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f13.net  |  f13.net General Forums  |  Gaming  |  Steam  |  Topic: Steam Announcements 2013 Edition [1. SteamOS, 2. Steam Machines , 3. Controller] 0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
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Author Topic: Steam Announcements 2013 Edition [1. SteamOS, 2. Steam Machines , 3. Controller]  (Read 99842 times)
Venkman
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Reply #70 on: September 27, 2013, 01:38:20 PM

Heh yea, but that controller could only work with those games made for it. The convention of normal game controllers hasn't really changed much in the last decade, and I assume anyone using controllers on a PC are using one similar to that standard too.
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Reply #71 on: September 27, 2013, 01:50:54 PM

I'm not saying that controller will work... but it sure would be great if something besides mouse and keyboard DID work, especially for a living room setup like they are trying to build with the Steam Machines. If it doesn't, it won't hurt anything other than Valve not putting resources into Half Life 3.

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Fordel
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Reply #72 on: September 27, 2013, 02:06:54 PM

I guess if I can still use a Xbox controller on the steambox, I don't have to care their new controller doesn't have a jump button.

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
K9
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Reply #73 on: September 27, 2013, 02:43:08 PM

I'm sure it will integrate nicely with Oculus Rift; it does look better than current gamepads for sure. I cast a fairly dim view on their assertion that this can let you play RTS, 4X, and MOBA games though; I'm also leery about whether this will be even close to competitive to a Keyboard and Mouse for FPS. In my experience the fine control over large areas that a mouse offers has never been recaptured, even slightly, by gamepads.

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Reply #74 on: September 27, 2013, 03:20:09 PM

It was terrible on the Intellivision, old man.

Edit: That was a response to Falconeer.
Quinton
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Reply #75 on: September 27, 2013, 04:15:38 PM

The controller is definitely the least interesting thing they've announced.  Not surprising (they've had people hacking on controllers for a year plus now, iirc), but I'm pretty skeptical of touch working better that analog or digital control sticks.  Touch and precision are two words I don't really associate.  But hey, I'd give one a try.

They're already supporting regular game controllers, keyboards, and mice, and I cannot imagine they'll stop doing that, so no worry there at least.
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Reply #76 on: September 27, 2013, 04:17:01 PM

Hated the Intellivision controller, my grandma had one of those things. Thinking about it, I'm not sure why. (Why she had one, not why I hated the controller.)
« Last Edit: September 27, 2013, 04:22:12 PM by Ingmar »

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Trippy
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Reply #77 on: September 27, 2013, 04:20:23 PM

It was good for Baseball, and that's about it.

Virtual touch controllers are horrible horrible things in mobile games. Supposedly the Valve ones will have some sort of haptic feedback. It remains to be seem if that actually helps or if they continue to be horrible horrible things.
Falconeer
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Reply #78 on: September 27, 2013, 04:22:40 PM

It was terrible on the Intellivision, old man.

Edit: That was a response to Falconeer.

What are you talking about? What was terrible were the side buttons, because they were just so hard to push. But the disc felt great on so many games. It's just that the games were built for it. Having 16 directions for sport games was really cool, and Utopia played just right with it. Not to mention Swords & Serpents and many others. Auto Racing, Snafu, Donkey Kong, Burger Time, and the ones that required 45° precision? Not so much.

Anyway, more seriously I don't see how (the Steam one) can work with today's games. The Inty one made sense in a world that was 'discovering' videogames and videogames, and while it was ahead (a gamepad instead of a joystick. First one ever?) was also not so responsive (too much dead zone and too many useless directions). And it ended up being a losing concept anyway. But todays gamers seem to know what they like and this Steam-pad feels more like a gimmick than something people will want to spend time training their muscle memory into.

Margalis
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Reply #79 on: September 27, 2013, 05:15:05 PM

It seems like this controller is optimal for FPS and lousy for almost everything else.

There's no way it's going to replace m/kb in an RTS, and no way it's going to replace a standard controller in an action game. How would play something like Arkham City on it? Or any game where your left thumb sits on the left stick and your right thumb over the face buttons? (None of the thumb face buttons are adjacent and only two are reachable with the right thumb)

"We can throw virtual buttons onto the touch screen" sounds like a cop-out. Yes, you can, but not for a fast-paced game, a game with a lot of inputs, or a game where you want to press things simultaneously or in quick succession.

Also it has no digital pad at all, which means it completely fails for 2D fighting games and most other precision-oriented 2D-ish games. (Also a lot of games map weapon switching to the dpad - I suppose this will use the touch-screen instead?)

In the end it feels to me like something you'd drag out just to play an FPS, and after a few days throw it in a closet and forget about it.

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Venkman
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Reply #80 on: September 27, 2013, 05:24:37 PM

I imagine keyboard and mouse will work just fiine. Or, maybe that's wishful thinking. SteamBox interests me only insofar as I can sit on a couch and play PC games on my projector to play the same games with the same control scheme I've enjoyed for decades. If I wanted a controller, I'd dust off my Xbox 360 and give any shit about the next consoles.
Rendakor
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Reply #81 on: September 27, 2013, 05:26:35 PM

FPS is the most popular genre on consoles, so that's the crowd this is chasing. If the Xbox kids can play CoD on a Steambox and feel familiar, that'll mean money hats for Valve. By comparison, the market for RTS fans who don't own PCs is miniscule.

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Margalis
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Reply #82 on: September 27, 2013, 07:11:09 PM

FPS games work just fine with an xbox controller. (As evidenced by the fact that FPS is now super popular on console) I assume this will be more precise, but aiming precision is not something people seem to care about all that much these days. As a m/kb user it probably matters, but I have trouble seeing many console gamers caring.


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Fordel
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Reply #83 on: September 27, 2013, 08:01:28 PM

Yea, I've been fooling around with StreetFighters on the PC recently, and the standard Xbox controller is bad enough, I can't imagine trying to play with this trackpad thing.

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
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Reply #84 on: September 28, 2013, 06:11:26 AM

I've never gotten along well with PS3/Xbox360 controllers (my thumbs seem to be incompatible with analogue sticks), but I like what I'm hearing about this one, so far.

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patience
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Reply #85 on: September 28, 2013, 11:00:20 AM

Well this things is great for platformers and this report is only about a prototype that didn't even have the LCD screen and used 4 buttons on the back grip instead of 2.

http://tommyrefenes.tumblr.com/post/62476523677/my-time-with-the-steam-controller

Yea, I've been fooling around with StreetFighters on the PC recently, and the standard Xbox controller is bad enough, I can't imagine trying to play with this trackpad thing.

I'd bet $100 this is better than a fighting game stick.

The layout suggests to me it will be almost as good as a hitbox which trumps game sticks so thoroughly people who could never do Zangief's full circle motions on traditional controllers could execute them.


OP is assuming its somewhat of a design-goal of eve to make players happy.
this is however not the case.
Kail
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Reply #86 on: September 28, 2013, 02:45:55 PM

I'm more worried about the compatibility than the functionality.  A lot of games don't recognize non-Xbox controllers, and I don't see this thing having that much more market penetration than Logitech, Thrustmaster, Razer, et al.  They say it works with every game, which is kind of a head scratcher, given how much of a pain it is in the current setup to get a controller that works with EVERYTHING, I kind of suspect that it's going to work, but not well, with a lot of controller games.

And if there are games which are "Controller Supported" which don't support the Steam pad, Valve is probably going to get more blowback than Logitech or whoever because it's their store and their OS and their controller.  

About the only thing I can think of is that Valve is either going to add a new "Steam Controller Supported" tag, or lean heavily on companies so that every game which wants the "Controller Supported" tag has to be Steam controller compatible, which is going to inconvenience a lot of indie studios using XNA.

edit: I'm also not nuts about the wireless thing.  Hoping that's an option rather than the only way to buy them.
« Last Edit: September 28, 2013, 02:55:36 PM by Kail »
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Reply #87 on: September 29, 2013, 07:56:30 PM

Yea, I've been fooling around with StreetFighters on the PC recently, and the standard Xbox controller is bad enough, I can't imagine trying to play with this trackpad thing.

That moment when you double quarter circle forward Ultra turns into a reverse dragon punch to teleport forward always killed me when playing Seth.

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Nightblade
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Reply #88 on: September 30, 2013, 10:26:24 AM

Quote
The layout suggests to me it will be almost as good as a hitbox which trumps game sticks so thoroughly people who could never do Zangief's full circle motions on traditional controllers could execute them.


I... don't think so. Ignoring that the haptic "pad" will likely be awful for the precision needed for the execution fighting game motions, the button layout will make pulling off pretty much anything in a fighting game a pain in the ass.
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Reply #89 on: October 02, 2013, 03:51:20 AM


Merusk
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Reply #90 on: October 02, 2013, 04:27:24 AM

It's in Europe, where "Blizzard" also filed numerous amusing copyrights that later turned out to be someone who'd figured out anyone can file something and list whatever company they want. I'd go with Hoax until Valve says something.

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Reply #91 on: October 02, 2013, 12:30:59 PM

Trademarks are different from copyrights.
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Reply #92 on: October 02, 2013, 07:48:25 PM

LOOKIT DAT APERTURE LOGO IN THERE
Lucas
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Reply #93 on: October 07, 2013, 06:59:33 AM


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KallDrexx
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Reply #94 on: October 07, 2013, 09:59:28 AM

That's going to be a pricey box.  Last time I looked Titans ran about $1k each.
Ragnoros
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Reply #95 on: October 07, 2013, 11:36:10 AM

Eh, with four GPU options and only 300 boxes they are probably only shipping like 50 or so equipped with titans. Regardless, a few hundred grand is chump change for valve.

That said, even their lowest test box is well over $600 off the shelf. I would think they would be testing some cheaper variants, because I can't really see Steamboxes competing with Xbone/PS4 if they cost twice as much, yet you can only play a handful of Linux games and stream shit from your other $600+ PC.
« Last Edit: October 07, 2013, 11:43:01 AM by Ragnoros »

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Reply #96 on: October 07, 2013, 01:27:17 PM

This will 100% be a loss leader for Valve to destroy the living room as it currently stands. Expect Steam integration to include TV and TIVO shit at launch.
Quinton
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Reply #97 on: October 07, 2013, 01:39:37 PM

If they can convince one or more PC OEMs to build a more integrated box they should be able to get the pricing competitive -- and Valve could potentially offer some amount of rev share with the OEMs if they wanted to encourage even more aggressive pricing.
Pennilenko
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Reply #98 on: October 07, 2013, 01:59:17 PM

Isn't it safe to assume that a large portion of valves customers are already good to go in the pc ownership category? If so, is this an attempt at converting console only only kind of people?

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Quinton
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Reply #99 on: October 07, 2013, 02:21:04 PM

Yeah, existing customers can obviously keep running Steam on their PCs as they already do... but maybe they'll consider a steambox to bring that library into their livingroom if they haven't already put a PC there... and of course the console market is ripe for disruption.

People keep pointing out that Steam only has a few hundred titles for Linux at the moment, but that's a lot more titles than either of the PS4 or Xbone will have available at launch... if Valve could get a few shiny AAA titles and a few snazzy new indie titles (the latter will be easier than the former), they're going to be able to be competitive with the nextgen consoles library-wise.
Kageru
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Reply #100 on: October 07, 2013, 02:24:39 PM

Yeah, PC owners have little reason to care. Unless you want a cheap HTPC for the living room. But it's mostly a hedge against microsoft going "walled garden" and for a post-PC future where a lot of families most powerful computers are an x-box and a tablet.

The current boxes are prototypes to test upper and lower hardware bounds for a box launching next year. I'd be pretty confident the titan is purely a test point rather than indicative of what will ship in the bulk of mass market steam boxes.

It's good news for linux gamers, but that's just a side-effect... certainly too small a market to actually be the focus. Linux in the box was a no brainer because for a cheap box license fees and windows dependency would make it non-competitive. But even there it's more "not windows" than pro-linux.
« Last Edit: October 07, 2013, 02:26:43 PM by Kageru »

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Trippy
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Reply #101 on: October 07, 2013, 02:29:24 PM

It's not really a hedge cause if Microsoft wanted to (and was willing to risk the anti-trust scrutiny) they could follow through on their threat to lock Linux out of motherboards that are licensed to run Windows.

Yes Valve could pay some of the desktop motherboard vendors to release versions with custom UEFI/BIOS that aren't locked out but that's extra cost for everybody involved.
Kageru
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Reply #102 on: October 08, 2013, 12:11:31 AM


The hardware that will be in the steambox doesn't need windows certification...

If microsoft gets even more monopolistic (it's already making it hard for linux vendors with UEFI) it would be a pain, but it's already pissed off the hardware guys by springing the fact it wants to be a device company (and would be competing with them in tablets, except they pay license fees and it doesn't) and PC's are not regarded as a growth market. I wouldn't be surprised if people worked around them while waiting for anti-trust to slap them down.

But I was actually drawing it from Gabe's quote;

Quote
“We want to make it as easy as possible for the 2,500 games on Steam to run on Linux as well. It’s a hedging strategy. I think Windows 8 is a catastrophe for everyone in the PC space. I think we’ll lose some of the top-tier PC/OEMs, who will exit the market. I think margins will be destroyed for a bunch of people. If that’s true, then it will be good to have alternatives to hedge against that eventuality.

This was when windows8RT was all about secure boot-loader and all apps coming through the microsoft run store had people really worried. Thankfully microsoft are fairly sluggish and incompetent even at being evil.

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KallDrexx
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Reply #103 on: October 11, 2013, 01:10:52 PM

Joystiq has a video demonstration of the controller.
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Reply #104 on: October 11, 2013, 03:38:48 PM


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