Steam OS
Neil O'Loughlin
Interesting....
Valve Announces Steam OS
Steam is getting its very own operating system, Valve announced today. It'll be a combination of Steam's current platform and Linux.
SteamOS is a free operating system designed for living rooms that Valve says "combines the rock-solid architecture of Linux with a gaming experience built for the big screen."
Valve says they've already got "hundreds of games" that will come to the new operating system next year, and that you'll be able to access the entire Steam catalog via "in-home streaming," a process they haven't quite explained yet. (We've reached out to a number of publishers, including EA, Activision, Square Enix, and Ubisoft, to see who's planning to develop or port games for SteamOS.)
"In SteamOS, we have achieved significant performance increases in graphics processing, and we’re now targeting audio performance and reductions in input latency at the operating system level," Valve writes. "Game developers are already taking advantage of these gains as they target SteamOS for their new releases."
Valve also announced four new features that will be available both for SteamOS and the standard Steam platform: streaming, family sharing, parental restrictions, and options for movies, music, and other media.
"SteamOS will be available soon as a free download for users and as a freely licensable operating system for manufacturers," Valve writes. "Stay tuned in the coming days for more information."
This is the first of three scheduled Valve announcements this week, all connected to the company's plans for bringing Steam into living rooms.
For almost a year now, Valve has been teasing the idea of Steam-branded hardware—an initiative that could prove game-changing as we enter the next generation of consoles. Last December, Valve boss Gabe Newell told me that the Steam Box would compete with Sony and Microsoft's next-gen offerings. The company has been slowly trickling out details since then.
Announcement #2 will go live on Wednesday at 1pm Eastern.
Sharkwald
Neil O'Loughlin
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Neil O'Loughlin
Tel # : 0044 (0)7894088352
Sharkwald
Neil O'Loughlin
Jono
I was pretty amazed how many of my steam list were Mac ready when I installed Steam. I'm sure Linux would give me a similar surprise thought probably not as many would be available.
Alatar
Analysis: Can SteamOS drag the PC game industry over to Linux?
Or: Why Valve should make Half-Life 3 a SteamOS exclusive.
by Kyle Orland - Sept 24 2013, 12:30am GMTST
Right after I wrote up today's news regarding Valve's announcement of a Linux-based SteamOS as central to its living room PC gaming efforts, I tweeted the following instant analysis: "If anyone has the clout to drag the gaming industry towards Linux, it's Valve." After thinking about it for a bit, I think Valve has a better than decent shot of actually pulling the transition off, especially if it wisely utilizes its position as what amounts to the biggest first-party developer in PC gaming.
The history of Windows' current near-hegemony in the PC gaming space is well known. Windows (and MS-DOS before it) had the most users, so developers coded their games primarily (or exclusively) for Windows. This attracted more gaming-focused users to Windows, which gave developers even more reasons to focus on Windows. It's a cycle that led to a widespread lock-in effect for both PC gamers and game developers, and it's been incredibly hard for other operating systems to break over the years.
Valve has already begun working to break PC gamers out of this cycle (and away from the "catastrophe" that co-founder Gabe Newell considers Windows 8) by extending its popular Steam distribution platform to Linux, a move that was announced last year. Steam for Linux launched in February with over 50 games sporting native compatibility, and its library has grown to nearly 200 titles since. This effort has been helped along by Valve's porting of its Source engine (and its attendant classic games) to Linux and by efforts like the Humble Indie Bundle, which has long encouraged its developers to offer their games for Windows, Mac, and Linux at the same time. (Linux gamers, in turn, have been some of the most generous backers of the Humble Bundles pay-what-you-want efforts.)
This has all been helpful to proving there is a viable market for games on Linux, but it hasn't really been enough to elevate the platform outside of its niche status for gamers. Aside from Valve's own output, the vast majority of Steam's Linux titles are the kind of indie games that are darlings with critics and in-the-know gamers, but these aren't destined to sell millions of copies. Even Valve's own Linux releases have been ports of games that came out on Windows years ago. That's nice for Linux-only die-hards, but it's not the kind of thing that's going to convince many people to switch in and of itself.
Valve's ace in the hole
Today, Valve said we should watch for "announcements in the coming weeks about all the AAA titles coming natively to SteamOS in 2014." There is one AAA announcement in particular, though, that would be bigger than all the others combined. It could instantly get millions of gamers to seriously consider making the jump (or at least adding on) a Linux-based OS for their gaming needs. That announcement would be a SteamOS-exclusive version of Half-Life 3 (or, somehow, if another Valve sequel or franchise with HL3-levels of buzz).
It might sound crazy to release such a big, highly-anticipated game on an entirely new OS rather than on the established OS already in use by 95 percent of gamers. It's important to note, though, that requiring SteamOS wouldn't technically cut off any of the millions of gamers currently locked in to their Windows or Mac boxes. Those users could still install the free, Linux-based SteamOS on their systems to play the game after all. They could even set it up as a secondary, dual-boot OS without affecting their current set up much. Installing a second operating system is a technical and onerous process that's not really of much interest to a mainstream audience. But if there's anyone that can make the process simple and streamlined, it's Valve. The company set the standard for streamlined game and update downloading through Steam.
Valve could also try to sell the SteamOS requirement as a way to squeeze every bit of power out of your PC gaming hardware by eliminating the overhead required for Windows or Mac OS. They already made a similar argument when noting that the Linux port of Left 4 Dead 2 was the best performing version of the game.
Many users would no doubt grumble and complain about needing to install a new OS to play the game, and many of them would no doubt complain quite loudly to anyone who would listen (meaning: on Internet message boards and petition sites). Still, the draw of a title as heavily anticipated as Half-Life 3 would convince most (if not all) of the complainers to suck it up and just go through the installation so they could play the game. In the process, Valve would gain a huge installed base for its nascent platform, making it an instantly viable option for developers to consider developing for. Even releasing Half-Life 3 as a timed exclusive on SteamOS (say, six months before a Windows/MacOS release) would achieve many of the same goals.
If this still seems like a crazy idea, remember that, nine years ago, it seemed just as crazy for Valve to require users to install a little program called Steam and perform an online check-in order to play Half-Life 2, even if they bought the game on a retail disc. Players complained back then too, and the launch wasn't without its share of technical hiccups. But users still bought the game by the millions and gave Steam its first tiny foothold into the new digital delivery landscape. Nine years from now, we could look at the dual launch of Half-Life 3 and SteamOS in the same exact way.
Neil O'Loughlin
How long after the Steam Mac launch was that? At that point it was basically Portal and TF2. Even for games that already had a Mac version, it took a while for steam to get them, partly, I think, because the Mac port was/is often done by a third party.I've not looked at the Linux list, but I would be surprised if, as you say, it consists of Valve first party and indie stuff almost exclusively.
Sharkwald
A number of different configs they say. I reckon there'll be an ARM based AppleTV like box that streams your games from your gaming PC, and probably 2 different streams of x86 based systems, in some kind of tiers, to simplify judging system reqs. I.e. If a game is "Standard Steam Machine" certified, it'll run at 1080p/30fps on a standard Steam box with all settings on, but if a dev wants to push the envelope, they can go for "Deluxe Steam Machine" certification, which needs a higher spec box to deliver that experience.
At least, that's how I'd do it to try and make PC gaming more accessible whilst still providing headroom for tinkerers.
Armand
Today's news is Steam Machines: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/09/25/steam-machines-valve-announce-hardware/#commentsA number of different configs they say. I reckon there'll be an ARM based AppleTV like box that streams your games from your gaming PC, and probably 2 different streams of x86 based systems, in some kind of tiers, to simplify judging system reqs. I.e. If a game is "Standard Steam Machine" certified, it'll run at 1080p/30fps on a standard Steam box with all settings on, but if a dev wants to push the envelope, they can go for "Deluxe Steam Machine" certification, which needs a higher spec box to deliver that experience.
I think the sweet spot might be 3 core configs : Medium, High, Very High (to use graphics terms), Silver, Gold, Platinum certified. Entry level to Hardcore.
In reality I fear we will seem more and this is where it might fall down. Too many configs and it will bring too much confusion. Consumers (and I’m talk mass market rather than the more tech savy) will already have to deal with multiple manufactures selling these boxes and each extra configs may grow the overall complexity of picking a box. You can already imagine the upselling & differentiation that will happen.
It greatly depends on how strict Valve holds manufactures to a cert process. I hope Valve have really strict requirements. So that if you buying a High System you get the 1080p/30fps in game performance (or whatever requirement) regardless of the manufacture.
I do hope they do the little box streaming receiver as well. Maybe even offer bundles with it.
Now my only issue and this is not a Steam steaming box issue is all these little boxes I’m gonna collect!! Imagine a ubiquitous standardised steaming standard (yep when pigs fly!!).
Armand
Nvidia‘s history of Linux support has been – to put it very, very lightly – rocky at best, but apparently that’s all about to change. The hardware manufacturer is now throwing its considerable weight behind both SteamOS and Linux as a whole, even going so far as to promise it’ll release documentation on its GPUs to the Linux community so as to help ease compatibility issues. Meanwhile, the meaner, greener side of the graphicsability wars boasts of engineers “embedded at Valve” to hammer SteamOS into rip-roaring, console-busting shape. Which, I suppose, makes sense, given that AMD is supplying innards for both Microsoft and Sony.
On the Linux side of things, Nvidia’s Andy Ritger offered the company’s services to open source driver developer Nouveau. Now, this is quite an about-face for the company Linux creator Linus Torvalds recently called “the single worst company we have ever dealt with” – perhaps nearly too good to be true – but here it is nonetheless:
“NVIDIA is releasing public documentation on certain aspects of our GPUs, with the intent to address areas that impact the out-of-the-box usability of NVIDIA GPUs with Nouveau. We intend to provide more documentation over time, and guidance in additional areas as we are able. A few of us who work on NVIDIA’s proprietary Linux GPU driver will pay attention to nouveau at lists.freedesktop.org and try to chime in when we can.”
Usage of some fairly non-committal language aside, it’s an encouraging shift (or whiplash-inducing, fire-spurting 180) in attitude. But why? Well, odds are, Nvidia’s partnership with Valve to get SteamOS up to speed has something to do with it. Nvidia’s Mark Smith explained in a blog post:
“Engineers from Valve and NVIDIA have spent a lot of time collaborating on a common goal for SteamOS: to deliver an open-platform gaming experience with superior performance and uncompromising visuals directly on the big screen. NVIDIA engineers embedded at Valve collaborated on improving driver performance for OpenGL; optimizing performance on NVIDIA GPUs; and helping to port Valve’s award-winning content library to SteamOS; and tuning SteamOS to lower latency, or lag, between the controller and onscreen action.”
All of which sound like very good things! Only time will tell if the big N is on board for the long haul, but – worst-case scenario – some support is still absolutely better than none. So yeah, Valve’s vision of a Linux-based future for Steam is looking less and less like a bunch of hot air. But is this what you, average PC gamer with a home and multiple rooms and 0.90 children, want?
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