That depends on what the Steambox was going to be to begin with. If it was to be a console, it would be hard to get in the market regardless. I think it would just be a PC with branding more or less (with a given Steam focused default configuration soft and hardware wise but just as open as any other PC) so I don’t think that would affect them.
I think Valve said their SteamBox wouldn’t include an optical drive, so it seems used games won’t be possible. Games can be purchased so cheaply on Steam anyway that it may not matter too much in practice.
Since it’s Linux based, GOG games probably won’t run on the SteamBox by default, but perhaps Linux games from other stores will (Humble Store, etc).
My excitement for Steam on Linux is more due to the fact that I hope it spurs more developers to include native Linux support for titles which could open up the market a bit and give incentive for sites like GOG to sell Linux games. I can’t say I am very confident Valve is able to make this work. Yes Steam is successful for them and they have release some great games, but lately it doesn’t seem like they are getting much done. Until I see HL3 (and I only hope it is the last in the series as I don’t think I can stomach another wait like the current one), I just don’t feel very trustworthy of Valve actually releasing something.
I would love to get excited for Steam on Linux, but taking Steam on Mac as an example I don’t think it’d going to work too well.
Most of the games available are Valve titles, and the one Mac compatible game I have played (Portal 2) is a bit buggy, as is the Steam client itself.
As is so often the case, great idea, less than stellar application. However, it’s better than nothing, and I do hope it makes developers release more PC games cross-platform in future.
I can see Steam on Linux being useful for people who play a few games, but primarily use their PC for other applications. Similarly on the Mac, some people use a non-Windows OS for everything else, but like to play a few games on the side. These people don’t have to reboot to switch to Windows if there’s a Mac/Linux version of their game. They can still keep their Windows partition around for Windows exclusives, but use OSX/Linux as their primary OS. It’s still a better solution than having to own a whole separate machine, as you have to for console exclusives.
There are lots of games on the Mac now, and I hope to see Linux game support continue to grow. It evens the playing field, leaving the operating system to be chosen based on other merits (such as UI) rather than what games run on it.
Sounds great. I can imagine setting up a PC that boots into Big Picture mode on a large screen. A number of people could take turns playing from a shared collection via their own accounts, just like on a console. If they can get multiple accounts working for split screen games too there will basically be no distinction between the Steam setup and using a console.