Valve have revealed the last part of the equation for their future Steam Living Room strategy, and it will come as no surprise that it's a controller. What will come as a surprise are the capabilities and technologies of that controller, which are quite a long way from the norm.

On the face of it the Steam Controller appears to be a simple dual-trackpad device, with a track-pad under each of your thumbs where you would normally find a D-pad or set of buttons. In theory these give you four axes of control, precision being determined by the sensitivity of the pad and the dexterity of your thumb. That's not exactly vanilla, but not beyond the realms of what's already being done: handheld gaming consoles have had trackpad functionality for some time now, not to mention smartphone and tablets. They're also clickable, but that is by-the-by.

The new part that Valve is bringing to the table is Haptics - which is a fancy way of saying communication through touch. Identifying that the control feedback thumbsticks bring to the table are an important source of information to the user, and that traditional rumble technologies just don't cut it, the trackpads will have a sensitive vibration response which developers can utilise to send feedback. The trackpads are so sensitive they can even double as speakers!

In principle, it's another channel of communication to the player. In practice, it will need integration into the software title, like any other controller feature.



So, with the trackpads out the way, we have to ask: 'what is a controller, without buttons?'. Well, the answer is that it has them: sixteen in fact. Eight are accessible to the user without taking your fingers off the track-pad including two in the rear, whilst the other eight should be conveniently located. These buttons can be bound to any keyboard or mouse function, and have supposedly been optimised to be ideal for the Valve FPS titles you've probably played in the past.

Finally we come to a central high-resolution touch-screen. Designed for multi-gesture input as well as being clickable, the touch-screen adds a further layer of control for input-hungry titles. Developers using the Steam Controller API can program it to act as a dial, scrollable menu or a wide-range of other features. The interface will also be overlayed on the TV/monitor, ensuring that the player's eyes never leave the action. It may be an expensive gimmick, or it may be an effective way as producing the sort of level of control we expect from a keyboard-mouse combination onto a much more compact device.



Much like SteamOS and Steam Machines, Valve are claiming that the controller has been designed with the principles of openness very much at the fore. If they were to manufacture hardware themselves this would very much be the hardware they would produce, but we would not be at all surprised to see the likes of Razer and Mad Catz jump on with gusto. As hackable as they may be, they're sure to be costly - advanced haptic trackpads and high resolution touchscreens aren't cheap, and will require an awful lot of engineering to be incorporated into a robust and compact package.

The Steam Machine Beta has been extended to the Controller, with the lucky few also being granted a prototype of the controller. It will be a slightly more cut-down version - wired and without a touch-screen on the front - but it should allow them to get a firm idea of how the controller should work and useful feedback to give.

So, what do you think of the announcements? Will SteamOS, the Steam Machines and Steam Controller be a hit and get your PC gaming into the living-room, or are you just disappointed that new games haven't been unleashed on an unsuspecting public? How would you price the Controller, and what sort of specs do you think a Steam Machine should have? Let us know in the comments.


Previously: SteamOS Revealed, Announcements Pt2: Steam Machines

Source: http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/