this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2023
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The Steam Deck is a full fledged Linux PC in a handheld format.
xbox one OS is windows 10 core. That doesnt make it "not a console"
A console is a closed off system. The Deck is literally just a Linux PC in handheld format. You can do everything with it, Valve even explicitly encourages you to do that.
The point I think is that a "console" is from a certain PoV a locked down piece of hardware only able to run certain software in certain ways. So eg. Stadia was a console, while AWS virtual desktops are not, despite both being just VMs running on some cloud service.
Point is, it's the software that makes a console, not the hardware.
and a console
The Steam Deck really blurs the lines between PC and console. Modern consoles use AMD64/Radeon hardware and at least the Xbox consoles use a modified Windows OS. The Steam Deck uses AMD64/Radeon hardware and a modified Linux OS. Both feature a controller-focused user interface centered around gaming.
If you exclude the Steam Deck from the definition of "console" then a console is defined by its restrictive nature and limited selection of games.
If you include the Steam Deck in the definition of "console" then a console is defined by its controller-friendly and gaming-first design (as opposed to a general purpose PC).
I feel both definitions have merit.
It really doesn't. Consoles are a completely closed off system, to the point where modifying it can get you banned from online services. The Deck is the complete opposite to that, with Valve even explicitly encouraging you to tinker with it. It always has been advertised as being a full PC, because you can do all the things you can do on a PC. You can literally go into desktop mode and have your regular KDE Plasma screen.
By your definition every gaming PC would count as being a console. That's just nonsense.
I feel like this is a modernized definition of "console". The earliest consoles distinguished themselves from the computers of the time by being gaming-first, not by being restrictive and closed off. Things that defined a console were not coming with a keyboard or mouse, connecting primarily to a television rather than a monitor, and using a joystick or gamepad for input.
There were a lot of instances of third party published games for consoles in the past, whether officially licensed or unofficial, approved or unapproved. The online service definition ignores half of the console generations in video gaming history. There were a lot of unlicensed/3rd party games published for the 8-bit and 16-bit era consoles (and yes, some of those had to bypass security chips, but I don't think all of them did).
I think in some ways the Steam Deck is a return to form of these earlier machines, but in a modern way (and handheld). Valve's openness isn't a good reason to not consider the Steam Deck a console. I fully agree that it is a PC, but I feel like it fits both definitions in the best way possible.
They weren't gaming first, they were gaming only. You didn't load up an office program on an atari or snes. That didn't really change until they combined them for media purposes, like playing CDs, DVDs & BDs, and even that was extremely limited and without consistency.
No idea what your homebrew / piracy paragraph is supposed to be in regards to this topic though. That's not just not official, but straight up "illegal" in the minds of their creators. As a kid I personally owned one of those SNES adapters where you'd plug in a floppy disk and would rip the game from the cardridge into a rom. If we were caught with that we might've even got into legal trouble. On a Deck you can copy & paste all the files you want. You can download and run all the programs you want, albeit a tiny bit more restricted than your regular desktop distro. But in essence, it's still a full fledged PC, with everything that comes with it, and you could use it just for non gaming purposes if you so wish.
It's simply that. A Linux PC in a handheld format.
This is admittedly REALLY pedantic, but there were some non-game cartridges released for the NES and SNES, such as Taboo: The Sixth Sense (a tarot card reading program), Miracle Piano (a program for teaching how to play the piano), Mario Paint (a basic music composition and drawing program), and a modem add-on for the Famicom that supported banking, stock trading, and horse race betting.
I wasn't referring to piracy, I was referring to unofficial releases. Think Wisdom Tree and their line of Bible Games for the NES/SNES (these are pretty well covered by YouTube creators which is why I mention them as an example). Also, some of the early consoles did have non-gaming uses. I believe there was a version of BASIC for the Atari 2600. There were several planned online communication systems for various early consoles. There was the "Work Boy" accessory for the Game Boy that turned it into a digital assistant/organizer. There were officially licensed cooking "games" for the Nintendo DS that were more of recipe collections than actual games. And you touched on media, which was another thing consoles did outside of gaming since CD drives became used on consoles. Wii Fit was more of a fitness accessory than it was a game.
Pretty much the only thing that separates PC from console in your definition is whether you can run your own code on it. I don't disagree that being able to run your own code on a machine is a huge benefit, but do you consider the iPhone a console? What about the Amazon Echo Show? Smart fridge? These have the locked down ecosystems of consoles but aren't gaming-first. I would say no, they are not consoles and I'm sure you would agree.