Yeah, they have enough money to try new and weird things, and abandon them when they’re not successful. This is a good thing.
Or maybe people would just prefer that they only make Half-Life games forever.
Personally, yeah. HL2+Episodes is in my top 5 all time games, and HL:Alyx is the best narrative VR game. If the Portal series counts by virtue of being technically in the same universe, then you have two of my top 5 games. And I say that as someone who owns a Steam Link and nearly bought a Steam controller.
Hasn’t Linus Tech done a review for a bunch of these, and they all end up being 799.99 or a lot more?
Honestly, I would mind just a cheap computer that can stream from my desktop, but I guess the Android App will make that possible, when coupled with a Kindle Fire.
That’s fine. But you’ll also understand if the consumer market takes a, “Yeah, I’m going to wait and see if this actually lasts before I spend my money on it.”
Totally understandable and my personal approach as well.
Google kills good products. With Valve all of those being discontinued makes sense.
I’ve almost bought a GPd several times. Hope this is something similar, but with a good option under 800$
For the first time ever valve is two steps from falling off a cliff. Netflix for games is coming and it will be an earthquake. I just used Netflix as reference, don’t get hung up on name.
It’s already here and it’s called GamePass Ultimate. It’s from a small company called “Microsoft,” you may have heard of them.
There’s no other company even close to being able to offer a similar product.
Valve isn’t going anywhere. They make $2 billion+ on Steam every year.
I know discontinuing Steam Controller probably made financial sense but it’s a great product.
Lots of companies could do it, they just need to be willing to burn a ton of money over many years to buy customers.
Yeah, very true, but that’s what I mean by “nobody is close to it.” But I can’t think of another company with that kind of money and ambition. Google’s not going to do it. Amazon’s not going to. Apple is doing it on mobile and is not a competitor with Valve. Epic is focused on other things.
Netflix did recently say they wanted to get deeper into gaming, but nobody knows if that means more game-y shows like Bandersnatch, making their own actual games, or doing something like GamePass, but they could afford $5 billion over the next couple years to acquire a library if they really wanted. They don’t have to do it like Microsoft has done it, by buying studios. They could just license game content like they do movies and shows from various companies.
Netflix for games on PC would be kind of a tough sell, IMO, because you see so many discounts.
In truth, only Nintendo and Sony have a real opportunity.
Free is a big mental thing…
Also with movies and tv-shows you mostly watch them once. With games there’s often a dream of a perfect game you can play forever. Especially with multiplayer games, strategy games or RPGs. You don’t rent access to Crusader Kings or Counter-Strike or Skyrim unless it’s just for a demo, you want to own those things.
They threw another year of redevelopment after Artifact 1.0 bombed, then cancelled 2.0 after they decided the reimagined version wasn’t fun and wasn’t going to get there. I don’t think abandoning is a fair assessment as they’re simply dropping products with poor reception (and in some cases replacing them like the Steam Link and the software version now available).