The Valve and Steam Platform Discussion Thread

[Space Satan]

Civilization is a turn based game. You can't play DOTA, starcraft or FPS with this.
Come to think of it - it may encourage devs to make more turn based games...

 

[Clockwork Knight]

I’m a happy Steam customer happily using my happy mouse and keyboard. I don’t want a controller?

You can’t make a sentence into a question by just putting a question-mark at the end. But we’re happy you’re happy, and by all means keep using whatever input method makes sense for you. Rest assured, we won’t abandon you. We love mice and keyboards, too.

 

[LeStryfe79]

Damn what a fuck up.

 

[Turjan]

Looks as if someone beheaded an owl.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

It's an interesting alternative to the mouse and keyboard. If it ever succeeds in replacing the KB&M, then humanity is far dumber than previously thought.

EDIT: Go away, stupid smiley!

 

[Cowboy Moment]

This will be the true test of Gaben's genius. If this weird shit actually works well and lets you play KB&M games comfortably, then I may well become a believer.

Rule of thumb says it's going to be awful though.

 

[buzz]

Reminds me of a Mass Effect reaper . And it's a Harbinger alright .

If this entire experiment succeeds, we will be basically going through PC gaming lethargy 2.0. Big company that more or less held a huge chunk of PC gaming by the balls suddenly catering and forcing its shit to consoles? It's the Xbox all over again.

 

[Gragt]

Impulse reaction: Valve's first complete boondoggle.

 

[Infinitron]

It's just a stupid controller.

If you feel like using a Steambox with a keyboard and mouse, just attach them instead.

 

[DeepOcean]

Shit, if I ever buy this thing, it will appear that is constantly looking at me.

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

This will be the true test of Gaben's genius. If this weird shit actually works well and lets you play KB&M games comfortably, then I may well become a believer.

Rule of thumb says it's going to be awful though.

this

and codex bitching about the fucking look of controller

 

[Turjan]

 

[Metro]

Looks like that 4 chan thing was wrong. Not sure why they ended on the controller as an announcement. It's pretty underwhelming compared to the first two.

 

[Bruticis]

Looks like that 4 chan thing was wrong. Not sure why they ended on the controller as an announcement. It's pretty underwhelming compared to the first two.

Fake shit on 4chan??? No way!

 

[Metro]

Nvidia is still working with Linux gurus, though!

 

[Infinitron]

A nice overview from SBH:

 

[felipepepe]

Very nice video indeed. It portrays very well the current picture; Microsoft is butthurt than they don't get % over PC game sales, so they implement their App Store and make Xbox "the place for gaming", abandoning the PC games market. But companies like ATI and Steam, that make a living precisely out of that PC market, get really anxious of the dark days ahead and start to produce alternatives....

SteamBox/OS and ATI's Mantle will probably suck horribly for the next years, while we all can play everything on Windows, but they might be the shinning saviours once Microsoft fully morphs into Wannabe-Apple.

 

[Metro]

Also that controller is horribly designed.

 

[DalekFlay]

SteamBox/OS and ATI's Mantle will probably suck horribly for the next years, while we all can play everything on Windows, but they might be the shinning saviours once Microsoft fully morphs into Wannabe-Apple.

I still think this is quite unlikely due to their business focus, but who knows.

Some developers have commented on this controller and said it doesn't feel like a normal touchpad at all, so perhaps Valve should not have used the term touchpad when advertising it.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Also that controller is horribly designed.

Really? Why? It's difficult to have any real opinion on the touchpads, we'll know how well they work after beta tester opinions surface. But the button layout has some good ideas, especially that what's important is the stuff you can press while using both thumbs for analog control - that's why they added more buttons to the back, and the touchpads will likely be more comfortable as buttons than traditional analog sticks. It's actually really fucking annoying on traditional controllers, that you can only really use the bumpers and triggers without taking your thumbs off the analog sticks. Especially compared to M&K, where you can press or hold a ton of different buttons while simulatenously using both WASD and the mouse.

 

[DalekFlay]

People seem to think only two non-trigger buttons are able to be pressed while moving, the two on the right, but they're forgetting there are two on the back of the controller for your middle-finger to press. How natural that feels I don't know.

I'm personally very interested in learning how this will work with old games as a pure mouse and keyboard emulator. They say that nonchalantly in the write-up, but can you image the clusterfuck that will be when they try to have an all-in-one solution for hundreds of thousands of games? I mean... wow.

 

[funkadelik]

WAT?

You guys are missing the point here! The Steam controller is now allowing us to use a gamepad whilst simultaneously pretending to massage two dudes' ballsacks. Disappointed Dexu San...

 

[Name]

People seem to think only two non-trigger buttons are able to be pressed while moving, the two on the right, but they're forgetting there are two on the back of the controller for your middle-finger to press. How natural that feels I don't know.

I'm personally very interested in learning how this will work with old games as a pure mouse and keyboard emulator. They say that nonchalantly in the write-up, but can you image the clusterfuck that will be when they try to have an all-in-one solution for hundreds of thousands of games? I mean... wow.

Perhaps they will ship a mapper that let users simulate keyboard for themselves. DIY for the win!

 

[DalekFlay]

Perhaps they will ship a mapper that let users simulate keyboard for themselves. DIY for the win!

I'm sure they will, but if the controller is emulating WASD instead of true analog for driving, for example, I would rather switch to a gamepad. And since it's not as fast or accurate as a mouse, by Valve's own admission, I would never play online with it. And as more of these examples reveal themselves it becomes more and more apparent this is a third device, not an all in one replacement device, and it's value dramatically suffers.

Unless of course the Steambox takes over the world and this becomes the new standard in gaming. In which case, get ready for low FOV, huge HUD and shooting balanced for this thing rather than a mouse, even in PC exclusives! Yahoo!

/pessimist

 

[Gozma]

wow so this is some shit for people that aren't like me and that I don't understand