| Kerotan said: I read a post from wyluzuj and it got me thinking. How likely is a STEAM OS and how successful could it be. There are so many questions.
Potential marketshare, How big a threat to Microsoft, Would people buy into it apart from about 10 million hardcore steam users? Do Microsoft even care? If they do how can they challenge them? Would they charge for the OS? How much if yes? Would Microsoft launch a rival steam on Windows?
I can think of many more. Give me your general thoughts on this and we'll see what everyone thinks. |
Potential market share, small at first for a number of reasons. It will grow over time, I don't think valve intended this to be an instant hit, more of a long term project.
Microsoft has bigger threats on the horizon, mobile which is the bulk of all computer sales now are all linux or BSD based (Android, iOS) the transition to mobile has been very profound and the market is shifting probably forever away from software in a box to software as a service.
Microsoft does care, they have always worried and had an active campaign against potential threats of all sorts (No new version of windos was ready until lotus did not run... as an example). They have actively campaigned against linux over the years http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_cancer/ as an example.
MS has dominant market share, so right now they need do nothing. If I had to suggest a solution it would be to offer more value to thier customer base. How about having file formats that don't require an upgrade of your licence (new version of word files not working on older versions causing havock with office work flows) , or not having to upgrade to get the latest DX version. Jut a few ideas.
Steam OS is free and will be free because it is just another linux distribution based on Debian with a few minor changes. It is licenced under the GPL and must therefore always be free. All linux distros run SteamOS games... the bigest share of that market is Ubuntu by far.
MS already launched a rival steam distribution system the Windows application service that began with windows 8.
Current SteamOS games 973 and that is in under two years. Windows games on Steam 4708 so it has a long way to go to catch up. There are a lot of AAA titles out and soon to be out but it will take some time for most of the back catalogue. Nvidia users will have a good experience (good driver support) but AMD users are still faced with serious driver issues on a regular basis though AMD is working on it.
I have been gaming on Steam on Linux (the repositories in SteamOS are a little small for my taste so I use a different distro) since the early linux beta when we had under 20 games. It has come leaps and bounds since then. I see it growing slowly over time.
