Gabe Newell clears up Steam Box confusion

Ok so yesterday I might have jumped the gun a bit saying we were looking at “Valve's console.” It isn't. Still, it will be part of a new lineup of Steam compatible hardware that are designed as small form factor PCs for gaming in your lounge.

Yes I also said that Valve were unlikely to compete with their own third party hardware and I was wrong on that count too. Valve head honcho, Game Newell said as much in his interview with The Verge, explaining that there would be several third party Steam box manufacturers, but that Valve would also produce its own, cool and quiet console with a small foot print.

“We'll come out with our own and we'll sell it to consumers by ourselves,” Newell said. “That'll be a Linux box, [and] if you want to install Windows you can. We're not going to make it hard. This is not some locked box by any stretch of the imagination.”

Some might wonder why Valve is allowing other manufacturers to get in on the market that Valve itself is looking to enter. Newell explained that it was opting for an open system, not the closed setup offered by the major console manufacturers.

Newell also mentioned the idea that Valve will enter the mobile sphere of gaming at some point. He said that the Steam Box project was internally called “Bigfoot,” and that the company was also working on “Littlefoot,” which is the mobile audience – not a talking dinosaur.

Of course Valve isn't the only one pushing for a little home console to compete with the next generation offerings from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony. Nvidia is planning to release a Shield mobile console that hooks up to your TV. Then there's Game Stick and of course the soon to be released Ouya.

KitGuru Says: Considering many people have claimed the console market is dying, it seems like a lot of business leaders disagree and want to get in on it. Why do you guys think that is?

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