The Great Steam Machine Flop, less than 500,000 Steam Machines sold

The Steam Machine aka gimped PCs which games are unoptimized for has sold less than 500,000 units based on the gamepad sales figure which is in the ballpark of 500,000. Can we concur that the Steam Machine is a flop?

The original article

There's been multiple threads on this apparently. Shame, but the initiative was botched as it was so this was expected.

Guess you could say...

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...they ran out of steam.

@Basinboy:

You win.

"Based on gamepad sales" ... err.... its probably ALOT lower than that then, as people are buying the gamepad seperatlyt.

Damn Valve really needs to put in a better Ad campaign, limit the number of Steam Machines from different brands to no more than 3 so less confusion for people that are not as tech savvy the overpriced/expensive ones need to get the boot, I think even some exclusives would be alright, they also need to get more media like a Netflix or Hulu app, and overall better driver support. With Vulkan out now all Valve needs to do is work with developers and linux porting teams like Feral and Aspyr to help create proper linux ports and give them some incentives to do it like more marketing on the front page of steam.

@Basinboy: Whelp... Thread's over. Came for the pun, and wasn't disappointed.

Yeah, the steam machine is worthless trash, you are better off building your own pc.

There is a thread about the controller selling that. What a misleading title you have.

Oh look, someone else with a brain figured this out. It's like the OP turned their brain off when they made this thread.

Neo will be a steam machine. one that actually sells.

I wonder how much money valve put into this? All those big PC makers have them all over there site and only that little sold?

I didn't even know it was out

@NoodleFighter: Forget it! All of Valve are nothing but engineers and programmers, they have no experience in marketing at all. Also, Steam OS is dead in the water so don't expect Valve to keep supporting it long as more PC gamers are switching to Windows 10.

Well all it is as a version of Debian/Ubuntu with the Linux version of steam pre installed, so I guess not much. They don't actually make the hardware.

Yeah but they have to pay for the advertisement why would the PC makers put them up on the front page if they don't sell?

Also they put in stores too and if they didn't sell in the stores the store would get mad at them.

I saw this coming based on prices of the various Steam Machines alone.

Barely none, they ran around working with other companies and getting them to help invest. They fixed the pricing and adjusted it like PC parts usually do due to low sales. These PC companies are good at pricing hardware to cover themselves.

@iandizion713: good point but I doubt they will work with valve ever again after being burned hard here. You really don't want to burn your bridges console gamers are huge and that was bridge that valve should not have burned.

@ProtossRushX: I doubt it, for them it was low risk high reward. They just getting started. Steammachine is a chance to stand out and make a name for yourself. And in the PC market, its crazy, companies rise from the ashes everyday.

If a company can make a nice Steammachine that destroys PS4 for same price, they could sell a million +. With the new cards coming out, its possible. We just watched the $1K Titan get beat by a $500 card.

Epic.

I knew it would flop. No self respecting PC gamer would buy those gimped PCs and they are also too overpriced for consolites.

Considering how overpriced those boxes are it's no surprise that sales are low. And that controller, while I appreciate the attempt at innovation, is useless because KB/M>>> all for nearly every genre and what is left is best suited for an X360 pad.

hahaha

I don't even know what a Steam Machine is supposed to be, to be honest. I thought it was just a new form factor for small performance PCs, and actually considered getting one as an upgrade, but since then it's just been a muddled mess with no clear target consumer.

Valve want Steam to become a hardware-independent gaming platform, that was clear from the start. I just don't think they were as clear about what they wanted from Steam Machines.

I remember I was calling it would flop on this very board, and multiple Valve fanboys were convinced it would not. The entire initiative was always botched- the product is a half assed solution to a problem with a far cleaner solution, using a model that already failed 20 years ago with the 3D0, and with no commitment or seriousness shown by Valve whatsoever. Hardware requires focus and commitment, two things that Valve very clearly lack.

Steam Machines are basically gimped PCs with no value, SteamOS is terrible, I think the one good thing we got out of the transaction was the Steam Controller. So, yay I guess?

I was the one that brought up the similarities of the 3DO. Actually, even the great Malstrom knew this would flop as well.

Edit: I do agree with the controller part, everything else lacks support from Steam Machines and Steam OS. Shame that @NoodleFighter is the only one that believes in Steam OS and Steam Machine.

Well, you can chalk this up as one of the few times that you, Malstrom, and I all agreed on something then lol

Valve lack of dedication to even try to market the steam machine was already a sign of failure before launch

it was more than just that, it was an attempt to get people to abandon Windows over fear mongering that Windows was going to be a closed platform that wasn't going to allow third party game distribution services like Steam, was bullshit though, people are still pushing that bullshit too

that's cause "steamos"(aka linux) is trash

steam controller sucks too

When people can make superior pcs, or buy superior pcs, for much less, why in the hell would anyone buy a Steam Machine?

Actually, Alienware Alpha Steam Machine (with Windows) comes with an Xbox 360 controller instead of Steam controller, and has been for some time. I don't think the Steam controller has been released here in Australia. Yet Alienware has been selling their Steam machine here with Xbox 360 controller for a while now. So the number is likely higher.

It was a stupid idea to begin with.

At first I thought the Steam Machines and SteamOS were a dumb idea but after seeing progress over the years in terms of support for Linux I actually believed in it. Even if SteamOS flops I'll still believe in Linux gaming and I am grateful for Valve helping Linux gaming get more traction. In the next 5 years Linux could be a major platform for PC at the rate it is going.

1 percent of the desktop/laptop PC market is not a major force for the PC.

Did anyone even think that steam machines would be popular when it was announced? I'm not surprised hearing those potential sales numbers ( I figure probably 40% of those controller sales are from people just getting the controller, so it's probably closer to 300k sales).

lol

Well as most people who are PC gamers build their own steam machines there's little reason to buy a pre-built one.

Consoles are also just gimped PCs but they have dedicated companies behind them and they are standardized.

just saying, people need to realize that consoles are just a sub category of a PC they have no value besides the exclusives tied to them

lol

"Death of consoles"

Poor marketing.

Sony and Microsoft are doing it better.

Same here. We already have prebuilt PC's they are called consoles. People who actually want a PC rig for gaming will just build one themselves.

Hmm I am going to look up how their sales look compared to xbox one sales at its time of penetrating the market, keeping in mind that Steam Machines probably haven't cost their manufacturers a couple billion in losses to help them to sell better.

this was suppose to kill off consoles according to herms

The only way it would work was I valved consolised those machines.

A major platform for games I should say

Never saw the appeal for these bastardisation of a PC, so not really surprised.

Just build your own damn PC, more fun that way (and it's not really hard).

That's too bad I thought it would sell well. I liked the idea and almost bought one at some point because I found myself enjoying many games that started out on Steam like Sheltered and Binding of Isaac, which came to XOne later. I guess if I really want in on more Steam I'll need a gaming PC, but now is not the time for that for me .

It would have been nice to play some of the higher profile pc games obviously, that too

Major platform for games? Steam machine's result is worst than Wii U.