Valve Engineering

Propaganda for what though?

"Hey, look at this guy with the screaming controller, he's so awesome for that" ?

More that it's funny to imagine that this feature was a deliberate pick from the CEO.

Might just be propagabenda

I mean, the choice to have the controller scream when dropped might have been something Gabe cooked up

What's funny is, in Europe at least, the orders were not processed by time - a ton of people were complaining that they ordered theirs a couple of minutes early like you, or on time and were among the most delayed.

In my case I managed to process payment a whole hour later (after finally giving up and spamming the Continue button), so I can't really be mad I ultimately bought one. And they finally shipped it, so there is hope for this week 🙏

Yeah sorry. I accidentally refreshed the page 5 minutes early and realized the buy button was working, my serial number ends in 00067 😬. Good luck getting one!

ok no issues yea the comic was very confusing at first

Thanks for answering, I'm just seeing all this 🤣 and yes are accurate I did test it like that

ok

Parent comment thought you were being sarcastic

Oh sorry, it's a common thing in my area that that's a sarcastic response. I thought you baited me.

I read it wrong. Apologies.

Anyways, I was entirely serious .. it's a weird feature to put into a controller but I get the nerd factor appeal of it. I can't confirm it first hand though, I'm waiting to get my hands on one.

I don't understand

I was responding earnestly because I thought it was polite. That's my mistake.

For anyone who gets the ridiculous 5070 overlay ad instead of actual audio (Thanks CNET, for finding really annoying ways around ad blockers), here is just a video of the sound: https://youtu.be/tw5Luf_7F8c

no, really ?

that's real... amazing

https://www.cnet.com/tech/gaming/the-steam-controller-wilhelm-scream-easter-egg-is-incredible/

HAHAHAHA!!!

When you drop the Steam controller it plays the Wilheim scream noise. They were trying it out repeatedly agitating their wife in trying something so senseless until it worked to her astonishment.

what ?

Ah, one of the lucky ones who got their controller actually shipped and in their hands already. Meanwhile tons of us stuck on "Packaged Items" for 2 weeks already, what a chaotic launch...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Cube

Dafuq

Came here to say exactly this tbh. Apply analytical math to Earth sphere and discover 2 opposite hemispheres rotating in opposite directions - equal to a ZERO value existence. In other words, 4 Earth Quadrants simultaneously rotate inside 4 Time Cube Quarters to create 4 - 24 hour days within one Earth rotation.

Considering its using the habtic motors, probably more likely used to test the capabilities of the controller

for me, this but "you died" sound


Happy Belated Mother's Day, GLaDOS!

"What are you doing? YOU MONSTER! They're one of us."

"I'm kidding. Destroying them is part of the test. They are no more important to you than you are to me."


!An image of the apparatus that forcibly holds the victim's eyes open in "A Clockwork Orange".

Okay, that one just sounds terrifying!

And to wrap a scream frame around my head!

Well, now I want a Scream Deck and Scream Machine!

This is where all this shit began in the modern era

They can also choose to intentionally make *slightly less* money if there's something they want to do first, or spend resources/time on stuff that doesn't bring in revenue. In a publicly traded company, the investors can sue for mishandling their investment.

And NASCAR. Du Pont has been caught secretly poisoning the US's water multiple times now

That and Formula 1 sponsors are the most sus companies in the world.

Yeah because public companies are just investment scams now. The product they make is not their primary revenue. Once CEOs figured out you can just say shit on social media and juice the stock. Its market manipulation all the way down. At least with private companies its still about making a product or service and serving your customers and no private equity doesn't count that is a different scam. Where you offload debit.

Not just gaming companies. I watch every prodct from a listed compny with suspicion by now.

Nothing says rent.

It doesn't need an update, it needs enforcement. The law is about copyright holders losing rights at time of sale, not the specific media that the copyrighted material exists on.

The EU enforced their first sale doctrine on Valve.

That's a matter of law, and you have to convince the government to update the law accordingly

Yeah... virtually every software license disagrees with you. You can't transfer a steam account, you (according to Microsoft) can't even transfer the OS license.

Personally I agree that we should be able to do so, but that exactly what is being argued - publishers are ignoring first sale doctrine

Yes that's why you can buy software and sell the computer with the licenses following along it, assuming you don't keep copies separately

No, the problem is that people believe "[concept] on a computer" is somehow magically different from "[concept] IRL" when it's not.

When you buy a game from Steam, you buy a *game*, not a license, and the First Sale Doctrine applies just as much as it does if you buy a board game from Walmart. Any claims to the contrary are simply *lies*, and any government support for such lies is simply *tyranny*.

The physical media is whatever is playing the content. The law doesn't specify the media.

1909, one year after the Supreme Court ruling: "Your honor, I know that the Supreme Court ruled that publishers can't add a shrink wrap license that prohibits cheap resale of copyrighted work but you see, I delivered the content on llamas where it was printed onto scrolls at the customer's home so the law doesn't apply. You wrote the laws thinking about trains and ships transporting books and I use neither."

And yet even DVDs have a bullshit screen about "license to the content blah blah" and bullshit like region codes

The problem is first sale doctrine applies to the physical media which carries the license of its own content.

maybe more to the publishers not allowing that

It's not up to publishers. Publishers tried to put a disclaimer on books preventing cheap resale. The Supreme Court struck it down and it was written into law over 100 years ago.

Yeah I agree but that maybe more to the publishers not allowing that that to me would be achieved through regulation just like with the refunds. First sale was not something publishers wanted just a feature of having physical media. Also there is a myth that all steam games are DRMed. There are may games that run without steam being open but that is up to the publisher. Stuff like family sharing they added is them bring value to customers while walking a fine line with the publishers.

It's called renting. A thing for over thousands of years.

All hail the FLOPPOTRON

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtRVTYMA87k

Haptics motors make sound, you can control the pitch by how fast you make the haptics vibrate. Map the vibrate speed to audio frequencies and you can play sounds

Like how they can make an F1 engine play happy birthday https://youtu.be/Tr4zb-HHZs4

Or floppy drives play music

https://youtu.be/yHJOz_y9rZE

Several! You could have different ones on different controllers.

Yeah, I had the custom sound startup on the original controller.

They did the same on the first model! But only for a few things

They did what now? 🤯

And like many classic bits of nerd silliness, it's also low-key impressive at the technical level.

The controller doesn't have a speaker in it. They managed to get this clear, recognizable sound from haptic feedback motors!

There seems to be a significant quality gap between publicly traded and private gaming companies.

tech feudalism

I use Steam but Gabe was one of the original tech feudalists.

Valve ignores the First Sale Doctrine, a law for over a hundred years. So now instead of being able to resell your games for whatever amount you want, your games are forever under the control of Valve.

Sure, this comic edit is just for the fun of it

Because Valve is one of the few tech companies that still wants to have fun and be silly like tech used to be. Before we entered the hell scape tech feudalism era.

I tested this out last night. It took a few tries and my wife thought I was crazy till it screamed out. 11/10 would buy again.

Scream Controller

Valve is trapped in a time prism where tech is still fun.

**GLaDOS/GabeN**: They're sentient, you know. I think that one was about to say "I love you".

It's beyond silly. And I love it.

But I also hate it because I don't want to drop my controller, but I love that it screams when I do.

"If we're not gonna have planned obsolescence, let's make it so people wanna drop their controllers on purpose!"

I love that it feels clear that Steam employees love their jobs.

I love that this is how I find out about this.

Billionaires don't make things

Ok, now I'm sold.

Honestly, now I really want one

I want to buy one just so I can do custom sound effects:

Use the accelerometer to detect when in free fall and play the Goofy falling scream then, on impact, cut it off and play the GTA "Wasted" sound effect.

This is funny

It can now also play any midi file https://youtu.be/T0RHXColYXU

Let's be honest, i would still buy it.

It's fun, but it's also clever marketing.

Probably it logs the impact acceleration event, and denies your warranty claim.

Engineer needed to tune/test it, and this was the easiest way to find out when the event triggers.

Made it fun,

And someone said, "Lets keep it in there"

And so it be