I was among the very first if not the first person to believe that SteamOS and Steam Machines would come back and have tremendous success -- and they did in the form of Steam Deck after rebasing on Immutable Arch -- brilliant.

I'm really having trouble inferring this "leak" as Valve preparing to re-enter the Living Room market.

I would argue that when SteamOS initially came out that their partners at the time were a big hindrance -- for example Dell/Alienware had a lot of overheating problems which lead to RMAs and the consoles breaking. And the Zotac consoles and others IIRC were priced at a unaffordable rate.

Valve, if you're listening -- I think the strat of having a really economical low cost entry device (such as the Steam Deck @ $399) while described as "painful" is an important part of strategy -- once people can talk themselves into buying the base model -- they can talk themselves into buying the upgraded version -- we saw that with Steam Deck higher speced machines selling well.

Also, partners matter -- having fewer hardware targets made it easier on developers to have fewer specs to target, and allowed for more quality control which were invaluable at brand and reputation building.

I have bought probably 8 Steam Decks by now and gifted them to family and friends, run Steam Linux on a giant TV, and have a bunch of Linux PCs for LAN Steam PvP.

My point -- having 4-6 people play on the living room TV on Xbox One XS controllers captures a certain kind of fun and convenience that is hard to replicate -- you only have to do the updates on 1 machine, you sit on the couch and play with friends and family and it's a blast (Eg: Ninja turtles game)

I think this __COULD__ be a stationary machine intended to be used in conjunction with Deckard, but the reality is that a standalone Deckard or a Steam Deck 2 probably have larger markets -- I kind of expect most potential gamers (children/teens age 10-20) to be used to a standalone device like cellphones for content consumption -- I wouldn't be surprised if TVs become a kind of "relic" of "the old days" as user habits change.

I would welcome a Steam Controller v2, I would also just welcome better interfacing of Steam Decks as controllers on a Big TV in the living room for up to 6-8 player PvP games on one screen.

I am not sure if most PC gamers would go for something like this because I think most people typically would just build a living room HTPC out of whatever spare parts or extra machine they have.

I do think the 10k-20k games situation greatly improves this.

If Valve wants to compete for the non-PC gamer console-gamer market, this could potentially tap that previously untapped market -- especially as cost of games has recently increased and Valve/Steam is a much better deal dollar per value.

I just think that sociologically, and psychologically the PC and Console player differ, and tapping the console gamer might require some new & optimized strats.

Also, I think that to be real, Oculus as a standalone gained so much traction for being able to be standalone, and enable players to be 'naughty' in the same way 'Back Massagers' became popular decades ago. Having a tethered VR, even wirelessly I am still 50/50 on whether or not it would deliver superior value to players.

I think that this "Living Room" could enhance existing valve tech like leveraging in home streaming to Phones, existing TVs in various rooms, to existing customers Steam Decks, Laptops, and other low powered devices, etc...

The "playing with tha boyz" IRL on the couch Halo 3, ODST, Reach has been dead since Microsoft made Halo 4 online 2 players per screen, and the internet bandwidth increased allowing people to connect remotely better.

I do think there is a multi-million dollar market, if not multi-billion dollar left behind by this hubris & meddling to try to "sell more copies".

If there were a few 4-6 player games on a big TV, with the right controllers, I think it could push a console like an avalanche billions of dollars, current sales models are SaaS, pay to win, and pay to be fancy -- but to win a player-bases love creates loyal consumers which pay out big (I mean I did by 8 steam decks because I believe in Valve bigtime for decades).

I would suggest treading optimistically, but cautiously as was the case with Steam Deck launch. I just really hope that if they do something new and it's x86_64 that it's AMD like Steam Deck -- it keeps costs lower, the drivers are better because their open source, more stable, and I think the thermals are more manageable for mid range too.

I would also strongly recommend having "personalization" styling options for Steam Controller v2 and any devices as was the case with Steam Deck White, and Steam Deck Limited Editions (Orange) -- consumers love to "make the device their own" -- in the same way Steam Deck boot splash has a major hit.

<3 Valve.

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Major props to 1047 Games, they may have had their infamous moments, but this is the kind of moves legends make

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Nintendo has neglected everything outside their favorite 3 franchises.

After the disappointment of Selaco, whenever I see "X (new) game is like Y (old) game" I am pessimistic now.

Freedom Planet, and Ex-Zodiac didn't really cure my itch for a "Starfox" formula game.

Selaco didn't cure the itch for "Duke Nukem".

But to steelman, Stardew Valley did cure my itch for "Harvest Moon" and go on to make millions of dollars.

From the trailer, I have zero interest in the "art", "characters" and "story" -- seeing too much of that makes me concerned the mechanics might not make the game stand up and cure the itch.

I really hope you can mute or minimize the in game inter-character chatter too. All I want is to fly a ship around, blow stuff up, PvP Multiplayer, and if they made it possible to drive a Tank like in 64 that would peak my interest.

I hope the best, I think there is a multi million dollar market here like the void of Harvest Moon used to have before SDV, but it's gonna take a very special labor of love to be able to tap it.

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THE WRITING IS ON THE WALL. VOTE WITH YOUR DOLLAR.

NEVER FORGIVE A CORPORATION. NEVER FORGET.

It's been apparent for years that PAYPAL and others wanted to manipulate and control the market by selectively debanking individuals and businesses.

This goes deeper than just "transactions" -- there is a power -- stalking the land -- that wants to __eliminate__ video games all together. There are places in the world that limit video games to __1 hour per day__ only within certain times.

THEY'RE COMING FOR YOUR GAMES

Everything that touches the internet will be dead likely very soon.

Some big things are around the corner -- and I'm pretty sure none of us will be happy with what they are when they reveal themselves to us.

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So, ... now Nvidia Executives are confirming what we intuitively determined years ago (governments want to use their software & hardware as a backdoor)

Logical Psychopathy, Madman strat with big balls just coming out and saying it putting the blame where it belongs, much respect.

They appear to have self-preservation.

They appear to understand that making their products a military proxy will lead to the destruction of their wealth and understand that would be not in their or their investors interests.

Now lets see how they do dismounting the tiger without becoming dinner.

What's apparent from the last few years, is that there has been a shakeup, and for some reason a ton of backdoors have been closed ( CUPS ). I'm guessing there is a new generation of backdoors that have already taken their place and that information will not be shared with non-"friends".

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The stats are pretty interesting:

India ( 8.46% )

US ( 5.24% )
https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/united-states-of-america [External Link]

Europe ( 4.31% )
https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/europe [External Link]

World ( 3.9% )

We're on the right path, much thanks to everyone who has laid stones on this roadway to bliss.

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(MasterCard used Payment Processors to talk to Valve) (Valve requested direct communication with MasterCard and were declined) (Payment Processors) specifically cited Mastercard’s Rule 5.12.7 and risk to the Mastercard brand.

El_Risitas_Laugh.gif

This is hilarious because as I understand it MasterCard is now in the "it wasn't us" -- "deny" phase. They are acting like it's not them but they are cowards to not tell the public, if someone gave the order -- who gave the order?

So much damage has been done to their brand. Whoever gave the order must have calculated the cost because the fallout from this may lead to VISA / MasterCard annihilation in the future.

I'm really pleased, the more they try to tighten grip, the closer they bring themselves to their own dissolution.

Black markets are what give a currency its value in their early phases -- their attempt to control & prohibit will only feed the rise of the next beast to take their place.

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No coward can ever be trusted

"Cowards can never be moral. Here is why: People can know what is right and even want to do what is right but still not act rightly." - Mohandas Gandhi

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I hope the art style remains playful and not too detailed -- when things translate from anime, manga, or drawings into 3d or even 2d into 3d the shock factor can multiply. It has to keep the playful fantasy style to remain fun -- too much realism would be too distracting and kill this game for me.

Looks okayish so far. It would be funny if they stole a page from Serious Sam 3 and did Hippy gore mode or something with flowers for funzies.

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SplitGate 1: 91% Positive
SplitGate 2: 61% Positive

So first they pandered to half of the people with a "Make FPS Great Again" hat, pissing off the other half.

Then they doubled down while announcing $80-145 micro transactions for "skins" pissing everyone off.

Then they pissed off the previously unpissed off half by pandering and begging for forgiveness or something like that.

Did I get that right?

--

Now they are attempting to narcicistically rationalize their mistakes away that they: "launched too early", "bit off more than we could chew" and use excuses like "boneheaded mistakes".

--

Things that should have been learned:

1. Keep your political opinions separate from your business.

2. If you piss off spiteful evangelical activists -- DO NOT BACKTRACK -- you will never be forgiven anyways.

3. Everyone hates expensive micro-transactions.

--

What now? They should:

1. Fail Often
2. Fail Early and
3. Fail Upward

They might as well take some big risks now.

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