Steam Controller Officially Announced!

[Chessrook44]

Welp the final announcement has been made, and it ain't Half-Life 5. It's the Steam Controller. So let's take a look at this thing and what the f&*k is this s#!t?

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamController/

Spoiler

How the frack are you going to make that thing work like a mouse and keyboard and not feel clunky?

 

[RangerDruid]

Welp the final announcement has been made, and it ain't Half-Life 5. It's the Steam Controller. So let's take a look at this thing and what the f&*k is this s#!t?

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamController/

How the frack are you going to make that thing work like a mouse and keyboard and not feel clunky?

Such a HUGE disappointment they didn't announce Half-Life 3 after all this.

Don't be so quick to judge the controller by its looks. Despite the ugly button layout, I'm hoping those circular pads actually handles better than traditional sticks (it probably will because it's valve after all).

 

[endtherapture]

I think the shape is off, but I definitely get it.

For example say you're playing Football manager on your TV, you use your thumb to move the mouse to a point and then click down to press the button - seems like a decent idea - cool that finally a company is trying to get different styles of games playable on a big screen.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

OK. It looks unlike anything I've ever seen. Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Need more data.
I do like the idea of having a controller that can play games that weren't designed with a controller in mind. Maybe I can finally play Mass Effect with my PC connected to my TV sitting on a sofa. I don't know what the fuck were they thinking when they decided not to add controller support to Mass Effect. It's a console port anyway for fuck sake.

Captcha: baby boomer

I wish death upon all of them.

 

[oppp7]

Wow, it's fucking nothing!

I think Valve's given up on Half Life.

 

[Juan Regular]

Half Life 3 announcement is still coming. They'd be insane not to release their Steam machines with the biggest system seller they got. And at this point even Valve must know that the wait has been long enough for even the most hardcore fan.

OT: I'm buying this thing, no questions asked. At the very least it's a breath of fresh air for a device that quite simply doesn't work as well as it should. We may be used to controllers but there's a lot of room for improvement and this might just be it.

 

[NoMercy Rider]

Complaints about no HL3 announcement incoming!

Really? If you were on top of things, you'd already know that Gabe said a few weeks back that none of this week's announcements would be about individual video game titles.

So it came as no surprise to me that today's final announcement was NOT HL3.

OT, I'm not a fan of the controller design, but I'll hold off judgment until I try one out for myself. Personally, I think Valve should leave controller design to the experts (Sony and MS), but I would love to be proven wrong.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

That doesn't seem like a great controller. I'd like to play around with one to know for sure though.

 

[Thr33X]

This means I can play APB Reloaded on my big screen. I am pleased.

 

[Roxas1359]

Eh I need to hold the controller and test it out before I give my official judgement on it. However, I will say that the controller just seems weird to me.

 

[skywolfblue]

1) Horrible ABXY button placement. In current controllers, you may have to stop looking around, but with this you'd have to stop moving for X and Y (or do some awkward twisting of your right thumb). To stop moving in most competitive FPS's = dead.

2) It's difficult, really difficult to be precise with a trackpad. I should know, I've played Unreal Tournament 2004, World of Warcraft, RTSs like Starcraft 2, for ages on a laptop trackpad (it was a rather decent MacbookPro with a good trackpad, not a crappy walmart-laptop's touchpad). It was certainly doable, but not ideal. Without weight (mouse, thumbstick) countering your fingers to add resistance, it's hard to make tiny precise movements, maybe the haptic system fixes that, we'll have to wait and see.

It's something new, I guess I should be glad for variety and people testing new ways of input, but my skeptical side says it's not going to go very far.

 

[LetalisK]

I'm still confused on its purpose. Is Steambox just Steam on its own piece of hardware or is it a separate console?

 

[LAGG]

Looks awesome for me.

Sure I would have chosen a Stick + Trackball layout, but it's good enough and already worlds better than two analog sticks.
I'll be doing Headshots and Shock Combo all day long with that baby <3

Trackpads 99% as as good as trackballs which are 99% as good as mice. And those trackpads look to be the kind that doesn't get bad in sweaty hands.

Spoiler: FPS with Trackball

This is an early prototype without the touch screen: http://cdn3.store.steampowered.com/public/images/promo/livingroom/rljKewyz3M/prototypes.jpg

 

[Full]

M+KB similar precision with a controller is very intriguing. Looks pretty fragile though, but it's only glamour shots. Wondering if the whole touch thing would be clunky as well.

Overall, want to hear a tad more (reviews etc.), but this is appealing to me.

 

[DrOswald]

My biggest complaint is the lack of face buttons. Track pads can at least approximate analog sticks, but there are no easily reached buttons on the face of that controller. How am I to play a precision game, such as Rouge Legacy, with no easily reached buttons? And shoulder buttons are not as easily or quickly manipulated as face buttons. I really am not a believer on this one. I will give it a chance (you know, wait for reviews and maybe borrow a friends controller) before casting final judgement, but this thing looks pretty bad to me.

Maybe this thing will be awesome. Maybe it really will have the precision of a mouse and keyboard but in controller format, and I can see the value in that. But I really doubt this will be replacing the PS3/X360 controller style as the default gaming input device. But then again, SteamOS is linux based so I am sure day 1 we will have the ability to use a PS3 or X360 controller if we want.

I guess it is better for Valve to do something new and fill a need that is not being filled, but I am still really disappointed by this announcement. Color me skeptical.