Steam Big Picture Mode to start public beta today

Valve will be launching a public beta today of its Steam Big Picture mode, according to a New York Times report.

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Valve had told us it was coming in early September, but now we supposedly have a date for the public beta of Steam's Big Picture Mode, where players will be able to click a button to have Steam reformatted for the big screen in their living room. Watch for it sometime this afternoon. Over the weekend, the New York Times revealed the beta launch in a behind closed doors report on Valve, saying the testing on the new mode would begin "on Monday." Kotaku, however, offered a more in-depth report, saying that all of Steam's fonts, icons and menus are designed to be viewed comfortably in the living room. Greg Coomer, who headed the team at Valve that developed the new mode, said "We're confident in some things that customers want. They want a full-screen experience. They want to be in the living room. They want to use a game controller. They wanna have a social gaming experience. And we have this platform that lets us ship a significant portion of that experience." Valve is already looking at future upgrades for Big Picture, including auto-correct and context awareness, such as recognizing someone typing a web address in a browser might need '.com', Coomer said.

Everything is larger in Big Picture mode for easier viewing on a large screen

(images courtesy of Kotaku)
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  • reply
    September 10, 2012 6:55 AM

    John Keefer posted a new article, Steam Big Picture Mode to start public beta today.

    Valve will be launching a public beta today of its Steam Big Picture mode, according to a New York Times report.

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 6:57 AM

      why not say according to valve themselves, who publicly said this?

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 7:28 AM

        If it was said "from Valve", it would be subject to "Valve Time".

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 6:57 AM

      HELLO MY FUTURE GIRLFRIEND

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 7:03 AM

      Very keen on trying this out. I'm actually a little sour I'll be at work and won't be able to preview this upon launch :<

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        September 10, 2012 7:22 AM

        it's a TV friendly interface for steam. not exciting stuff. i think you'll manage.

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 7:24 AM

          Dude, you are such a wet blanket. Just because you don't have a setup to appreciate this, doesn't mean it isn't going to be amazing for those of us who can.

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 7:29 AM

            ^ this. Reading steam chat from my couch is a strain on the eyes. I'm looking forward to not having to increase the font size manually (via skinning) every time there's a UI update, which has been frequently since opting into the Steam community beta a month or so ago.

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 7:29 AM

            Dark Souls PTD PC + res upgrade patch + 50" tv + xbox controller.

            EOT.

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 7:43 AM

            Exactly, this is a huge deal for all of us who have setups for this and have been waiting forever for this feature. They originally announced it over a year and a half ago, it's been a long wait!

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 8:16 AM

            If you have such a hard-on for launching stuff from a controller, you could have either
            a) used electroly's launcher that has been out for a while
            2) gotten a console

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 8:24 AM

              i dnt think you understand the reason ppl are eager to embrace this.

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 11:33 AM

            [deleted]

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 11:43 AM

              I've seen his set up. He jelly.

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 8:14 AM

          lol

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 7:24 AM

      the funny part is that this interface looks less of a bloated mess and more user friendly than their regular UI which i guess is sticking around

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      September 10, 2012 7:41 AM

      Awesome

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 7:45 AM

      [deleted]

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 7:47 AM

      AWESOME!

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 7:48 AM

      You can toggle a setting that boots up Steam Big Picture as soon as you turn on your PC, effectively turning it into a Steam console.


      Yeah baby! The only reason I want to hook up to a TV. (I still wanna use a mouse and keyboard though)

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 8:00 AM

      Awesome I just set up a Windows 7 HTPC in my living room on the big screen. disgunbe guudddd.

      Can I control XBMC with a 360 controller? If so I shall never leave my couch.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 10:28 AM

        Considering the X originally stood for Xbox, you better damn well be able to.

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 8:15 AM

      I can't imagine I'll be playing on my TV in the future, but would love to definitely check this out and see the interface

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 8:49 AM

      Advantage of this over my gaming pc connected to big screen?

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        September 10, 2012 9:12 AM

        Thats exactly what this is for......its a nice UI for doing just that.

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          September 10, 2012 11:12 AM

          So, you're saying that it is an advantage because it hooks up to my big screen? Again, I do that now with my gaming pc...why do I need this?

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 11:13 AM

            i think you're confused. this is software, not hardware. you run it on your gaming pc that is hooked to your TV

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 11:55 AM

              It seems like another client, and that (to me) seems pointless.

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 12:00 PM

                I don't think you understand what BP mode is doing. It's a first-party modification to the existing Steam client to make it easier to use when hooked up to large screens at bigger distances than between a monitor and chair. It's the same client with functional changes to it.

                You can switch back to standard mode when you sit in your milk crate.

                • reply
                  September 10, 2012 12:22 PM

                  Thank you for more detail. It's some sort of VNC, so you need a gaming pc running somewhere.

                  • reply
                    September 10, 2012 12:29 PM

                    [deleted]

                    • reply
                      September 10, 2012 12:34 PM

                      Thanks. So they added the hooks to a new GUI to allow my controller to navigate the menus...is that it?

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                        September 10, 2012 1:25 PM

                        yah it's just a new GUI design that supports Gamepads as an input... I dunno why you all are making this difficult.

                      • reply
                        September 10, 2012 4:57 PM

                        Jesus, it took you long enough ...

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 12:00 PM

                what do you mean by another client? this is part of Steam

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 11:39 AM

            This is just means Steam will be easier to use on your HDTV when you are sitting far from the screen. You will be able to check a box in Steam and enable it. On your gaming pc.

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              September 10, 2012 11:58 AM

              What is so difficult about connecting your gaming pc to your big screen that requires another client? I still don't see the point.

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 12:19 PM

                It's not a separate client. It's just a different interface for the current one that makes more sense for HDTV viewing distances, plus controller navigation built in if you want that.

                Like how you can currently switch between detail / grid / list / small mode views, now there's also a "big picture" mode.

                If you don't see the point of it then you don't have to use it.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 12:17 PM

        It's NOT just software:

        (from the website)

        "Big Picture System Requirements

        OS Windows Vista, 7, or 8. OS X support coming soon.

        Memory 1 GB RAM

        Processor 3.0 Ghz P4, Dual Core 2.0 (or higher) or AMD64X2 (or higher)

        Video card Required / at least 256MB memory and DirectX 9-compatible with support for Pixel Shader 2.0b, Recommended / 512MB+ memory and DirectX 10-compatible

        Disk space 1 GB recommended

        Internet connection Broadband recommended

        Controller Xbox 360 Wireless Controller for Windows, Xbox 360 Wired Controller, or Logitech Wireless Gamepad F710 recommended. Keyboard and mouse also supported. "

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 12:19 PM

          i'm not sure what you think you're seeing here, but those are the system requirements for the software. this is a software feature. i don't really understand where your confusion is coming from

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 12:25 PM

            You need a gaming pc running somewhere to make this work, correct? It seems like the excitement is that this is a software only solution.

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              September 10, 2012 12:31 PM

              are you asking me whether you need a PC to run Steam? this is part of Steam. you need a gaming PC to run Steam. this runs on your gaming PC, as part of Steam. i don't know how else to describe this

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 12:38 PM

                I think I got it...it's simply a new GUI that allows you to use your controller to navigate the menus, right? With all of the fanfare I thought this was something more substantial...it's just a client update.

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                  September 10, 2012 12:43 PM

                  Well, they announced it more than a year ago and some people have been looking forward to it for that long.

                  http://store.steampowered.com/news/5063/

                  • reply
                    September 10, 2012 1:09 PM

                    Thanks for that link. The PR today was confusing (to me anyway). It seemed like they were selling a new service of some kind. I can see how this new GUI would be useful.

                    • reply
                      September 10, 2012 3:25 PM

                      Did you read the article? It is right there.

                      " . . . where players will be able to click a button to have Steam reformatted for the big screen in their living room."

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 9:05 AM

      This sounds good and I must set this up!

      Question:
      My gaming PC is not near my TV anymore and when it was I just plugged in the HDMI cord to each. However, what is the best wireless option to stream my PC video to TV now that they are far apart (20 ft at most)?

      I see this on newegg: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815554007&nm_mc=KNC-GoogleAdwords&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-_-pla-_-NA-_-NA

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 9:22 AM

      Did not realize it was going to be so expansive, on screen keyboard, etc

      http://kotaku.com/5941793/valve-is-bringing-steam-to-your-tv-today-watch-out-consoles

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 1:38 PM

        Holy shit that looks really nice, can't wait to try it. It's going to be sad/funny if they have a better "big screen" UI than Sony or MS...

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 9:28 AM

      Potentially dumb question from a guy that doesn't know much: can I run a 30 foot HDMI cable from my computer to my TV for this, or do I have to worry about some sort of signal degradation (or some other evil that I'm not aware of)?

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 9:38 AM

      Not sure if this was already linked in one of those other articles, but here's an ad for big picture mode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFrL6-OhN94

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 11:01 AM

      [deleted]

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 11:13 AM

      FUCK YES

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 11:16 AM

      GG Origin

      Steam in the last year:
      Workshop
      Greenlight
      Big Picture
      New community interface

      Origin:
      Zero new features

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 11:35 AM

        [deleted]

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 2:49 PM

          They added like a little grey line at the top of the UI. That was big. Also it records how many hours I've spent playing games. Big stuff.

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 4:48 PM

            Shut up

            Seriously I'm not even going to defend Origin But this is just stupid. You aren't bitching cause there is walmart and target in the world it's just a competitor and if you don't like it fine but you make the whole gaming community sound like a bunch of whiny 3 year olds when you bring crap like this up.

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 7:00 PM

              You're not going to defend Origin because there is nothing to defend. The client was criticized at launch for being featureless and it's still featureless over a year later.

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 7:31 PM

                No it's a decent client. Yeah it doesn't have everything that steam has but on it's own merit it's a pretty good client and way the well better that it could have been or anything that people would have expected from EA.

                • reply
                  September 10, 2012 7:47 PM

                  It's an inconvenience for me. I don't care if it's functional. MySpace is functional, I still use Facebook because it's better. Origin is completely separated from my Steam account, which is where all of my friends and games are. Where I have actual social features like voice chat, commenting, recommendations, wishlists, etc. EA can't give me a single compelling reason to use their service over Steam. It exists solely so EA can make more money. Steam exists to make money, but does that by actually improving PC gaming. How has Origin improved anything? At the end of the day, it does nothing for consumers.

                  • reply
                    September 10, 2012 8:19 PM

                    Ehh....Use what you want. Boycott EA cause according to the internet they have been boycotted since the late 90's and are still around.

                    The main issue I have is when people act overtly stupid about stuff and post shit like "they added like a little grey line at the top of the UI. That was big" and having to drag something else that dare to compete with what they decided to devote their fanboyism.

                    Because at the end of the day THAT does nothing to improve gaming.

                    • reply
                      September 10, 2012 8:53 PM

                      Umm, I use Origin whenever I play Battlefield. I will play games I'm interested in and deal with all kinds of bullshit. That's why I play PC games. Don't expect me to be happy when I have to use an inferior system though. If Origin were somehow better than Steam, I'd be the first person to embrace it. It's just vastly inferior and it pisses me off that almost no progress has been made, while Steam has made huge strides in the last twelve months.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 11:42 AM

        I don't remember being able to verify your games on origin when I first ran BF3 last year. And you can do that now (recommended in fact after the last few big patches w/ DLC).

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 11:43 AM

      Here is the video --> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFrL6-OhN94&feature=player_embedded

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 11:46 AM

      Has it gone out yet?

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 12:01 PM

      that advert is odd imo. that voice over sounds it belongs in a commercial for apple or an airline

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 12:52 PM

        Would have been hilarious with Cave Johnson

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 12:50 PM

      Also just something to remember here in Valve's larger vision.

      They want to bring non-gaming apps to Steam.

      Can you imagine them adding Steam-based Hulu and Netflix clients? Or some competent DVD/Blu-ray/media player?

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 1:17 PM

      So, this is not terribly different to just running an HDMI to your TV the way you can now?

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 1:32 PM

      **FOR THOSE WHO WANT TO TRY IT**
      --
      To opt into the beta, go to the Steam menu and select settings. From this screen, you can click the change button under the Beta participation heading and select the "Steam Beta Update." Once you’ve committed your selection, Steam will prompt you to restart the application. Once it’s back up and running, you’ll find a BIG PICTURE button near the upper right-hand corner of Steam’s main window. Click this, or if you have a game controller up and running, press its center button to enter Big Picture mode.
      --

      Hmm, this work for anyone?

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 1:35 PM

        No, I don't think it's live yet. I've opted in but there's no update currently.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 1:43 PM

        I opted in but it doesn't seem that the Big Picture update has been pushed yet

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 4:03 PM

        Works for me. This is fucking awesome!!

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 4:03 PM

          Oddly it ONLY works in 720p or 1080p. No 1440p. It changes resolution when you bring up BPM.

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            September 10, 2012 4:12 PM

            Can't use the D-pad, only the left stick works. I kinda don't like the arrangement of the library window. The initial "Recently Played" view is just a flat, horizontal list of games. It only shows 5 games at a time, leaving you to scroll left and right for the rest. If you move down to "View All Games" you get three rows for a total of 12 full titles and 3 titles which are half shown and half cut off by the edge of the screen. It's serviceable but you have to scroll around way more than you would using SC360 at native resolution. Good enough that I don't feel the need to continue developing SC360, and pretty good for a first release. Knowing Valve they will continue improving this as they receive feedback.

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 4:25 PM

          How the fuck?? Mine doesn't have the big picture button!!

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            September 10, 2012 4:26 PM

            What's really unfortunate is there doesn't seem to be a way to launch BPM using the controller. I hate to say it but this almost completely negates the purpose of BPM for me :/ You have to use the mouse to open Steam and then click "BIG PICTURE". This seemed really obvious to me when I wrote SC360

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 4:34 PM

              [deleted]

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 4:37 PM

                they really did a bang-up job. 1440p support and being able to launch it without having Steam up are the only two improvements i can think of, besides a handful of bug fixes which i'm sure they'll address in short order.

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 4:35 PM

              [deleted]

            • reply
              September 10, 2012 4:37 PM

              Just press the big round xbox button, it works :)

              • reply
                September 10, 2012 4:39 PM

                only works if Steam is already open and has focus, which is kinda pointless

                • reply
                  September 10, 2012 4:41 PM

                  Ha yes. It's only useful if you want to play multiple games on the couch then.

                  • reply
                    September 10, 2012 4:46 PM

                    Wouldn't be too hard to rig up a utility that would just bring up Steam when you press a controller button, even if Valve doesn't fix this. You'd end up pressing Back+Start to bring up Steam, and then Home to bring up Big Picture Mode. Not perfect, but infinitely better than reaching for the mouse. I might look into ripping my controller code out of SC360 to produce a utility like this.

                  • reply
                    September 10, 2012 7:06 PM

                    If they don't fix it before I get there, I'll put together a utility for launching Steam using the SC360 chord (Back+Start) so that BPM can be accessed without needing a mouse

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 4:46 PM

          Agree HOLLY SHIT :) only real beef I have is the paging is gone from all the sections but its just beta so that makes sense.

          PC gaming = Ultimate Gaming

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 2:39 PM

      Well, I guess I won't need a new console for the next generation!

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 3:06 PM

      http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/znljf/steams_big_picture_steam_on_tv/

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFrL6-OhN94

      It's also on reddit. So far the discussion there seems to focus on what the steam browser is like compared to other browsers.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 3:22 PM

        Hahaha "a web browser for the TV that doesn't suck." I hope this is true!! (because they all do in fact, suck)

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 4:00 PM

        [deleted]

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 3:26 PM

      [deleted]

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 4:14 PM

      It's slick, fast, and smooth. I guess they limited it to 720p and 1080p because it's meant for TV's only.

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 4:16 PM

      So when I go to big picture mode it crashes Steam after a few button presses. It crashes it a lot.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 4:25 PM

        Don't think I'll be moving my PC into the living room for a few weeks or so. This is really really crashy.

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 6:56 PM

          I think my problems have to do with Windows 8 and the Xbox controller. Same problem I have with Tell Tale Games and Windows 8 and the Xbox controller. Crash, crash, crash.

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 4:26 PM

      Very slick. No real problems so far. There are some control issues with the overlay and the dynamic zoom in the browser acts very oddly but it seems like a great first go that is completely usable.

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 7:14 PM

        Slick indeed. lack of d-pad navigation is odd though, and yeah the zoom isn't nearly as smart as double tapping text on an iphone.

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 4:33 PM

      [deleted]

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 4:39 PM

        It really needs a way to switch screen. I don't want to use Catalyst to switch.

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 4:40 PM

          That has been my problem with playing games on my TV since forever

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 4:44 PM

          [deleted]

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 4:46 PM

            Yeah but that's annoying and defeats the purpose of having a couch interface! I want to write a macro that launches BP mode AND sets it to "Projector Only" with one button.

            Maybe I will do that!

          • reply
            September 10, 2012 4:47 PM

            I know just let me do that with the controller and launch BPM. Ok thx.

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 4:48 PM

          I use a combo of hippo remote and splashtop on iPad but nothing is elegant.

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      September 10, 2012 4:50 PM

      They're using the middle button on the 360 controller. WHAT TRICKERY IS THIS, I thought you couldn't get access to that via the drivers?!

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 4:57 PM

        it's stupid, too. it interferes with GFWL games in exactly the way you'd think it would

        • reply
          September 10, 2012 5:03 PM

          Just another reason to hate GFWL since the Steam overlay is way better :P

      • reply
        September 10, 2012 7:16 PM

        No, you can't get access to it via Microsoft's XInput API, which is very easy to use. The USB driver stack is there, if you can figure it out - it's too arcane for most developers (who don't regularly work with drivers).

    • reply
      September 10, 2012 7:51 PM

      Just tried it at home with a laptop, works quite well once you get all the issues between laptop and HDTV device worked out.

    • reply
      September 11, 2012 8:37 AM

      [deleted]

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      September 11, 2012 6:02 PM

      THANK YOU STEAM!!! YOU ARE THE "G" in OMG!!!

    • reply
      September 13, 2012 3:44 PM

      I let out a 'Holy Shit' in a duke nukem voice when i loaded it for the first time.

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