Gabe Newell: Valve Prepping Game Console

[SKYMTL]

Gabe Newell confirmed that Valve will be entering the console business during an interview at the Video Game Awards on Friday.

Speaking to Kotaku, Mr. Newell didn’t elaborate what a Steam console would look like — whether it would be a Linux-based Steam OS or a Windows-based HTPC made in partnership with an OEM — but made it clear that his company was dedicated to putting PC gaming in the living room.


Read more here: Gabe Newell: Valve Prepping Game Console | Hardware Canucks

[Skyllz]

Interesting...

As long as they keep it non-proprietary software for Steam, this is cool.

[headsh0t]

Cool, the rumours were true. Hopefully it does well against the current big guys. I wonder how far off it is though and what kind of hardware it will contain. Also, controllers.

[dandelioneater]

Interesting. I hope it is some sort of custom linux OS. I would be bummed out if they went the windows direction.

[Perineum]

I'm never a great predictor of these things but I would guess it would have to be Windows based for easy porting of the PC experience into the living room.

[headsh0t]

Possibly, but Gaben was pretty vocal about his disgust for Windows 8, its app store and the direction Windows is headed in general - which is why they've been focusing on the Linux Steam and porting over all of their titles.

[Perineum]

Ah ok, I didn't know that.

[Soultribunal]

So valve can make a console but they can't finish my HL3?
Damn Priorities, always getting in the way.

-ST

[frontier204]

I suppose it's related to the new button at the upper right-hand corner of the Steam window?
Big Picture Release

I don't quite get it... either Valve will jump into the crowded console business trying to get developers to port games to them or if it's Windows based, they'll start competing with pre-built gaming PCs (which have no problem attaching to "living room" stuff). Only Apple can pull stuff like this off without being a little niche product that no one cares about

[SKYMTL]

Actually, if you think about it, Valve has all of the ingredients for a console.

- Good distribution network
- Millions of existing clients
- A huge library of titles
- 1st, second and third party developer support

The only thing they're missing is an actual hardware platform.

However, make no mistake about it. If this is based on Linux and will only play Linux-supporting games, it will fail and fail miserably.