Valve's Steam Machines Delayed, Won't Be Coming In 2014 134
sfcrazy (1542989) writes "Valve has announced that its Steam Machines won't be available in the market anytime in 2014. The company delayed the release due to ongoing work on the Steam Controller. Valve's Eric Hope explains on Steam Forums why the work on controller is causing the delay: 'We're now using wireless prototype controllers to conduct live playtests, with everyone from industry professionals to die-hard gamers to casual gamers. It's generating a ton of useful feedback, and it means we'll be able to make the controller a lot better. Of course, it's also keeping us pretty busy making all those improvements. Realistically, we're now looking at a release window of 2015, not 2014.'"
Re:Controller-friendly games from micro-ISVs (Score:4, Informative)
Others reading this discussion may not know the answer to that question. Please repeat the answer not for my benefit but for theirs.
Okay.
Say a video game developer that is a home-based family business is working on a controller-friendly game. For which platform should it develop this game?
All of them. Well to be more specific as many as you can. Since it's controller-friendly you'd want to focus on the PS3/PS4/Vita/360/Xboxone/DS with less focus on the Wii/Wiiu. You could also support PC with the 360 controller.
Multi-platform is the way to go.
Re:Cloud gaming (Score:4, Informative)
You are missing half the point of steamOS/steambox. One half is to make the 'PC' platform big-screent tv-living-room gaming friendly.
The other half, is that its Valves hedge against Microsoft destroying their entire business by altering windows.
Valve saw Metro, Microsoft accounts to sign in being the preferred default, and the Windows App Store. They saw Windows RT with complete and total lock down. They heard the rumours of Windows going subscription based, and cloud based.
Steambox/SteamOS is a hedge against Microsoft Windows becoming hostile to Steam.