When news of the revived Steam Machine dropped, throngs of excited enthusiasts quickly staked a claim in its existence. They excitedly heralded its entry into what we all know to be the long-dead “console war.” The media chimed in too, opining about the timeliness of its return and whether or not it has the chance to significantly dent the crowded market it’s entering into.
But I don’t think the Steam Machine really needs to “fight” in the traditional sense to be competitive. That’s because I don’t believe it actually has to do anything in order to chip away at the already-crumbling console infrastructure to win hearts and minds. It just has to be there.
Size:640 × 360480 × 270
Want us to remember this setting for all your devices?
Please use a html5 video capable browser to watch videos.
This video has an invalid file format.
Sorry, but you can’t access this content!
Please enter your date of birth to view this video
JanuaryFebruaryMarchAprilMayJuneJulyAugustSeptemberOctoberNovemberDecember12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031Year202520242023202220212020201920182017201620152014201320122011201020092008200720062005200420032002200120001999199819971996199519941993199219911990198919881987198619851984198319821981198019791978197719761975197419731972197119701969196819671966196519641963196219611960195919581957195619551954195319521951195019491948194719461945194419431942194119401939193819371936193519341933193219311930192919281927192619251924192319221921192019191918191719161915191419131912191119101909190819071906190519041903190219011900
By clicking ‘enter’, you agree to GameSpot’s
Terms of Use and
Privacy Policy
enter
Now Playing: New Steam Hardware Everything To Know So Far
The console market is arguably in the best place it’s ever going to be for a large shakeup. Nintendo is, as always, doing its own thing with the Switch 2, which has proven itself to be a phenomenon beyond what we’ve seen before, and capable of filling the first Switch’s intimidatingly large shoes and serving Nintendo’s large niche.
Meanwhile, the PlayStation 5 has emerged victorious over the Xbox Series X|S, though I’d argue it has failed to leverage that momentum and made itself gaming’s premiere hub in large part due to strategic shifts that have complicated matters and muddied the waters. Notably, PlayStation’s gambit to invest in live-service titles this console generation hasn’t panned out and brought in players outside of its existing ecosystem all that much. At the end of the day, the most exciting prospects in games aren’t emerging from PlayStation’s camp.
And yet, despite its missteps, PlayStation has dwarfed Xbox in terms of sales. That reality feels like it has more to do with Microsoft’s instability and lack of concrete direction for its gaming division than PlayStation’s own merits and successes.
In the case of PlayStation and Xbox, both have also increasingly ceded territory to PC gaming in the past several years. While it’s a little slow to the process, Sony has ported most of its output this console generation over to PC storefronts. Since the very beginning of the generation, Xbox has been loud about its courtship of PC players, simultaneously launching marquee titles on both Xbox and PC in order to have a more pronounced position in the realm of PC gaming. Lately, the “This is an Xbox” campaign out of Microsoft has emphasized how little sense it makes to pick up one of its consoles over a PC or a Fire Stick, which isn’t exactly a great selling point for Xbox consoles.
As you’re hopefully beginning to see, the console space is remarkably weak right now–that’s without accounting for the state of U.S. tariffs, which are likely to impact Steam Machine pricing but won’t surprise its adopters like it did when existing console manufacturers increased console prices in response. In an ecosystem largely driven by exclusivity, PC is also quietly the king, which seems like a major boon in the Steam Machine’s favor. With the Steam Machine positioned as its console-like companion and access to much of PC gaming’s sizable library, I think the console market has something to be fearful of here.
That’s because a number of this year’s biggest success stories are still exclusive to PC. Last we heard, Landfall Games and Aggro Crab’s Peak, a multiplayer game about climbing a mountain in often comic situations, had sold north of 10 million copies by August of 2025. REPO, a survival horror game with proximity chat, launched into early access this past February and still maintains concurrents in the six-digits. And though its numbers have since dwindled, Schedule I became the game du jour for a hot second on PC, reaching an all-time peak of nearly 460,000 concurrent players. Outside of Arc Raiders and continued successes like Fortnite and Roblox, the trend of games achieving viral-levels of success and explosive growth in 2025 has been concentrated on PC exclusives.
A look at climbing game Peak.
The Steam Machine now promises to bring these titles to console players right out of the box. This audience is occasionally starved for the kinds of tentpole games that justify a console purchase–consider how long it now takes a AAA developer like Naughty Dog to make just one title. The Steam Machine holds a tantalizing potential previously unavailable to console players: the ability to play more of the biggest success stories in gaming that happen each and every year.
And then there’s the Steam Machine’s other uses. While it’s certainly a gaming PC disguised as a console first and foremost, it’s also, as Valve has clarified, literally a PC too. SteamOS, which has been fine tuned for Steam Deck, has proven its reliability, but Valve has made no secret of the Machine’s malleability either. Though I’m sure Valve would love for adopters of the Steam Machine to stick with SteamOS, it isn’t locked into one operating system like a console would be. In fact, Valve happily touts the fact that the Steam Machine can support other operating systems and functions if the user wants on the system’s own landing page!
At a time where customers are becoming cagier about where they spend their hard-earned money, a system–one which can double as a home computer and console, too–tapped into Steam’s vast library sounds like a much better use of time, energy, and cash than investing in several different consoles. To Valve’s benefit, the math is indubitably on its side the second the Steam Machine hits the market.
The Steam Machine may prove popular via another avenue: price. A gaming PC is a luxury expense. It’s always been expensive, at times prohibitively so, and that’s not changed for the better in the last decade. And while Valve doesn’t seem likely to subsidize the Steam Machine, it could prove to be unmistakably game-changing for console players currently spreading their money across multiple consoles, handhelds, a computer, and more.
I didn’t love ponying up the grand it took to build my gaming PC, but it turns out that consolidating all the use cases I could have for such a piece of hardware–gaming, working, socializing, browsing and consuming media–and paying a premium for it saved me needing to own anything else. Now, I’m completely alienated from most of my gaming systems. Of them all, my Switch 2 gets the most regular play. Otherwise, my PS5 is a glorified cable box. And my Xbox? Well, I honestly couldn’t tell you the last time I booted up my dust-covered Xbox Series X, which is baffling considering it is where I’ve spent the most time and money since 2020.
My PC is my new base of operations, and despite its relatively exorbitant cost, it’s been worth the price of admission. I suspect many are looking ahead to the next generation of consoles, doing the math, and coming to the same conclusion: buying one Steam console that can play PC, PlayStation, and Xbox games is likely a more sound investment than buying up every alternative on the market.
Just earlier this month, Strauss Zelnick, head of Take-Two Interactive, told CNBC that he thought the industry was trending in the direction of PCs rather than consoles. After a decade of continued post-launch support and growth–including sustained popularity on PC thanks in part to mods that have turned Grand Theft Auto 5 into a roleplaying simulation among other things–I’m inclined to agree. For better and for worse, gaming’s future does in fact appear to lie in, maybe even rely upon, a major shift to PC over consoles.
The Steam Machine is well-positioned to capitalize on that shift and further gaming’s increasing dependency upon Valve–a prospect fraught with its own perils–without breaking a sweat. I don’t believe the Steam Machine will immediately light up the charts or have PlayStation shaking in its boots upon launch, but it shouldn’t be taken lightly either. No, I suspect it’ll be much more of a silent killer, and if any one company has the ability to play the long game here and slowly but surely make a sizable dent in the console market, it’s Valve.