Steam sharing beta. Exactly what it says on the tin - by Phatose
icemann on 15/9/2013 at 04:47
Monkey business as in?
bleaksand on 15/9/2013 at 12:11
Quote Posted by icemann
Monkey business as in?
If it's devices that get authorized, then library-sharing with a friend or family member also extends to everyone else in that household.
Fafhrd on 23/9/2013 at 20:05
(
http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamOS/) SteamOS. Suddenly the 'authorize ten devices' and 'installed games' thing with Family Sharing makes a lot more sense. Somebody on a different account playing on the SteamOS box in the living room wants to play a game from the gaming PC that isn't available natively on SteamOS, they can ask for authorization and stream it. Somebody wants to play something from the main account on the gaming PC, it kicks the living room guy off.
Yakoob on 24/9/2013 at 03:34
I normally leap over valve like a rabid fanboy but this has me scratching my head. While it has some awesome features, like streaming, cloud storage, sharing, workshops/community/etc i kind of feel its... Not the best idea.
if it really is limited to games and allows for hot swapping hardware, its sounding like a more feature-restricted console with incosistent and unknow specs for devs to aim for. So little of the benefits of consoles with all the hassles of pc development, oh yay...
Unless you never actually run games on it and it just functions as a streaming device for your computer with few extra perks like music/movie player or Internet browsing. Hmmmm...
Fafhrd on 24/9/2013 at 04:54
What's not to get? It's a customized Linux distro that will (likely) have more consistent driver support than Linux has had in the past. It's not going to be 'limited to games' any more than any other PC OS is. And it will remain an open platform, while it is entirely in the realm of possibility that Windows won't be for much longer (unless post-Ballmer Microsoft admits that Metro for desktops was the stupidest thing ever and starts back-pedalling on a lot of those decisions).
Phatose on 24/9/2013 at 13:46
What's the point? Steam's big advantage versus consoles is it's existing library. Unless this thing is going to run current windows games, it's gonna come up real short on reasons to buy it over a PS4.
Yakoob on 24/9/2013 at 16:02
Quote Posted by Fafhrd
What's not to get? It's a customized Linux distro that will (likely) have more consistent driver support than Linux has had in the past. It's not going to be 'limited to games' any more than any other PC OS is. And it will remain an open platform, while it is entirely in the realm of possibility that Windows won't be for much longer (unless post-Ballmer Microsoft admits that Metro for desktops was the stupidest thing ever and starts back-pedalling on a lot of those decisions).
See, the thing is, I'm not so sure that's the case. They way they're touting it as just-games etc. it's almost sounding like it's basically locked down to be running fullscreen Steam all the time, only with linux as hardware-interfacing backend. Hence my comment, if that's the case, of more limited console with the hassles of PC "unknown specs" development...
But it's really muddy now, so hard to tell. Oh valve, you such a tease :P
Sulphur on 24/9/2013 at 20:09
It's a custom Linux distro, and it's going to be open. It says so right (
http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamOS/) here.
Quote:
"Content creators can connect directly to their customers. Users can alter or replace any part of the software or hardware they want. Gamers are empowered to join in the creation of the games they love."
So pretty much a Linux kernel tweaked for games that isn't walled off. Sounds intriguing... if you want to use Linux.
Dresden on 24/9/2013 at 21:46
I'm confused. How is SteamOS supposed to run games without DirectX? Isn't it Windows only?
Fafhrd on 24/9/2013 at 21:51
There are ~300 Linux capable games on Steam right now, including all of Valve's games. Later this week Valve is going to be announcing a slate of games from various companies coming to Linux next year, and they're going to continue to push companies releasing on Steam to do a Linux port as well. And since the PS4 is all OpenGL, building a Linux version off of the PS4 branch of any multiplatform game should represent roughly the same level of difficulty as porting the Xbox 360 or Xbox One branch to Windows.
