I’ve been alternating between being wholly involved with school or Animal Crossing. I’d atone for being so one-track-minded, but I haven’t unlocked a “sorry” emote yet. Legitimately incapable or apologies.
Monday, September 30, 2013
From the Depths of Game Obsession
I’ve been alternating between being wholly involved with school or Animal Crossing. I’d atone for being so one-track-minded, but I haven’t unlocked a “sorry” emote yet. Legitimately incapable or apologies.
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
SteamOS and Consolification
I've been so inundated with schoolwork that I didn't even know to look for the announcement. Thank god Twitter blows up at the smallest waves in the internetosphere, and that I feel no guilt in perusing the 140-character news bursts while dashing to class. (On that note: sorry to the bicyclist who must have thought I had some sort of bizarre walk pattern as I dashed out in front of you, stopped suddenly, did an excited arm flail, then looked terrorized before dashing off again, requiring you to swerve manically out of my unpredictable path. But, to be fair, us peds are known to be wily and thus why you aren't supposed to be riding on the sidewalk to begin with, so it's your own fault, really.)
I'm generally a Valve enthusiast, loving the games they make, supporting their platform.Valve has honestly tried new things without reserve. They support and market indie games, they embrace new distribution methods. Steam was ridiculously brilliant when it came out and continues to be brilliant. The Steam community is vast and varied, connecting gamers cross-genre. They seamlessly integrated the community into their platform, they make fantastic games, they experiment with new mechanics. They're hiring researchers to study their community. (They think that their community is something worth studying. And oh em gee it feels awesome to have my studies validated after coming up against derision for so long and so consistently.) Basically, they are super rad.
So when they announced yesterday that they are releasing SteamOS, for free, in 2014, my first reaction was to do the aforementioned spastic-arm-flail-of-excitement. And then, because I'm a worrier, I got worried. I feel no shame in the worry-- come, worry with me. But first, excitement justification:
Giddies:
Stream-to-TV: By including the feature to stream games from your PC to the TV, you feasibly give yourself the ability to choose how you want to play your game, at that moment. Feeling the need to be as horizontal as possible, perhaps in Batman footy jammies? Stream it to the telly and couch it. Want to capture one of Bioware's touching romantic scenes so you can finish your Garrus/Tali/Thane/Liara tribute video? Motivate yourself to your computer. That can be within the same day if your gameplay moods are as fickle as mine.
Resolution of the Romeo and Juliet Dynamic that is the Console/PC Divide but Without Tragic Circumstances: I've long bemoaned the rift between PC and console players of the same game. I play TF2 on PC, but my friends seem to be more comfortable controlling fine actions with the unwieldy flippers commonly found attached to a controller. (It's fine, I don't judge.) Even worse, we can't settle this in true gamer fashion as we've never been able to play together while using our respective platforms. On SteamOS, this divide is effectively removed, and the battle of which-is-better can actually be based on statistical win data.
One Platform to Rule Them All: My couch friends are my PC friends, and my couch achievements will be my PC achievements.
Worries:
Linux is Scary: For those used to buying a box and just having it work, SteamOS will take a bit more to implement. Choosing (or building!) a box and installing OS could be intimidating to those on the busier or less technologically inclined. I assume that Steam will be announcing just such a box to get around these concerns, but until then, I'm leaving this on the list. And while Steam already has tech support, there is the additional issues that arise from using Linux. Already, many people can troubleshoot their own problems on Mac, Windows, or even their consoles. Linux quite a bit less used, and hardware developers may not have had Linux in mind when creating their drivers.
A Question of Interest: Do Steam players want to play in front of the telly? Or are they part of the Steam community in part because the mouse-and-keyboard calls to them? If this is the case, how will they be incited to become couch converts?
Conversion usability: As of now, the only way to use a controller with Steam games is to plug it in as a peripheral and map the controls to your liking. This could be a deterrent to the plug-in-and-go group, and be difficult for devs to find time to pause work on the current projects to retrofit a new control scheme. (Especially all those lovely indie devs that have less manpower to reallocate.)
How We Play: I've mentioned the player-gamer interface issue a couple times in my worry list, so maybe this is indicative of a broader question. Is there a new way we could consider playing in the living room? Something with the fine control of the mouse and keyboard, and the relaxed mechanics of the controller? Such a system would be perfect for the Steam Box, but I've heard absolute zero discussion on input device redesign with these goals in mind. I suppose all controllers are trying to be better versions of the one before, but they seem to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary.
Steam has promised two more announcements this week which I'm sure will illuminate some of the specifics of the living room experience they have planned for us. But Steam has the ability to play with and redesign our expectations and perceived possibilities in how we play games. And judging from their history, we're likely to see something interesting. I'll try to be more stationary this time when the news comes out.
I'm generally a Valve enthusiast, loving the games they make, supporting their platform.Valve has honestly tried new things without reserve. They support and market indie games, they embrace new distribution methods. Steam was ridiculously brilliant when it came out and continues to be brilliant. The Steam community is vast and varied, connecting gamers cross-genre. They seamlessly integrated the community into their platform, they make fantastic games, they experiment with new mechanics. They're hiring researchers to study their community. (They think that their community is something worth studying. And oh em gee it feels awesome to have my studies validated after coming up against derision for so long and so consistently.) Basically, they are super rad.
So when they announced yesterday that they are releasing SteamOS, for free, in 2014, my first reaction was to do the aforementioned spastic-arm-flail-of-excitement. And then, because I'm a worrier, I got worried. I feel no shame in the worry-- come, worry with me. But first, excitement justification:
Giddies:
Stream-to-TV: By including the feature to stream games from your PC to the TV, you feasibly give yourself the ability to choose how you want to play your game, at that moment. Feeling the need to be as horizontal as possible, perhaps in Batman footy jammies? Stream it to the telly and couch it. Want to capture one of Bioware's touching romantic scenes so you can finish your Garrus/Tali/Thane/Liara tribute video? Motivate yourself to your computer. That can be within the same day if your gameplay moods are as fickle as mine.
Resolution of the Romeo and Juliet Dynamic that is the Console/PC Divide but Without Tragic Circumstances: I've long bemoaned the rift between PC and console players of the same game. I play TF2 on PC, but my friends seem to be more comfortable controlling fine actions with the unwieldy flippers commonly found attached to a controller. (It's fine, I don't judge.) Even worse, we can't settle this in true gamer fashion as we've never been able to play together while using our respective platforms. On SteamOS, this divide is effectively removed, and the battle of which-is-better can actually be based on statistical win data.
One Platform to Rule Them All: My couch friends are my PC friends, and my couch achievements will be my PC achievements.
Worries:
Linux is Scary: For those used to buying a box and just having it work, SteamOS will take a bit more to implement. Choosing (or building!) a box and installing OS could be intimidating to those on the busier or less technologically inclined. I assume that Steam will be announcing just such a box to get around these concerns, but until then, I'm leaving this on the list. And while Steam already has tech support, there is the additional issues that arise from using Linux. Already, many people can troubleshoot their own problems on Mac, Windows, or even their consoles. Linux quite a bit less used, and hardware developers may not have had Linux in mind when creating their drivers.
A Question of Interest: Do Steam players want to play in front of the telly? Or are they part of the Steam community in part because the mouse-and-keyboard calls to them? If this is the case, how will they be incited to become couch converts?
Conversion usability: As of now, the only way to use a controller with Steam games is to plug it in as a peripheral and map the controls to your liking. This could be a deterrent to the plug-in-and-go group, and be difficult for devs to find time to pause work on the current projects to retrofit a new control scheme. (Especially all those lovely indie devs that have less manpower to reallocate.)
How We Play: I've mentioned the player-gamer interface issue a couple times in my worry list, so maybe this is indicative of a broader question. Is there a new way we could consider playing in the living room? Something with the fine control of the mouse and keyboard, and the relaxed mechanics of the controller? Such a system would be perfect for the Steam Box, but I've heard absolute zero discussion on input device redesign with these goals in mind. I suppose all controllers are trying to be better versions of the one before, but they seem to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary.
Steam has promised two more announcements this week which I'm sure will illuminate some of the specifics of the living room experience they have planned for us. But Steam has the ability to play with and redesign our expectations and perceived possibilities in how we play games. And judging from their history, we're likely to see something interesting. I'll try to be more stationary this time when the news comes out.
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