02:38
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So why would you choose a steamOS computer over a console? Consoles are cheaper and so much simpler. And you can't really play any complicated pc games because the gamepad just doesen't have enough buttons.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 03:11
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Quote: " So why would you choose a steamOS computer over a console? Consoles are cheaper and so much simpler. And you can't really play any complicated pc games because the gamepad just doesen't have enough buttons."


Surely you can play with a keyboard and mouse just like on a regular computer. I'd imagine you could also use an xbox controller if that works for the game you're on?

I see this as a way of unlinking games to the windows OS for us PC gamers.

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Phaelax
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 03:30
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I thought the dreamcast controllers were pretty decent

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Inflictive
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 03:57
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Quote: "Surely you can play with a keyboard and mouse"


So I would be stretched out on the couch with a keyboard and mouse? Or hunched over a coffee table? That would be awkward and ridiculous, I would end up moving the computer back to a desk with a monitor. Then at that point it's normal pc gaming except without windows and therefore without directx, which like %80 of games require.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 04:52
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Quote: "which like %80 of games require."


Not if steamOS takes off (for new games of course).

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Dar13
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Posted: 30th Sep 2013 07:39
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Quote: "I don't have any direct experience with developing operating systems so probably best to take this with a pinch of salt, but as far as I know... Linux is a kernel for GNU, which is a free-software Unix-like operating system (GNU stands for "GNU is Not Unix"). The majority of GNU is based on Unix, but Windows is a completely different architecture and as such does not share any libraries or drivers with Unix or GNU. You can probably find out a lot more from wikipedia."

Linux is the kernel, GNU is a philosophy of software development/operating system development which together is called GNU/Linux. Linux is the effort to replicate and improve the UNIX kernel while the GNU project has their own effort called Hurd(which just reached version 0.5 after two decades of development... yeah). The GNU project's contributions are more often than not tools such as find/ls/cat/sed and etc rather than to the kernel.

Windows, when transitioning from DOS to Windows, created a new kernel called NT which is the backbone of their OS(current version is like NT6.0 at this point I think). There is very little interoperability between the two kernels as they approach even basic things like memory allocation for programs and the separation between the kernel and userspace in very different ways.

However, there are many libraries that are specifically built to facilitate cross-platform development such as OpenGL, SDL, LibGDX(though that's Java-based), Ogre3D, Qt, and wxWidgets among others. Developing for Linux is quite a bit easier than it ever has been before(especially for game developers with the release of SDL 2.0).

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Mobiius
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Posted: 3rd Oct 2013 01:16
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Quote: "Sony's Playstation controller is garbage: it's too small, unergonomic, the sticks are horribly positioned, inaccurate and convex, the triggers are virtually designed for your fingers to slip off them. It's a terrible controller. Microsoft has had far less experience designing console controllers and their XBox controller is far superior."

I agree wholeheartedly.


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Quik
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Posted: 3rd Oct 2013 07:32
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The controller looks nice - I cant aim these Xbox or Ps3 controllers at all - so I think these new ones will help me with that. Ofc - mouse will probably still win when it comes to serious gaming - online gaming, but this controller for casual / SP stuff? Yeah, I do actually think so.

not to mention it'll work well with Oculus ; )



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Chris Tate
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Posted: 4th Oct 2013 02:48
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I remember when the PS1 came out; the Sony Playstation; everybody at school where talking about the Sega Saturn and the up and coming N64; but the PS1 was the underdog. You used to have to buy magazine articles to read about the PS1, whereas the media was focused on the mainstream consoles; but the Sony console made it in the mainsteam and pretty much pushed out the Sega Saturn and Dreamcast.

I wonder if the SteamBox will do what the PS1 did; perhaps forcing one of the big three to follow trends, instead of setting them

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Nabz_32x
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Posted: 7th Oct 2013 16:28
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I can´t imagine that the touchpad solution would be an improvement in any way, it would be a bit like playing with Nubs ( those Joysticks that just move with your thumb while staying at the same angle ( Open Pandora but way more precise )).
I think it is just unergonomic for your thumb because your thumb makes the Forward or backward movement also by varying its angle.
Maybe this can be fixed if the rest of the Controller is perfectly ergonomical designed, but then I would still miss the feeling of having the stick pressing a bit against my thumb when moving it.

I am also not a big fan of a single Company uniting most of the Hardware suppliers to be compatible to their standart, i am more for some Kind of ISO or DIN standarts regarding this.

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Quik
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Posted: 7th Oct 2013 16:53
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Nabz: I know for a fact that I do aim much better on touchpads, it's just the other controlls is janky as heck on a touchpad.
and just comparing to that itself, i think this will help ME a lot. Might be unergonomic - but it's going to be better for my aiming.



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Nabz_32x
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Posted: 7th Oct 2013 19:28
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if it improved your aim, then their must be something good to it, I remember playing fear 2 on my Laptop with touch pad and the aiming in General wasn´t that bad.
I guess it is something you have to try first Hand before comparing. A closer look on the controler revealed to me that it is designed as ergonomic as possible ( by the Looks of it ), I guess I will have to try this control style sooner or later.

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creamtown
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If Steam users are already hooked with the whole system in Steam, then i'm not surprised if many users would jump to Steam ship in the near future. Besides, many big companies make new OS, right? Google with its Chrome OS, etc.
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Quik
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Posted: 23rd Oct 2013 13:57
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Quite nice to see new OS's coming out, competition is always nice ^^



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Libervurto
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Posted: 27th Oct 2013 23:13
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Are people allowed to fork the OS? Have Valve actually added anything new or tweaked the kernel, or is this just another standard linux distro with a Steam skin? I can't see any details on their site.


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bitJericho
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Posted: 31st Dec 2013 15:19 Edited at: 31st Dec 2013 15:22
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Lonnnng bump. Yeah people are forking the OS.

Incidentally a friend and I launched a SteamOS forum with giftcards and prizes for mods and hacks. You should check it out. Feedback would be greatly appreciated too.

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The Zoq2
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Posted: 31st Dec 2013 16:23
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I saw something about that on reddit a few days back but I had no idea you were behind it. Small world I guess

I am really enjoying steam OS so far (even though I have not found a way to install .deb files yet ). I dont think I have enough experience to do anything interesting for your competion though.

Say ONE stupid thing and it ends up as a forum signature forever. - Neuro Fuzzy
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Daniel TGC
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Posted: 1st Jan 2014 09:05 Edited at: 1st Jan 2014 09:07
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I don't see the point in this for the following reasons.

1) I have a PC, why do I need yet another console box in my living room? And if there is no box what's the point in installing yet another OS on my PC, and one that's less capable than Windows.
2) It's just a linux distro, linux doesn't get all the good games, and wine emulation still leaves much to be desired.
3) If a steam OS box is to compete with a PC's graphics or even the likes of PS4 and XBOX One then it'll need some pretty expensive hardware inside.
4) It just going to annoy me that ALL THOSE WINDOWS games I own can't be used on Steam OS. After all, it's happening already. It annoys the pants off me that I can't play most of my Steam games in my Mac OS machine without bootcamping windows.
5) Gaming is mostly moving towards mobile platforms like Android and iOS. As those devices get better and better (as we see with Ouya) people will probably just start using their tablets as their home console system.
6) Do we really need another operating system? Really?!?!? There's already 20 quadrillion, couldn't Steam just run on Ubuntu or something?
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Libervurto
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Posted: 1st Jan 2014 13:50
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Daniel TGC wrote: "1) I have a PC, why do I need yet another console box in my living room? And if there is no box what's the point in installing yet another OS on my PC, and one that's less capable than Windows.
2) It's just a linux distro, linux doesn't get all the good games, and wine emulation still leaves much to be desired.
3) If a steam OS box is to compete with a PC's graphics or even the likes of PS4 and XBOX One then it'll need some pretty expensive hardware inside.
4) It just going to annoy me that ALL THOSE WINDOWS games I own can't be used on Steam OS. After all, it's happening already. It annoys the pants off me that I can't play most of my Steam games in my Mac OS machine without bootcamping windows.
5) Gaming is mostly moving towards mobile platforms like Android and iOS. As those devices get better and better (as we see with Ouya) people will probably just start using their tablets as their home console system.
6) Do we really need another operating system? Really?!?!? There's already 20 quadrillion, couldn't Steam just run on Ubuntu or something?"


1. If you don't want it don't get it, it's free to not install too.
2. Steam is the biggest digital distributor of games; they have released a Linux OS and are continuing to port games to Linux; I'll leave you to fill in the blanks.
3. Yes it can be expensive, this is why I don't buy consoles any more. I have a computer that does all kinds of things, building/buying another machine to do the same job or fewer jobs is a pointless waste of money IMO.
4. I have a few Windows games I can't play any more, which sucks but I'm over it already. I bought Mark of the Ninja on Steam for Windows and now they have a Linux version I can download it for free, so hopefully the same will happen with most games. Wine works pretty well these days for pretty much anything but games. Mount & Blade works well with it but I haven't had much success with others.
5. I wouldn't say gaming is moving anywhere, there are more people gaming more often and mobile devices have allowed that, but there are huge genres of games that aren't suited to mobile devices.
6. Yes, we need as many as we can get. This is how open source development evolves. I do wish there was more focus within the community to collaborate instead of everyone starting their own project to solve the same problem, but maybe if it was that way there would be less freedom of ideas and we would actually see slower improvements.


Formerly OBese87.
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The Zoq2
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Joined: 4th Nov 2009
Location: Linköping, Sweden
Posted: 1st Jan 2014 17:31
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The main reason steam OS is exciting for me is that it might give linux a chance in the gaming world and I would be really happy if windows lost some of its grip on the market.

Also, have any of you guys managed to install Skype on it, I cant seem to get it working

Say ONE stupid thing and it ends up as a forum signature forever. - Neuro Fuzzy
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