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Teleglitch patched for controller support, new DLC adds 'music to kill by'
On this, the day if its first DLC pack release, Teleglitch: Die More Edition has also been updated with full controller support and a deep, limited-engagement discount on Steam. The Guns and Tunes pack, available now for $1.99, adds "music to kill by and the weapons to make it happen:" Eight new starter weapons/utilities, five new songs that "enhance your Teleglitch experience," and a new option to randomize weapons at the beginning of the game. Folks who pre-ordered Teleglitch before its release last July already own this DLC, the listing states. The game is now also fully compatible with Steam's Big Picture mode, thanks to its newly added controller support. When our own Dave Hinkle reviewed Teleglitch at launch, he described it as "a harsh mistress," saying that the game's true reward lies in "the empowerment you feel from besting the seemingly impossible odds." Snag Teleglitch: Die More Edition for just $3.25 until October 14.
Steam Box exists, will come in a variety of Steam Machines in 2014
Valve revealed the Steam Box today, under the name "Steam Machines." These boxes will come in multiple forms from different manufacturers in 2014, but all Steam Machines will run SteamOS. First, Valve is sending out 300 prototype boxes to Steam users, free, for testing purposes. See if you're eligible here. "Entertainment is not a one-size-fits-all world," Valve writes. "We want you to be able to choose the hardware that makes sense for you, so we are working with multiple partners to bring a variety of Steam gaming machines to market during 2014, all of them running SteamOS." Valve announced SteamOS on Monday, a Linux-based operating system designed to play Linux games and stream Windows and Mac games, along with other media, from a computer to the big screen. SteamOS streams over a user's home network and onto a TV using "any living room machine," as Valve put it. "Any machine" now includes the Steam Machines. Steam's Big Picture, the UI portion of a living room gaming system, entered public beta in September 2012. Valve founder Gabe Newell has been pitching the Steam Box (in everything but name) as a device to unify mobile, desktop and living room technologies, all possible with a Linux backbone. On Monday, Valve announced that "hundreds" of games are already running in native Linux on SteamOS, and AAA titles are making their way to SteamOS in 2014. Valve has one more announcement to make this week, in 48 hours. Update: Valve's final announcement, made on Friday, is the Steam Controller.
SteamOS streams from computer to a big screen using Linux
SteamOS is a Linux-based operating system built to stream Windows and Mac games, music, TV and movies from a computer to the big screen, along with native support for Linux games. SteamOS allows users to stream over their home networks and onto their TVs, "running on any living room machine." The new OS will be available "soon" for free. "In SteamOS, we have achieved significant performance increases in graphics processing, and we're now targeting audio performance and reductions in input latency at the operating system level," Valve writes. "Game developers are already taking advantage of these gains as they target SteamOS for their new releases." Valve says it is working with well-known media services for music, TV and movies on SteamOS. The new service of course incorporates Steam Family Sharing, allowing users to share their game libraries with friends, and will include more robust parental controls. This is the likely software portion of Steam Box, a device that Valve has been publicly toying with since March 2012. (In terms of Valve Time, a 1.5-year turnover is some seriously hyperspeed hardware.) Last week at LinuxCon, Valve boss Gabe Newell talked Steam Box and unified couch computing, noting that closed platforms can't bring together disparate technologies. Big Picture Mode, the supposed UI side of Steam Box, entered public beta in September 2012. Valve has two more announcements to make, with the next one scheduled in two days. The anticipation.
Valve boss Gabe Newell on Linux in the living room, more info next week
Valve has long touted the power of Linux as a gaming and networking platform, but at LinuxCon 2013 bossman Gabe Newell was really able to let his Linux love fly. He takes the crowd on a tour of gaming history, and how Valve is addressing the connected living room with the Steam Box and Steam Big Picture mode. Big Picture modifies the desk-focused UI of Steam for a couch-bound audience, making menus and games accessible with a controller. The Steam Box is the hardware extrapolation of Big Picture, putting a Linux-run PC that unifies mobile, desktop and living room technologies in a common family area. This unification is something other platforms can't do, Newell said. "Yes, in fact, you can take everything that you liked about your PC and get it to work in your living room – that's called Big Picture," Newell said. "Our next step, having done these other pieces, is now on the hardware side. There are sets of issues to making sure that whatever computing platform you have works well in a living room environment. There are thermal issues and sound issues, but there are also a bunch of input issues. The next step in our contribution to this is to release some work we've done on the hardware side." Next week Valve will release more information about its approach to unifying technologies and it will outline "the hardware opportunities that we see for bringing Linux into the living room," Newell said. In March, Newell said customers would see some Steam Box prototypes within four months. Other fun facts: Valve is developing a Linux debugger alongside its LLVM debugger, and when it updates a game such as Dota 2, Valve generates up to 3 percent of the worldwide LAN-based IP traffic.
Joe Danger, Joe Danger 2: The Movie somersaulting onto PC
Joe Danger's latest daredevil stunt is to ride both his games, Joe Danger and Joe Danger 2: The Movie, onto PCs via Steam. UK indie studio Hello Games told us a number of tweaks are coming to the PC versions, including Big Picture Mode and Steamworks support. The latter is for the games' level editors. which on PC feature "all the secret controls" Hello Games used to build both tricksters. Both games will support gamepad, mouse and keyboard controls. Other tweaks and additions include ghost records of other players for both games, and new levels. Prices and release dates are still to come. "It's weird, PC is actually Joe Danger's birthplace," Hello Games' Sean Murray told us. "We couldn't get hold of devkits when we started out, so I coded my first ever PC engine for the original Joe Danger, and we ended up developing the entire game on PC. I feel like the PC version has been brewing forever - but only played by four of us here in the office." We expect a few more people will be playing it when it comes to Steam. We gave the XBLA version of Joe Danger 2: The Movie a wheelie good four stars in our review, saying that it does the two things puzzle-racers should do: " tug at your need to beat them, and then tug at your need to beat them better." %Gallery-189935%
Adult Swim's Super Puzzle Platformer Deluxe hitting Steam soon
Super Puzzle Platformer Deluxe, a crazy mix of Tetris and Mega Man created by developer Andrew Morrish and published by Adult Swim, comes to Steam later today. The project started as a Flash game (playable for free) in which you shoot groups of blocks that fall from above. The "Deluxe" part is new, with the game having evolved to include eight different characters, six worlds, and local head-to-head multiplayer. Full controller support is also included, so you can play SPPD through Steam's Big Picture mode. Super Puzzle Platformer Deluxe is regularly priced at $7.99, though it'll be 25 percent off at launch. To celebrate, Adult Swim's also having a half-off sale on its first Steam release, Super House of Dead Ninjas, next Tuesday, May 28.
BioShock Infinite's PC specs revealed
BioShock Infinite's PC requirements have surfaced from the depths of the development sea, and the minimum specs aren't as tremendously demanding as one might imagine. We'd even wager that most modern-ish non-gaming laptops will be able to run Infinite, albeit at "Low" settings, provided that they run Vista (at least), rock an Intel Core 2 Duo/AMD Athlon X2 processor and have DirectX10 compatible on-board graphics.Irrational Games also dropped news that the PC version of Infinite will include controller support and is compatible with Steam's Big Picture Mode, in addition to supporting multiple monitors for those who really exceed the minimum system requirements. The game also spans three DVDs, due to the size of its textures. The full list of both Minimum and Recommended specifications can be found after the break.
Valve engineer: No plans to announce 'Steam Box' in 2013
Ben Krasnow, Valve electrical engineer and mad genius, has told Engadget that Valve will not be announcing plans for a consumer-friendly "Steam Box" PC this year. The news comes after German site Golem.de reported that Klasnow himself claimed Valve would make such an announcement. The alleged comments would have been made during a talk at the EHSM conference in Berlin last month, which Klasnow attended."With regards to the Steam Box news – there has been a lot of things stated in the media which I didn't say," Krasnow tells Engadget, "For example, it's true that we are working on getting Steam into the living room, and are planning for a hardware box, but we have no current plans to announce anything in 2013." Yesterday's report also stated that the device would run on Linux, though Krasnow says may or may not happen in the end. Still, even if Valve's official Steam Box won't be revealed this year, he says the company has many other hardware projects in the works that likely will be.Valve itself, meanwhile, tells Engadget that "Many PCs optimized for Steam and Big Picture will be shipping later this year," and that the company will brings some of these to its CES meetings, along with its own in-house prototypes. Indeed, smaller PCs designed for Steam and Big Picture mode are already being announced, specifically Xi3's diminutive "Piston" models revealed earlier this week. As if to drive the point home, Xi3's new PC was partially funded by Valve and will be featured in the company's booth at CES.
Rumor: Valve to unveil Steam Box this year, will use Linux
Valve's rumored "Steam Box," a compact PC designed to easily connect to televisions and leverage Steam's Big Picture Mode, will debut this year according to a report from German site Golem.de. Furthermore, the Steam Box will supposedly run on Linux. That wouldn't be too surprising given Valve head Gabe Newell's distaste for Windows 8 and the company's recent Linux push. The 2013 release also gels with Newell's recent comments predicting a spate of TV- and Steam-friendly hardware launching in 2013 from various companies, including Valve.The news was supposedly confirmed by Valve electrical engineer Ben Krasnow during the EHSM conference in Berlin last month. Krasnow, incidentally, was there to show off his homemade X-ray scanner. Given that his personal projects also include, among other things, a DIY rocket engine, we'd say he's probably qualified to help build a little computer.Valve has plenty of opportunities to announce the hardware this year, including GDC in March, E3 in June, Gamescom in August, or even CES, which takes place this week. For what it's worth, Valve chose to announce Big Picture Mode at GDC 2011. Of course, given this is Valve we're talking about, the company could just hold an event of its own.
Valve's Gabe Newell talks 'turnkey' living room hardware
With the recent launch of Steam Big Picture, it hasn't taken long for the words "Steam Box" to enter the collective gaming community's brain space. Valve boss Gabe Newell reignited that discussion when speaking on the red carpet at last night's Video Game Awards ceremony about the company's plans to enter the hardware business.Newell told Kotaku that he sees multiple companies entering the hardware space, and that "most customers and most developers are gonna find that [the PC is] a better environment for them." His reasoning is that consumers "won't have to split the world into thinking about 'why are my friends in the living room, why are my video sources in the living room different from everyone else?' So in a sense we hopefully are gonna unify those environments."The Valve boss suggested that companies would launch PC bundles in 2013 designed to run Steam in the living room and compete with next gen consoles. Newell added that Valve is one of those companies, and its efforts may not be as open-source as some might expect:"Well certainly our hardware will be a very controlled environment. If you want more flexibility, you can always buy a more general purpose PC. For people who want a more turnkey solution, that's what some people are really gonna want for their living room. The nice thing about a PC is a lot of different people can try out different solutions, and customers can find the ones that work best for them."
Steam Big Picture is live, weeklong sale on controller-friendly games
Steam Big Picture, the mode that transforms Steam into a big-screen service easily controllable with a gamepad, is officially live now, following a beta that began in September. To celebrate, a range of games that fully support controllers are on sale through December 10 at 10 a.m. PT, some for up to 75 percent off.A few games on sale are Tiny and Big: Grandpa's Leftovers, Castle Crashers, Portal 2 (now with split-screen), Left 4 Dead 2, A Virus Named Tom and Mark of the Ninja. There are more than 30 games on sale, all of them featuring full controller support.Steam breaks down games into full and partial controller support: There are 41 games with full support and 387 with partial, though on the Big Picture sale page Steam lists 70 with full and 851 with partial, so there may be some hiding in the rafters. All games are accessible in Big Picture mode, though not all support gamepads, of course.
Portal 2 gets split-screen and Big Picture support on Steam
Steam's Portal 2 now supports split-screen and Big Picture mode, meaning PC and Mac players can enjoy inter-spatial robo-cooperation on their TV sets. Valve's patch notes say split-screen co-op is accessed by pressing X on the second controller in the first co-op menu.The patch also fixed a couple of minor errors, including not being able to exit the Robot Enrichment or Create Test Chambers menus with the controller. We at the Joystiq Enrichment Center would like to remind you that any inability to exit Joystiq is perfectly regular, and your enforced presence on our website is most appreciated.
First Valve hardware to go into beta next year
Valve in-house hardware hacker Jeri Ellsworth told Engadget that she hopes to hold an external beta test, tied to Steam, for the company's first hardware product next year. Internal beta tests within Valve are already ongoing.She wasn't clear on what the device would be, but the stated goal is "to make Steam games more fun to play in your living room." The new hardware is some kind of input method to improve playability of PC games using Big Picture Mode. It could be a controller, or it could be some kind of keyboard/mouse combination.Or it could be maracas. Maracas have proven perfect for every game we've tried them with, including Samba De Amigo, and ...
Valve's first hardware beta starting by next year, wearable computing still far off
Valve Software's hardware division is still in its infancy. Despite having existed for over a year, recruitment is still its primary concern -- "prototyping is almost secondary," longtime inventor/hacker/now Valve employee Jeri Ellsworth told us in an interview this week. As the team ramps up, production becomes more and more prolific, of course; Ellsworth lights up when she talks about the work her team is doing now. She gets verbose when asked about corporate culture at Valve, about how she's never worked at a company where risk and failure are so acceptable -- even encouraged. She's visibly excited about the prototypes she's creating at Valve's new prototyping facility, but manages to contain herself enough to not let slip exactly what her and her team are working on. When asked what the team's immediate goals are, she obliquely states, "To make Steam games more fun to play in your living room." That's the team's one-year goal, at least. The challenge is making games that require a mouse and keyboard palatable to people who are used to a controller, or to people who just don't want to migrate PC controls to the comfort of their living room. Working in tandem with Steam's newly beta'd "Big Picture Mode," Ellsworth's team is creating a hardware solution to the control barriers found in many Steam games. She wouldn't give any hints as to what that solution is exactly, but she left no options off the table -- from Phantom Lapboard-esque solutions to hybrid controllers. Regardless, it sounds like gamers will have a chance to give feedback on those designs, as Valve's hardware team is planning a beta for its various products. Ellsworth is hoping to have one for the team's first product in the coming year -- we'll of course know much more about the product by then, she says. Internal beta tests are already underway, and a variety of the team's prototypes are available in the office for other Valve employees to tool around with. The next step is getting prototypes into gamers hands -- she says Valve already has a production line for short runs, making a beta possible -- and iterating on design before launch. As for how the beta will be handled, she posits it'll be tied to Steam in some way, but no logistics are anywhere near nailed down.
Steam Big Picture beta hands-on
Been keeping up with Steam's Big Picture interface? Then you probably know it's already in beta. The 10-foot UI hopes to help Valve's content distribution portal get comfortable in front of your couch, offering gamers access to their favorite PC titles from a gamepad-friendly interface. We piped the beta out to our own living room to take a look, and weren't surprised to find a sleek attractive UI with a heap of polish. That said, we were glad we didn't leave our mouse and keyboard at the office.
Details on Steam's Big Picture Mode before this afternoon's beta [update: You can now opt in]
Steam's Big Picture Mode, the new menu designed for use on TVs, will be available in beta today, as reported over the weekend. More information, including screenshots of the menu, was released today, including the look at the on-screen keyboard.The "lotus" style keyboard (as in the flower, not the software company) has users tilt an analog stick in one of eight directions to highlight a cluster of letters, then hit a colored button to specify the letter. It's a weird-looking solution to the problem of on-screen typing, but a Valve staffer told Kotaku that when people try it, "they're almost instantly faster than [when using] QWERTY."Big Picture also includes a web browser, which can be used simultaneously with a game through a multitasking feature. You can switch back and forth, Kotaku reports, without going back to your PC's desktop.This isn't necessarily a first step toward the legendary "Steam Box" console. "What we really want is to ship [Big Picture mode] and then learn," Big Picture Mode team leader Greg Coomer said. "So we want to find out what people value about that. How they make use of it. When they make use of it. Whether it's even a good idea for the broadest set of customers or not. And then decide what to do next."Update: A trailer for Big Picture Mode, above, shows the keyboard in motion, along with other features.Update 2: Steam users can now opt in to the beta for Big Picture Mode! Go into settings, select "Steam Beta Update" and restart the Steam client. Once you've completed that, you'll see the Big Picture button in the top right-hand corner.
Valve launching Steam Big Picture Mode later today, look at its snappy UI right now (update: it's live!)
As rumored, Valve's bringing its digital distribution gaming portal to televisions today with Steam "Big Picture Mode." Kotaku confirms the news this morning that the TV-friendly version of Steam will launch "later today," alongside a slurry of screenshots and impressions. Beyond what we already know about the service -- it's the full Steam we already know and love, albeit with controller-based input -- a variety of new details abound. A built-in web browser, for one, and a new form of text input for controllers which seems to massively trump the usually QWERTY setup. The entire store is apparently navigable via controller (though mouse and keyboard still work, if that's your kinda thing), and you can even prioritize games based on what's workable with a gamepad. Does this mean that the long-rumored "Steambox" is headed to living rooms soon? Not so fast, says Valve. "We really don't have a road map. And we think we're going to learn a tremendous amount through this first release." Big Picture Mode's beta is PC-only for now, but a Mac version is promised as coming "soon." Update: Users can now opt-in to test the mode and download a beta version of Steam. Hit the second source link below to get started. [Thanks, Yannick]
NYT: Steam's Big Picture public beta begins Monday
Can't wait to use Steam's forthcoming Big Picture mode to game from the comfort of your couch? Well, you're in luck, because it might be ready for a test drive tomorrow. According to The New York Times, the living room-friendly user interface is getting the public beta treatment starting Monday. Gabe Newell let loose last month that both the TV-geared view and Steam for Linux betas would be "out there fairly quickly," but there's still no word on when the Ubuntu-bound preview will land. In the meantime, we'll keep busy by gawking at Valve's augmented reality headset, which the NYT got a glimpse of during a trip to the firm's headquarters, at the source link below.
New York Times: Steam Big Picture public beta starts Monday
Last August, we found out that Steam's Big Picture interface would be moving into its beta phase "soon," but we never expected it would be, like, soon. It is Valve after all, and we never figured that Big Picture's public beta would happen in our lifetimes, let alone on Monday, September 10, like the New York Times says.For those of you who haven't been following this song's bouncing ball, allow us to refresh your memory: Steam's Big Picture interface is a custom UI designed specifically to make Valve's all-encompassing digital storefront more user-friendly on televisions. It's being designed with controller-based navigation in mind and would represent Valve's first formal step into the living room. Whether Monday's testing is truly public or invitation based like its Community beta remains to be seen.
Steam 'Big Picture' beta coming soon
On tonight's episode of GTTV, Valve's Gabe Newell revealed that a beta for Big Picture mode would launch "soon." Big Picture mode, first announced in early 2011, will allow gamers to hook up their PC or Mac to their living room television – well, okay, it doesn't have to be in your living room, just wherever you've got a TV. Valve aims to offer "simple, easy-to-read navigation designed specifically for TV" and controller support with Big Picture mode.Tonight's episode of GTTV isn't available online yet (it's still technically on Spike TV on the east coast, if you want to catch the last few minutes) so we're going off host Geoff Keighley's Twitter account right now. We'll be sure to update as more information is made available. In the meanwhile, go grab a rag and dust off that moldy old television set!
