Steam launches video game console amid high component prices

NEW YORK: Video game heavyweight Valve on Monday launched a new console, dubbed the Steam Machine, that will set gamers back more than one thousand dollars due to chip prices inflated by the global AI race.

The US company behind the popular Steam game marketplace and subscription platform – the namesake of the new console – attempted a similar launch in 2015, but abandoned the project in 2018 after it had tepid sales.

But the successful launch of the handheld Steam Deck console in 2022, which the company says sold millions of units, gave new impetus to a Steam Machine stand-alone device.

The Steam Machine is not quite a traditional console in the vein of an Xbox or a PlayStation but rather a PC tailor-made for high-end gaming and can function as a traditional computer when not used for gaming.

Valve – the company behind famous video game titles like Counter-Strike, Half-Life, and Left 4 Dead – says Steam Machine units will start shipping on June 29.

But the exploding cost of memory chips – also used in the massive, global AI data centre boom – will see the entry-level version of the console priced at $1,049 (€1,039).

Prices for memory chips have more than tripled over the last year or so.

The current iterations of Sony’s PlayStation and Microsoft’s Xbox are priced at US$599, though they were released more than five years ago.

“The prices we’re sharing today reflect the state of the world for manufacturing or, more accurately, the price of the components as we’ve secured them over the past 6 months,” the company said in a statement.

It added that high demand for the chips has created a shortage, which “has impacted the number of units we’ve been able to produce for launch”.