Steam Frame evaluation | PC Gamer

The Steam Frame is a good way to sport in digital actuality. I’ve been testing it for 3 weeks and I’ve performed extra VR video games in that point than I’ve in lots of months. That’s as a result of, above all else, it is handy. What used to sluggish me down with different headsets is usually a factor of the previous. I place the Steam Frame on my head and decide a sport to play; VR has by no means been simpler.

But I have not all the time been offered on the Steam Frame. I spent the week previous to its arrival enjoying on the Pimax Dream Air, which incorporates probably the most spectacular Micro-OLED shows. That is a troublesome act to observe for any VR headset, not to mention one with optics not dissimilar from the three-year-old Quest 3. As a long-term VR consumer and somebody that is been privileged to play a lot of the greatest VR headsets lately, the Steam Frame felt too acquainted an expertise out of the field.

Over many weeks of testing, I’ve seen extra how the Steam Frame has eased a number of of my elementary gripes with digital actuality; issues that trigger me to depart my different headsets to collect mud on the shelf. Like how usually I must arrange my playspace, set the ground top, peer out from my headset at my laptop, modify the strap, or untangle myself from a cable.

A wi-fi dongle included with the Frame takes care of the cable, delivering a seamless and dependable connection between it and a gaming PC. The fully-featured SteamOS means step one upon donning the headset is selecting a sport, and the second step enjoying it. The included controllers work with each sport, VR or non-VR, and are tracked with pinpoint accuracy. And with such a light-weight design, that is one headset I’m not in a rush to take off.

I wish to use the Steam Frame greater than some other headset I personal proper now. That consists of some which are double the value. Ack, I’ve talked about cash. Now I’ve to do the laborious factor and convey this spiralling again right down to Earth: The Steam Frame begins out a $1,059 for the 256 GB mannequin. I have not spoken to anybody, even Valve staff, who has a lot constructive to say concerning the value. The reminiscence disaster has finished a quantity on the Steam Frame, because it did the Steam Machine.

The Steam Frame is not an inexpensive means into digital actuality for the lots. It needs to be seen as an fanatic providing; or, on the very least, you need to care a bit about VR to buy one. Those of us desirous to attempt VR for the primary time are nonetheless higher off with a Quest 3 or Quest 3S for worth for cash; and people of us that already personal a Quest 3—that is a number of us—it is a powerful improve, missing any main visible overhaul. There are undoubtedly higher choices for fanatics in search of that, just like the Bigscreen Beyond 2. Yet it’s way more handy than high-end headsets that also depend on Base Stations or heavy tethers.

Ultimately, I imagine VR to be a holistic expertise. Focus all of your efforts on one side of a headset and the consumer expertise is more likely to undergo furthermore for one thing else; the weakest hyperlink. Take it from me, even high-end optics fall flat after the umpteenth time resetting your playspace as a consequence of poor monitoring. The Steam Frame does, then, have its virtues: It’s by far the perfect all-round VR headset for consumer expertise, with no main faults apart from the value; it is simply that value issues greater than most.

Steam Frame – Gallery

Steam Frame – Features

Steam Frame – Optics

The Steam Frame’s optics are, on paper, the least thrilling factor about it. We’ve seen a handful of headsets with related configurations, from the Quest 3 to the Pico 4 Ultra; neither of which are brand new.

Graphical fidelity feels much the same on the Steam Frame as the Quest 3. There’s an amount of aliasing (jaggies) on straight lines and sharp details, which adds a touch of flicker as your head moves around. There is also a slight hint of chromatic aberration to the edge of some brighter details, such as the Steam Frame logo upon startup, though this is quite minor.

Text is clear to read when scaled appropriately, though can get tougher to make out when it’s outside of the fairly large focal area of the pancake lenses or at a greater distance. Similarly, some details in game worlds can be lost when viewed from far away, and objects with meshes can get a little distorted or flicker—something that higher-end headsets, like the Pimax Crystal Super or Dream Air, don’t suffer from. Those two headsets are available with Micro-OLED displays, which offer much more vibrancy and range of colour than the Steam Frame, but for huge price tags.

The Steam Frame is right up there with the best of them for binocular overlap.

The Steam Frame offers, more or less, a level of quality that I’ve become accustomed to in relatively affordable VR headsets.

Where the Steam Frame outperformed my expectations is in binocular overlap. This is the amount of an image (given as a percentage) that is covered by both left- and right-side displays at the same time. It’s not as often talked about as resolution and refresh rate, but it’s hugely important for long-term comfort while wearing a VR headset. The Steam Frame has a pretty high binocular overlap, according to my own testing in the ‘What is my Field of View?’ application (more commonly called WimFov). This is with an IPD set to 64.

• Steam Frame – 77%
• Meta Quest 3 – 69%
• Pimax Crystal Super 50 PPD – 77%
• Pimax Crystal Super Micro-OLED – 86%
• Pimax Dream Air (standard FOV) – 86%
• Pimax Dream Air (wide FOV) – 77%

The Steam Frame is right up there with the best of them for binocular overlap, beaten only by the Micro-OLED optics used in both the Crystal Super and Dream Air. The Quest 3 has a lower level of binocular overlap, which can lead to discomfort or worsened 3D effects, though it does depend on your IPD and various other biological factors. I tend to struggle with headsets with a low overlap over time; they strain my eyes.

Binocular overlap, as measured in WimFov

Valve is pretty honest when it comes to the FOV. The Steam Frame’s horizontal field of view (HFOV) is noted as ‘up to 110 degrees’, and lo and behold, I measured it at that. That’s not as common as you might think. I often find the effective HFOV to be lower than the stated FOV. For example, all three of the headsets in the table below have a listed HFOV of 110 degrees.

There are a range of factors that can have an effect on effective FOV, not the least bit my own biology. Yet one big factor is the design of the padding between one’s face and the lenses. Valve seems to have nailed the padding design to maximise the effective FOV; thick enough as to not be a detriment to the long-term comfort yet ensuring a one’s eyeballs are right up to the lenses. Using the glasses spacer included with the Steam Frame will knock this back a touch.

Beyond the numbers, the Steam Frame’s optics plonk you right into the game world. There’s no visible distortion until the very extremes of the lenses, and even then it’s not that bad by comparison to some. The gap around the nose is a little noticeable during gameplay, and made worse by the glasses spacer, but you have to be kinda looking out for it to notice it too much. That can be reduced with the extended light blocker in the Ergonomic Accessories Kit for an additional $59 (89 CAD / 69 EUR / 59 GBP / 99 AUD).

There is a degree of glare, as I find with most headsets with pancake lenses, but to a lesser extent than the Quest 3. It’s only really noticeable when there’s a very high level of contrast being displayed, which isn’t all that often in my experience.

For the most part, when I’m trying to throw barrels, bottles, and cans at headcrabs in Half-Life: Alyx because I’ve run out of ammo, I’m not thinking about the FOV, binocular overlap, or glare; I’m thinking, ‘Ah, ah, ah! No, no, please, just die already! Oh, god!‘

That’s positive, right?

Steam Frame – Performance

The best way to play on the Steam Frame is over the included wireless adapter. It’s a USB Type-A dongle providing a 6 GHz connection beamed directly at a dedicated antenna on the Frame. Another antenna on the Frame connects directly to the local Wi-Fi. The Frame actually taps both connections for game streaming from a local PC; selecting between the two in real-time for the lowest packet loss and most robust connection.

The best way to play on the Steam Frame is over the included wireless adapter.

I’m yet to notice any connection issues over the dedicated dongle, whether in my own home or in our busy office. Nor any visible dips in quality for the game being beamed across. That’s really impressive, as Valve’s is using what it calls Foveated Streaming to reduce the bandwidth requirements over the wireless connection. It does so by only streaming the game in the highest detail in the area where one’s eyes are looking. The rest is streamed at a lower quality level. The Frame’s built-in eye tracking has to keep up with your pupils to ensure a smooth experience—and it does a superb job of it.

The Frame supports a refresh rate up to 144 Hz, though it defaults to 90/72 Hz, depending on the power mode selected. In the battery-saving Playtime mode, it will only run at 72 Hz, which is pretty passable in my opinion. At the expense of battery life and processing power, it can run anywhere from 90–144 Hz in the settings menu.

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 (SM8650) chip does a pretty good job of rendering games locally. It does, however, require gentler programming in the graphics menu.

Take Half-Life: Alyx, for example, as Valve has created a version of the game that runs natively on the Snapdragon chip. It is of much lower quality than you’ll experience by streaming the game from a local PC over the provided dongle. Valve has added foveated rendering to the game (dynamically changing the rendering level based on where one’s looking) in order to improve performance. Unlike foveated streaming, foveated rendering is far more noticeable in my peripheral vision.

Though Half-Life: Alyx running at all on the Snapdragon chip is impressive, as are other games that are able to run just fine after being chopped up by the two compatibility layers, Proton and FEX. Proton deals with Windows to Linux; FEX deals with x86 to Arm. I tried out a few VR and non-VR games standalone on the Steam Frame and it often dealt surprisingly well with them. These included a few Steam Frame Standalone Verified games and one that hadn’t yet been checked.

• Eleven Table Tennis (verified): smooth, high fps
• Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered (not verified): failed to run past splash screen
• Escape Room VR (verified): smooth, decent fps
• Hades (verified): smooth, high fps

Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered is Steam Deck Verified; however, that doesn’t mean it will run on Frame, as it using FEX as well as Proton. Essentially, there are a few more hoops to jump through.

Hades, on the other hand, runs great via both translation layers. It’s likely a boon to the Frame that the game has a Vulkan version already available. If I understand it correctly, Vulkan should let Valve skip some of the translation work and improve performance. The game reached around 100 fps, so it definitely didn’t seem to suffer for any of the funny business in the background. It’s best to set the Steam Frame’s cap to beneath this figure, anyways, as it keeps the visuals steady and stable. Once I set the system to 144 Hz, which it couldn’t reliably hit in Hades, moving my head would cause the game screen to shudder.

Eleven Table Tennis is a great reminder of when low latency and high refresh really matter in VR. I’ve been trying to beat the silver-level AI in that game for weeks now. I had, at times, thought it impossible, especially after trying and failing on three different VR headsets (Frame, Dream Air, Quest 3).

Installing the game on the Frame and running it locally at 120 Hz, with the ergonomic straps removed from the controllers to aid my front spin, I finally cracked it. I nailed some fast return balls that the stupid cat (the AI has a cat’s face, don’t ask) couldn’t return. It was a silky smooth experience, even on the Frame’s internal ‘Turnip’ Adreno GPU. I feel the local processing and high refresh really helped me here; but it drained the heck outta the battery on this thing: 50% gone in under 30 minutes.

Nevertheless, the standalone functionality feels less crucial to me. I will almost always stream games from my gaming PC via the wireless connection, due to the performance, quality, and battery life improvements I’ll get onto shortly.

Steam Frame – Ergonomics

The Steam Frame weighs in at 440 grams. On my scales, it’s more like 403 grams, but that’s more a criticism of my crappy scales than anything else. What’s important is that it is exceedingly light; the second-lightest from my own measurements.

• Steam Frame: 403 g
• Quest 3: 437 g
• Quest 3S: 454 g
• Crystal Dream Air: 280 g
• Crystal OLED: 848 g
• Crystal normal: 837 g
• Sony PS VR2: 499 g

Comfort in a VR headset is not all about weight, but in this case, the Steam Frame’s small stature helps a helluva lot. Valve has balanced the weight of the Steam Frame across the front and back of the device, with the battery as a counterweight to the headset’s ‘core module’, containing the optics, SoC, and most other technical bits. With the weight of the battery elsewhere, the core module weighs only 157 grams. Valve has that at 185 grams but hey ho; crappy scales.

Ample cushioning around the face and on the rear of the battery help to alleviate most discomfort from the weight of the device during play sessions. Unlike the Quest or older, heavier headsets, the weight does not feel like it is localised to your cheekbones or around the eyes. Even after hours of play to test the battery life, I didn’t notice any patches of red or indentation lines on my face.

If you wear glasses, the Steam Frame is pretty accommodating. There’s a spacer included in the box that adds another 4-7 mm between your face and the lenses. It’s the easiest to add into the headset that I’ve used to date, too. It’s all magnetically attached—the padding and glasses spacer can be replaced in no time at all.

Ergonomics accessories kit

Valve is offering an Ergonomic Accessories Kit as a separate purchase alongside the Steam Frame. It costs 59 USD/89 CAD/69 EUR/59 GBP/99 AUD and includes three premium upgrades:

• Controller straps w/ compatible battery doors
• Extended light blocker
• Top headset strap

I reckon most Steam Frame customers would buy the Ergonomic Accessories Kit without question. I probably would, too. But I’ve done my duty and played extensively with it fitted to the headset and without, and I have to say, it’s really not a must-have.

The headset doesn’t move around much with or without the added top headset strap. It is, however, useful if you’re planning to pass the headset around a large group of people, as it makes it easier to adjust from person to person in a dash. I suppose if you’re playing Beat Saber or anything a little more active, you may want the added support, but again, I don’t think it’s all that necessary.

The extended light blocker does a pretty good job of keeping light out from your nose, and that’s especially true if you wear glasses like me; however, I’ve played mostly without and it’s not been a detriment to my time in VR.

Then there are the most contentious upgrades of the three: the controller straps. These replace the cord straps included with the controller with straps that tighten around the entire hand, akin to the Valve Index design. Once installed, I can make better use of the finger sensing features of the Steam Frame controller (capacitive buttons combined with some sensing of the lower digits) and they’re easier to slip into than the standard cord option.

On the flipside, the Frame’s controllers are not as elegantly designed for this sort of strap as the Index’s. I had a few members of the PC Gamer team try out the Steam Frame one by one in the office, and on numerous occasions I received the feedback that they cannot comfortably reach all the buttons. Take away the straps and that issue goes away.

In my experience, the straps are an improvement for games where grip plays a large role, such as Half-Life: Alyx. I can launch an item towards me and catch it naturally without thinking twice. Whereas without the straps, I had to sorta relearn to lift and grab, as two separate movements. But I definitely don’t mind using the controllers without the straps, and for playing 2D games, the more natural position without the added straps feels best.

Steam Frame – Controllers and tracking

The tracking on the Steam Frame is excellent; perhaps even its strongest feature.

It’s inside-out tracking using four monochrome cameras, combined with IR illuminators for low-light conditions. Those monochrome cameras aren’t the best for passthrough or XR play—they offer a rough blue fascimile of the real-world behind the headset—but they work great for mapping the movements of the headset and controllers. That means no more Base Stations, as were required with the Valve Index; just the Frame itself keeping track of its position in VR.

What impresses me most is how consistent the boundaries of the playspace seem to be when using the Frame. It’s yet to lose track of a boundary, floor height, or its own location within that space in my many weeks of testing. Whether I place it on the floor, move it around, turn it off and on again, or even move furniture around it, the playspace is locked in.

The headset does a great job with the controllers, too. The pair provided with the Frame support 6DOF and an inertial measurement unit (IMU) to correctly orient themselves in the world with excellent accuracy.

I’m yet to experience a single moment where one or both of my virtual hands go wandering off into the distance. Neither have I experienced what I will shamelessly call a floppy hand problem, where my virtual hand feels stuck on some invisible object and flops around like a fish as I try to wiggle it free. I have had both of those happen to me in the past couple of weeks with another headset, the Dream Air, but none so far with the Frame.

The Frame’s controllers are similar in shape and style to those included with the Quest 3/3S. That’s no bad thing; both are comfortable and intuitive. Yet Valve has also added more buttons to its latest pads, including ABXY on the right controller, a d-pad on the left controller, and bumper buttons to both.

These extra inputs aren’t required a whole lot in VR; most devices don’t make use of them. They are instead useful for playing 2D games on a virtual screen within the Frame. I’ve been testing this out with the original Hades: dragging the screen to a massive cinema-like size and putting my gaming chair into its deepest recline. It’s pretty good, and even though I think the novelty of playing on a virtual big screen is already beginning to wear off, I can see why Valve says you can slip the Frame on and then decide which game to play. It can pretty much play whatever from your library with minimal fuss and without switching controllers.

For the record, you can pair up an external controller, keyboard, or mouse to the Frame over Bluetooth, including a Steam Controller. I haven’t found much need to do so as of yet.

Steam Frame – Software

SteamOS is going places. Once limited to the Steam Deck and whatever one dared to load the ISO onto, it has since made its way into the living room and other handhelds. With the launch of the Steam Frame, the Arch Linux-based operating system breaks into the third dimension.

The Steam Frame offers a familiar interface for any PC gamer. It’s just SteamOS, or Big Picture Mode, except its hovering in front of you. It has extensive menus for adjusting various settings on the Steam Frame, a status bar with some handy functions for VR, and a slightly tweaked interface for moving and enlarging windows within your expanded field of view. Otherwise, it’s just Steam.

The Steam Frame wouldn’t be around were it not for SteamOS, Proton, and FEX.

All your games in your library move over to the Steam Frame upon signing in. There are new categories automatically added to the interface to separate VR titles from non-VR titles, and in some cases, games are divided by those installed on the headset and those that can be streamed from a nearby PC. Once you select a game, you can click the arrow to the right of the green play button to select between playing it locally or streaming it from your gaming PC; depending on if it is installed on one or both devices.

Valve also offers the Steam Frame Standalone Verified program to give an idea of whether a given game is going to play nicely while running on the Frame’s own hardware. Few games are built for the Frame—as far as I know, it’s just Half-Life: Alyx—most are going to be either Android games running through Lepton, Valve’s Android container, or use translation layers, Proton and Fex, in order to be made to run on Linux and Arm.

The Steam Frame wouldn’t be around were it not for SteamOS, Proton, and FEX. Meta has Horizon OS, Google has Android XR, and Apple has visionOS for their respective headsets. Only Horizon OS feels in any way a fit for gaming, but even so, Meta has shifted to a more XR-centric interface and put a hold on third-party headsets using it. So that’s out. That really means Valve had no other option than to do it itself with the Steam Frame.

And thank God for that. The biggest selling point for of the Steam Frame and SteamOS in virtual reality for me is that Meta has nothing to do with it. While you no longer need a Meta account for the Quest 3/3S, you still have to use the services of a company with big AI aspirations and a problematic privacy and safety document.

As for video games obtainable for the Steam Frame, it has a lot to select from already on Steam, and it is set to learn from Valve lately including assist to Steam for Android video games. The Steam Frame additionally comes with a free copy of Half-Life: Alyx, and I can consider no higher sport that this to indicate off what it could do; capable of each be streamed from a gaming PC and run regionally on the Steam Frame’s Snapdragon processor. It’s the perfect VR sport round at this time, regardless of being launched over six years in the past.

That touches on one problem going through VR on the whole at this time: the supply of latest video games and experiences. Plenty of the perfect VR video games are the identical ones we have now been enjoying for a few years, reminiscent of Beat Saber, Phasmophobia, Skyrim, Blade & Sorcery, Job Simulator, Arizona Sunshine; which I’ve pulled from Steam’s personal reputation rankings, amongst a sprinkling of newer titles. One newer title I’ve actually loved prior to now 12 months is Ghost Town, made by Fireproof Games, however even it’s a 12 months outdated now.

While Steam itself sees ever-increasing numbers of games revealed to the platform each single 12 months, virtual reality games published on the platform have plummeted since an preliminary surge round 2017-18. Meanwhile, the Meta Horizon Store appears to still be trending upwards each year, although I can not ensure what number of of these are precise video games. Lots appear to be coaching functions.

If Valve can appeal to new builders to share their current and future Android video games on Steam, maybe we’ll see a renewed surge of VR video games on the platform. As of proper now, it looks like recent experiences are few and much between.

Steam Frame – Battery

You do not need to consistently fear about tripping over a cable with the Steam Frame. Instead, you may have to pay attention to your battery degree.

The Steam Frame comes with a 21.6 Wh Li-ion battery, situated on the rear of the strap. It has a USB 2.0 Type-C port off at an angle from its left-hand aspect, which is used fairly solely for charging the system as a consequence of bandwidth limitations for information.

There is not an adapter included with the headset. Instead, it may be charged with any appropriate energy adapter as much as 45 watts.

Valve is promoting its personal adapter for $29 (49 CAD/39 EUR/29 GBP/49 AUD). While I’m personally not too bothered concerning the lack of charger within the field—I’ve a lot already and I’m all for slicing out extra chargers—a few of my colleagues really feel it’s kind of of a miss at this value level.

It takes some time to completely cost the Steam Frame from flat. In one check, utilizing a 140 W Anker energy adapter, it took 151 minutes to go from fully empty to completely charged. In one other, utilizing Valve’s personal energy adapter, it took 142 minutes. So a great two hours and alter for a full cost.

Here are the battery ranges and instances recorded from my testing:

Using an influence meter on my wall outlet, I recorded the facility attract each checks round ~ 11 W always.

I requested Valve concerning the battery charging behaviour forward of launch. They instructed me:

“An empty battery takes around two hours to charge to full capacity. However, the charging is not linear. There is fast charging from 0 to 65%, and regular charging from 65% and up. Charging to 65% is expected to take less than 40 minutes. (Note: these values may be optimized over time, and are therefore subject to change.)”

I hadn’t seen any signal of quick charging to 65% in my very own checks on the time I reached out; nonetheless, prompted by Valve’s response, I attempted one final check. I ran the battery right down to near-flat, and whereas the headset was nonetheless turned on however not enjoying any video games, I plugged within the charger.

This time, the facility meter learn ~31 W—thrice the draw I recorded when the headset was powered off. When it reached 65%, it dropped to ~18 W.

I’ve felt slightly impatient with the Frame on a number of occassions—a sense of getting to attend too lengthy between classes as soon as the battery had died. Though I did enhance issues by not letting the Steam Frame die fully between costs, utilizing a suitably highly effective energy financial institution in my pocket (round 25 W ought to do it), and utilizing the Frame’s varied energy saving modes.

Depending on the mode of use, the Steam Frame can final between one and two hours of play time:

• Half-Life: Alyx (Arm model, operating regionally): 63 minutes
• Half-Life: Alyx (streaming from PC w/ Frame set to Playtime mode): 114 minutes

So, for each hour performed in a sport operating on the headset, you will be kind of charging for 2; nonetheless, the longevity of the headset whereas streaming from a PC is fairly spectacular.

I took these figures with the Frame set to Playtime mode, which favours battery life over efficiency and limits the body fee to 72. You can push larger efficiency at a price to longevity.

I famous the facility draw of the headset in every mode whereas enjoying Half-Life: Alyx. When the sport is operating natively on the Steam Frame in standalone mode, the entire system attracts round 17-19 W. Instead beam the sport from my gaming PC utilizing the included dongle and the Frame attracts as little as 10 W. Nearly half as a lot energy draw; practically double the battery.

There could also be an alternative choice for extending the Frame’s battery life in future, too. Valve has confirmed to us it’s engaged on a brand new strap with hot-swappable batteries and BMR drivers to match the superb audio system on the Valve Index. This will likely be a swap-in improve for the modular Frame. No launch data for that one simply but, although.

As for the controllers, I’m but to swap the AA battery situated in every one since I started testing. Still going robust at this time at 74%.

Steam Frame – Value

Everyone’s dissatisfied by the RAM disaster.

There’s just one Steam Frame value shopping for. That’s the 256 GB mannequin. It’s a VR headset that works greatest when streaming video games put in in your gaming PC, and if you wish to benefit from the standalone performance, there’s an SD card slot for straightforward enlargement.

That 256 GB mannequin prices $1,059. So let’s examine that value to its competitors. The Steam Frame prices:

• 76.5% greater than a Quest 3 512 GB;
• 8.6% lower than a Bigscreen Beyond 2E, or 10% greater than the Bigscreen Beyond 2;
• 53.9% lower than a Pimax Dream Air;
• 6% greater than a Valve Index at launch;
• 202% greater than a Quest 3S 128 GB.

The Steam Frame will not be as inexpensive as I’d prefer it to be. Nor my colleagues, a few of whom actually winced as I instructed them the value. It’s additionally extra expensive than Valve’s authentic value goal.

I want we might have shipped it on the value that we have been eventually 12 months.

“We set out to design this hardware with one particular price in mind,” says Joy Lyons, {hardware} engineer at Valve, “… that price target shifted just due to the ongoing RAM crisis around the world.”

“We’re happy to have our customers be able to have hardware during this RAM crisis, and we think it’s important to launch new hardware out there and have new experiences available. But, yeah, I think everyone’s disappointed by the RAM crisis.”

I want I might go one evaluation with out mentioning the damned reminiscence disaster, or one chat with Valve with out bringing it up. It has undoubtedly put a dampener on the joy I felt for the Frame popping out of Valve’s workplace in Bellevue practically a 12 months in the past. One of the folks that ecstatically confirmed off the Steam Frame to me throughout that go to was Jeremy Selan, a software program engineer at Valve engaged on the Frame.

I had an opportunity to meet up with Selan once more lately, and I requested him, ‘if you happen to might click on your fingers and alter something concerning the Steam Frame at this time, what would it not be?’ Selan responded, “Price. I wish we could have shipped it at the price that we were at last year.”

That’s a query I stole from our Andy Edser throughout an interview he ran earlier this year with Valve on the Steam Machine. The response then from engineer Yazan Aldehayyat was much the same: “Make it cheaper”.

So if you’re disappointed about the price of the Steam Frame, you’re not wrong to be, nor are you alone in that sentiment. It sucks.

What’s tricky for Valve is that Meta seems to have inventory or money enough to have staved off another price hike for the Quest 3. For now, at least. The company raised the price of both the Quest 3 and Quest 3S in April, though remains at lower price than Valve can offer for not totally dissimilar hardware. Meta said at the time of that price hike, “we’re making this change because the cost of building high-performance VR hardware has risen significantly.” And if trillion-dollar Meta is feeling it, you can bet Valve is too.

I wouldn’t chastise someone for buying a Quest 3. You do get a lot for your money, even after the price hike. Yet if it were me with some money to burn on a VR headset today, I’d buy the Steam Frame. Convenience is king; and the Steam Frame has it nailed. While I might be in the minority of PC Gamer writers surveyed about this, I’d be willing to pay more for the ease of use and comfort provided by the Frame.

I’d also be willing to pay a bit more for the upgradeability that is being talked about here. It’s only after taking the core module out myself and chatting to Valve about the modularity of the device that I’ve begun to realise why it’s called the Steam Frame.

There’s potential for plenty of upgrades here. From the full-colour RGB passthrough module from Arcturus that I’ve just started playing around with, or the hot-swappable battery strap from Valve, to whatever modders turn their mind to next. Building out my own Steam Frame to suit my needs over time is an exciting prospect.