Two days ago, the network was informed about Valve’s drastic steps towards Steam Machines. Initially, it was thought that these would be completely removed from the stores, but one of the employees decided to explain the situation.
He did it right here, and his entry shows some really interesting things. The first is a response to the allegations that the Steam Machines project had (allegedly) die. Such a thesis was made by many people who supported it with the disappearance of the appropriate tab from the menu “Equipment”In the Steam store. It turned out, however, that it was a purely aesthetic procedure, because analyzing the network traffic and the low interest of users, the creators found that there is no point in cluttering the interface.
Even the author, Pierre-Loup, confirmed the low popularity of the equipment in the aforementioned entry. However, it claims that Valve’s plans to develop an open platform for players have not changed at all. Nay! The company still wants to pursue the development of SteamOS, a variation of one of the Linux versions, to create a much more affordable place for both developers and players. There will be a problem with this, however, because the percentage of players on Linux is like a drop of water in the sea, which definitely makes it difficult to distribute a proprietary operating system.
In Vulkan we believe!
However, the Steam Machines adventure taught the team many things that guided the work at (in my opinion) a really forward-looking direction. Of course, I am talking about the development of the low-level API Vulkan, the optimization of which at times makes a really great impression, and the availability on all platforms literally crushes the competition. Unfortunately, it is not very popular due to the much more developed and more supported DirectX12.
At this point, we are putting a significant amount of money into the development of tools, drivers and many things related to the Vulkan API. SteamOS will be our medium by which we will deliver them to our clients, which will definitely benefit the Linux ecosystem.
Ultimately, Steam Machines were not removed from the offer. Even though their low popularity is really frightening. This, however, is to improve with the development of Vulkan, which will find its place in the SteamOS system, which is an integral part of every Valve computer.
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