Steam introduced its new range of products, Steam controller and Steam link, earlier this year. With years of planning and sculpting the very art of PC gaming, Steam has managed to bring all the elements of PC gaming into a console controller.
Steam introduced its new innovative controller that enables PC gamers to enjoy their games while sitting on the couch. With the help of steam link, players can link their PCs and stream into their living room television sets to experience wide screen game playing.
This $50 steam controller dons a fresh design and features two integrated track pad (a four axis and a mouse like pad), two paddle buttons at the back, a joystick and a small version of Xbox 360 buttons. The company says it will revolutionise the PC gaming experience.
The controller is set to be released on 10 November, 2015; gamers can pre-order it at the Steam store.
For PC gaming enthusiasts, the controller seemed a little awkward to use because the track pad, which was supposed to bring back the mouse experience in the controller, gave gamers a hard time in figuring out the functions.
The track pad was a disaster in a first person shooter game because the gamers could not get the accuracy of pointing the cursor at the enemy when using a head shot.
Moreover, the use of buttons (which look exactly like Xbox 360) is unnecessary in this controller. Though the buttons are not stiff, they seemed to be very small for experienced console gamers.
Gamers feel that the current move by Steam is a bold one because the controller is not an ordinary controller. They have also not completely discarded this controller because the real usage is not determined in a single use. Constant use will make this controller a successful product. Also, third party developers would have a big role in making the controller for other uses than just gaming.
"We have a large audience. I think its 125 million active Steam customers right now. Every possible permutation of what people want to do exists. We want to make sure we're flexible enough to handle the things people want to do," Valve's Robin Walker told PC World.
"We'll be doing a bunch of stuff in the future like allowing you, if you want, to get the CAD files for [the Steam Controller] or something. Or order all the electronic guts and none of the form factor from us because you want to roll your own. We want to enable that kind of modding and hacking and see what happens. Whether it's a workshop where you can upload your own form factors and other people can download them and 3D print them, who knows?", he added.
"Our goal here is to build a good living room experience for our customers. It's not to sell a bunch of hardware," Walker explained.
