Rumour: Valve working on a "Steam Box" console

[nsane.forums]

Have an Xbox 360 or a PS3? You might want to make some room in your cabinet for a new console Valve is working on.

Once upon a time, it was that annoying updater bundled with your brand new copies of Half Life 2. You couldn't play your new game without getting this Steaming pile of... matter to work properly. Oh, how the years have gone by and we're enjoying crazy Steam sales with minigames emptying our wallets in our crazy pursuit of achievements, or remarking how cool it is to get a game working on Windows, Mac OS X, and oh yes, the PS3. Just by making one single purchase.

Granted, for now only the Portal 2 PS3 copy can lay claim to elegant platform ubiquity. But what if Valve were to make this possibility happen on an entirely new bit of hardware for your living room (or a dorm room, if applicable) setup?

That's what a new exclusive report from The Verge is speculating. Recall last year, when Valve revealed a new "big picture" mode for Steam, whereby gamers can enjoy their favourite Steam games from the comfort of their couch, provided the game they're playing has controller support.

That bit isn't new, but what is new are reports that Valve is working with hardware manufacturers to develop a standardized specification for what a Steam Box should be like. Kind of like Google's relationship with their Android partners. According to The Verge, said baseline specifications are what you'd get in a beefy PC: a Core i7 CPU, 8 gigabytes of RAM, and some NVIDIA video card.

Of course, considering Steam Boxes are essentially fancified desktop computers, the box can run any PC game out there (including those that require a Steam competitor to run or update), and - thank the heavens - no licensing fees or expensive devkits. Indie developers rejoice!

There's also this new patent from Valve that The Verge dug up. It appears to be a proprietary controller, but with some biometric additions and the ability to customize the controller based on the game type. Barring that, the Steam Box will still accept traditional USB controllers.

We might hear more about this in the upcoming Game Developers Conference next week, or maybe E3 in the spring. In the meantime, it would be nice for them to have some example of a desktop PC modeled like a console. (Oh wait, there is.)

View: Original Article

[DKT27]

Only if they bundle Half Life 3 and Portal 3 with it. :)

[Nemesis]

that is cool, i would look into it if this device if it did indeed became availabe.

[Frosticles]

Looks cool, my only slight concern i suppose is that all that high end intel & nvidia stuff (which is awesome) could kick out alot of heat, so hopefully they will be able to sort that with some form of interesting heat-sink array possibly

[RadioActive]

Core i7 and 8GB RAM is a bit of overkill IMO..

[Nemesis]

Core i7 and 8GB RAM is a bit of overkill IMO..

future proofing. only thing you would need to upgrade every few years would be a graphics card.

[DKT27]

Has a prototype "Steam Box" been shown already?

A new rumor claims that a picture of a prototype "Steam Box" was posted on the Internet months ago by Valve team member Greg Coomer and that Valve has up to 10 people working on it.

The Internet is currently buzzing with rumors that Valve may be working with PC hardware makers on creating the specifications for what is being called a "Steam Box"; basically a PC desktop dedicated to PC gaming. Now there's a rumor that a Valve employee might have posted up a picture of one of Valve's prototypes for such a Steam Box months ago.

According to Kotaku, their unnamed tipster claims that Valve currently has between five to 10 people working on the Steam Box project, led by Valve team member Greg Coomer. Oddly enough, Coomer posted word on his Twitter page months ago that he was building a small PC. In a tweet from November, he even posted a picture of this PC. The message itself was, "Built this tiny PC. i7 quad core, 8GB ram, Zotac Z-68 mobo w/ onnboard Nvidia mobile gfx. Runs Portal 2 FAST."

Why is this significant? Because the article on The Verge that broke the Steam Box story claims the prototype that was allegedly shown to some possible hardware partners at CES 2012 in January was a "hand-built version of the device". Furthermore, it claimed the device had a "Core i7 CPU, 8GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA GPU."

The unknown source for the Kotaku story does claim that the specification for both Coomer's hand-built PC and the CES prototype "DOES NOT necessarily reflect what's going to be used as the 'baseline' specification for the final product(s)." So if Valve really is working on such a game console-like PC box, these hardware specs may be upgraded.

In any case, Valve has yet to comment publicly on these reports but it's possible that an announcement may come as early as this week during the Game Developers Conference, or in June at E3 2012.

:view: View: Original Article

[RadioActive]

Core i7 and 8GB RAM is a bit of overkill IMO..

Not even worth that. have you seen the hardware used in XBOX360 and PS3? It's almost archaic compared to modern specifications yet it delivers! It's all about the game development rather than sheer hardware requirements IMO.