Watching Robots Make Steam Controllers Is Surprisingly Neat

Have you ever looked at a controller and wondered how it was put together? Valve released a video today showing how its Steam Controller is made and what makes them. If you've played the company's Portal games, then these controller-building robots might look familiar.

According to the video's description, Valve wanted to take a shot at manufacturing its controllers when it first started designing the hardware, so the company looked into automated assembly. Although humans are present and involved throughout most stages of consumer manufacturing, Valve "kind of went overboard" and apparently built one of the largest fully-automated assembly lines in the United States.

Valve stresses that it hasn't gone crazy and has assured us that humans still supervise the robots to keep them from becoming sentient, like Portal's antagonist GLaDOS.

If you haven't been able to decide whether you want to buy the hardware or not, GameSpot has put together a guide on everything you need to know about Valve's controller. And we also tested it to see if the Steam Controller can replace your keyboard and mouse.