First Impressions: Steam Link and Steam Controller

Half-ready for Primetime

Streaming games from a PC with Steam on it is something Steam's been capable of for a while, but I've taken little advantage of. I don't have a PC connected to any of my TVs, so it's been limited to me playing Luftrausers on my little Linux Mint-running netbook. I was really impressed with the smoothness of the streaming, despite Luftrausers being a fast-paced arcade game and the whole ordeal running over my wireless network on my tiny, underpowered netbook. When Valve unveiled the Steam Link and Steam Controller, I jumped on it just for the chance to do some game streaming to my TV in a fashion much cheaper and more effective than building a whole media center PC. The results have been mixed at best.

Let's get something out of the way first: I am not a hardware reviewer. I'm not counting pixels or framerates. I rely on real reviewers to tell me what works and what doesn't on a technical level. Occasionally, I make a dumb first-adopter purchase because I can. It's fun to take a risk every now and then. All that to say take this as anecdotal information at best. I'm not trying to tell you what to buy, but give an earlier than retail look at something I was really interested in.

Steam Controller upper right, Steam Link (with Steam Controller dongle) lower right. Xbox 360 controller upper left for reference.

Setup
Setting up the Steam Link was really easy. I plugged it into the power, and HDMI, and walked through the process of selecting my language, signing into my wifi network, and choosing a PC to stream from. My partner and I are both running Steam, so I was given the option of which computer I wanted to stream from. The Steam Link gave me a code to enter into my PC to enable the streaming link, which was the first of many trips to my PC in support of the Steam Link. Then it downloaded an update or two, and rebooted a couple times. All expected behavior at this point.

You would think the Steam Controller would be more simple than that, but you would be wrong. The first thing it wanted was a firmware upgrade, and the Steam Link wasn't capable of providing it. Obviously, anyone with a Steam Link or Controller is going to have a PC running Steam on it, but it was real annoying to have to also take the controller to my PC to give it an upgrade. Valve mercifully provided a micro USB cable to enable these type of upgrades, but it seems a little annoying that the Steam Link itself couldn't provide this kind of update.

Streaming
When I first set it up, I wanted to put the Steam Link to the test. I hooked it up to the TV that's furthest away from my wireless router. Finding my wireless networks was no problem. However, the performance of the stream left a lot to be desired. Graphical and audio hitching was frequent. To give some perspective, this same TV has a Roku 3 attached that has no problems streaming Netflix or Hulu in 1080P HD on the same wireless network. I moved it to a TV about half of the distance away from the wireless router and performance got a lot better. Don't expect TV or movie streaming performance out of the Steam Link. Also, no matter how close you are to your network, don't expect to get anything done while Steam is downloading a game. The Steam Link becomes incredibly unresponsive while any game was downloading. However, starting a game will pause downloads, which allows the Steam Link to stream as normal.

Games
When I bought the Steam Link, I thought it'd be a great opportunity for my partner and I to play local multiplayer stuff, like Nidhogg and Gang Beasts. Nidhogg was the first game I started, and it worked flawlessly. Looked like it does on my PC, instant input response, lots of fun. However, that was probably the best experience I've had streaming. Some games work, but theyv'e got problems. Either they play far too slowly to be enjoyable (such as with Shadownrun: Dragonfall) or the streaming will crash Steam when you quit the game, necessitating a trip to the PC to kill the game and restart Steam. I also experienced some games that would dump to the Big Picture Mode interface while the game is still running. There was no obvious way to switch back to the game from the Steam Link, so I would have to go back to my PC to kill the game. Some games didn't work at all, either presenting nothing but a white screen when streaming, crashing when the game begins, or not accepting any Steam Controller input. There were also some little annoyances that accompanied a stream crash. One of those was that the stream will automatically mute your PC, but when it crashes, it doesn't unmute when you restart. Not a big deal, but annoying.

For the sake of perspective, I tested 20 games with Steam Link. Ten of those games I classified as "works great", meaning the game streams at an acceptable rate, controls work, and nothing bad happened. I classified five as "not working", meaning the game was wholly unplayable. The rest were some mixture of the two, either working fine but crashing somehow, or working in some less than perfect state. Here's the breakdown:

Working Great:

• Nidhogg
• Payday 2
• Battleblock Theater
• Bedlam
• Divekick
• Don't Starve Together
• Dungeon of the Endless
• Heavy Bullets
• Pillars of Eternity
• Skullgirls

Not Working:

• Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel
• Towerfall: Ascension
• Dead Pixels
• Kisima Ichiguna (Never Alone)
• You Don't Know Jack

Kind of Jank:

• Shadowrun: Dragonfall (runs slow)
• Outlast (works fine, crashes stream on exit) 
• Wasteland 2: Director's Cut (works fine, switched to Big Picture Mode mid-game)
• Five Nights at Freddy's (works fine, crashes stream on exit)
• Gone Home (poor performance)

Steam Controller
I don't have a whole lot to say about the Steam Controller. It has two trackpads with some haptic feedback. The ABXY buttons are a little too small, but the analog stick is fantastic, as is the shoulder triggers. Whether a game supports the typical Xbox style controller is mostly irrelevant; the Steam Controller can be configured to emulate any keyboard or mouse button press. This means games that don't natively support a controller, such as Dungeon of the Endless, can still be played with the trackpads acting as mouse movement, and buttons emulating keyboard and mouse. In nearly all games, the Steam Controller worked great. The one game it didn't work on was You Don't Know Jack. It wouldn't accept any Steam Controller input whatsoever.

Wrap-up
My first night, I played five games, and three of the straight up didn't work. It put a real damper on my enthusiasm. After working with the Steam Link for a little while, and trying out different games, I'm a bit more optimistic. For the games it works on, it does everything you'd want it to. But when it breaks, get ready to walk back to your PC to fix things. It's got a lot of annoyances and feels more like a beta product than a final release. I'm absolutely not giving up on it, but I get the feeling us early adopters are the unwitting true beta testers of this thing before it gets a wider release in November. What it is really missing is an honest list or showcase of games that work great and show off the Steam Link and Controller. I would be less annoyed if I weren't testing these games myself to find out what works and what doesn't.

Since this isn't a review, I don't feel compelled to adhere to a review score. Therefore, here's an emoticon sequence describing my reaction to the Steam Link and Controller.

:D  :[  :|  :\

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POSTED BY: brian, sci-fi/fantasy/video game dork and contributor since 2014

First Impressions: XCOM Enemy Unknown

wandering the desert

For gamers, the current months are something akin to Moses and the Israelites after their liberation from Egypt. It's slim pickings out there. Other than the fourth Borderlands add-on downloadable content in June, there's not much coming down the pike until Grand Theft Auto V in September. It's usually the time of year most of us either pull out the best games of the last year for another playthrough, or go find something to do outside. 

Much like the Hebrews, I was wandering the desert (also known as Best Buy) last weekend  looking for manna from heaven. Then I saw XCOM. My cousin had loaned me the game several weeks ago with a highly positive recommendation, but it's been a while since I played a real-time strategy and tactics type game. I'm used to squad games that use a turn-based combat system, but most of the ones I've played are Japanese. Ever since he gave me the disc, it had just been sitting on my shelf. I hadn't heard of it and the back cover copy didn't really grab me. However, I already had it so I thought I'd do some research to see if it was any good. To my shock and excitement, the only game this year with a higher rating on Metacritic.com was Bioshock Infinite. XCOM was rated a 90 while Bioshock got a 93. XCOM came out last October, but it was clearly the best option I had for playing a quality game right now. 

It was that or play the new Star Trek game, and it's getting absolutely demolished by critics. So far, I have to say I made the right choice. 

the big picture

The Earth is under alien attack. A truly original concept in gaming, I know, but the approach to the traditional theme is different than any I've seen. The game is a re-make of a 1994 Amiga game that was later converted to the original Playstation. I missed the first one, but this version is awfully fun. You are in charge of XCOM, the Extraterrestrial Combat Unit. They are responsible for the protection of Earth from an increasing number of alien abductions and direct attacks. As you can see above, all the continents and many of the largest countries on the planet are counting on you. Fail to adequately protect them and they will leave your fragile alliance, preferring to be responsible for their own defense.

In order to learn about alien attacks, you must scan the planet looking for activity. You begin the game with one satellite. As you progress, you build and deploy more satellites over different countries. They are used to catch incoming alien ships before they get to the planet's surface. If an incoming ship is identified, you can scramble Interceptors to take them down. If you are able to destroy the alien warship, you then send your squad of soldiers to the crash site to wipe out any survivors and recover alien technology that survived the impact.

strategy and tactics

A large part of the game involves your team of researchers and scientists. The researchers take alien technology your squad recovered from alien abduction attempts or crashed UFOs and use it to upgrade your own weaponry and technology. The picture above is the XCOM headquarters, also know as the Ant Farm. It contains your Engineering and Research divisions, as well as a barracks for your troops, the Situation Room that tracks worldwide panic levels, a hangar to house satellite-protecting Interceptors, and Mission Control from which you launch attacks on enemy incursions.

You can expand your "Ant Farm" by building new facilities such as Power Plants, Thermo Generators, Foundries, and Satellite Uplinks. You must have satellite uplinks to control and monitor the various satellites you've put into orbit. The foundry allows you to develop upgrades for your existing weapons, armor, and vehicles. Power plants and thermo generators merely improve the speed and skill with which you create new items and facilities. The depth and detail involved in simply learning all the aspects of this game was astounding. It made the upgrade system in other RPGs like Skyrim look simplistic in comparison. I'm some 15+ hours in and I still feel I've only scratched the surface. While I have a general understanding of the game at this point, I still feel there's a lot more to discover before I've finished it all.

squad combat

Before leaving on any combat missions, you must outfit your squad. You begin the game with four members, but can expand it to six as you gain experience and cash by completing early missions. The soldiers come in several types including Assault, Support, Heavy, and Sniper. Each one has upgradable skills that are added to their arsenal of moves as they are promoted up the chain of command. Snipers gain a headshot. Heavies can fire a rocket launcher. Assault troops gain the ability to fire after moving or get off two shots per turn instead of the normal one. Support can use multiple medpacks to heal other squad members during battle. 

The combat in XCOM is turn-based, which is unusual in Western games, in my experience. I've played several turn-based games this generation including Lost Odyssey, Star Ocean, and Tales of Vesparia, but they were all Japanese. This is the first American game of its type that I've experienced. XCOM was made by Firaxis, the company headed by Sid Meier, the famous creator of the Civilization series. For the uninitiated, turn-based combat is kind of like playing a board game or Dungeons & Dragons. Each character, including the enemies, gets one turn to make a move. After that, the game moves on to the next character and allows them to make a single move. 

While some Call of Duty fans might find this style of combat slow and tedious, it adds considerably to the strategic aspect of the gaming mechanic. You must use competent squad-based tactics if you want to keep all of your soldiers alive throughout the mission. The quickest way to kill off a character is to send them charging off by themselves, Rambo-style. I learned the hard way that lone soldiers are quickly ganged up on and wiped out by groups of enemies beyond their ability to withstand. 

the breakdown

Although this is considerably different than any of my recent gaming experiences, I've been enjoying it immensely. I wish I'd had time to finish the game this week, but it requires 30+ hours of gameplay to complete and I simply didn't have the time to finish it in five days. That said, if I had to rate this game today I would give it an 8 or a 9. Although the game has tons of moving parts and keeping track of them all seems daunting at first, once you've grasped the various responsibilities you have as the leader of XCOM, the smoothness with which they work in tandem is nothing short of amazing. 

If, like me, you're looking for a quality game during this down-time in big name releases, give XCOM a look. It isn't for everybody. If you're a fan of the Call of Duty series or other shooters like Halo, this one may not be for you as the action isn't as fast-paced or intense as those blockbusters. On the other hand, if you enjoy a game with depth that requires thought and planning in order to succeed, XCOM is right up your alley. It is very similar to Sid Meier's Civilization series, but set in a completely different universe. If you are a fan of his previous games, I believe you will enjoy this title just as much if not more. Good luck and happy gaming!