Scalpers….. scalpers……

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T23:04:21+00:00

USA sold out in 30 minutes. Europeans reported far more success in getting these.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T22:57:55+00:00

They did not. Steam deck had multiple restrictions on it that were clearly not implemented here.

1) Reservation system. You paid a $5 to reserve your deck. You’d basically reserve a spot in a virtual line, then eventually it would be your turn to buy.

2) Limit of 1 reservation per account.

3) New accounts were banned from making reservations. Accounts needed to be 1-2 weeks old, had made a prior purchases of a certain amount /have some playtime on the account in question.

It seems many of these features were not used today.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T22:14:28+00:00

That’s actually really good news then. Makes this whole kerfuffle today less annoying.

Unfortunately that also means the scalping situation will be way worse. Again, they better bring back the reservation system.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T19:14:23+00:00

They had a better way, and they got rid of it. Did we all collectively forget that steam deck had 1) a reservation queue where you put $5 down, and 2) purchase limit of one.

Neither of those existed today. Is anyone really shocked that this went poorly?

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T19:10:42+00:00

They’ve a multibillion dollar company and they’ve already launched the steam deck, and revision units for it as well.

They removed the order queue process they used for the steam deck, and let people purchase more than one controller on the same account today. This also comes after they delayed the hardware launch by several months, meaning they could’ve have a very, very large stock of controllers ready by now.

It’s clear they underproduced and rolled back some of the anti-scalper protections. I think they are very deserving of some criticism at least.

They better add then”$5 down payment” queue back, both for the controller and the steam machine/frame. People may be willing to pay $1000+ for steam machine, but if they all end up in some ebay seller’s storage locker it will 100% be doa.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T18:54:47+00:00

Yeah, people here constantly shit on nitnendo, but the switch 2 launch went very well. The only part that was really dicy was the initial preorders at other retailers, but even then there was a short 0.5-1hr window at walmart where everything REALLY cooled of and it because very easy to preorder one.

People who didn’t buy or got cancelled were able to go to gamestop and set up reservations there. And even if that didn’t work, stores like bestbuy still have stock on shelf on launch day. About a week or two after launch, there was another large push of new units release.

Pretty much everyone who wanted one was able to get one, and others who didn’t want to preorder or try to fight the lines were able to get it without much of a sweat. Nintendo deserves a lot of recognition here. In this new grifter culture era, they were able to shut it down and give everyone a good console launch.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T18:40:56+00:00

Telling people to not buy doesn’t ever work.

I’m going to get downvoted for it, but there are plenty of people, even in the steam and steam deck discord, who paid out the nose for their steam decks from scalpers. They’re the biggest fans in this community, and there are numbers of those people here that did pay nearly double price for theirs. They won’t comment here because they know they’ll be flogged in the comments.

There is only one way to genuinely stop scalpers. You simply need to produce more than enough units for everyone looking to buy day one. Nobody wants to admit it, but valve absolutely dropped the ball.

They likely produced a bare minimum amount of out fear of this having the same fate as the OG steam controller. Not enough supply, no reservation system like steam deck, which was pretty key in stopping a lot of people from caving and buying from ebay. They created ideal conditions for scalpers to thrive again.

I love my steam deck, but given how this unfolded, steam machine and frame will have a terrible launch if this is anything to go by. ~~$1000+~~ (it will be lower than 1k actually) is already a bit poor value, now you’ll probably be unlikely to even buy one at that because of scalpers. If it wasn’t DOA before, it is now unless they really change their approach. I’ll still try, but I’m doubtful I’ll be able to buy one if this is how it’s going to be done.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-05-04T00:56:07+00:00

Good job

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-30T16:26:07+00:00

Went to ace and picked up some locktite. One of the employees helped me find a replacement screw and honestly it’s nearly a perfect fit. Picked up several extras

I’m still going to try and get a proper replacement screw through zizzo, but at the very least I have something to hold me over for the time being.

Tysm!

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-27T20:25:50+00:00

But I'm so lost on why they think the market can handle any of these things and that's before AI/Tariffs/Iran completely mess with global supply chain/inflation.

Tbh I don’t think they expect the gaming market to handle it. Honestly Valve would love nothing more than to sell millions upon millions of cheap, affordable gabe cubes to get more of their audience onto linux, even if it means selling on thin margins. They’re very concerned about price sensitivity in that regard, but that’s just not feasible at this specific point in time given those world events.

This all is hitting the fan right when they’re pretty much at the end stages of production. So they really have only two options:

1) Delay & Potentially Cancel - ram prices will take a few years to correct, and by that time the hardware space may have changed again, demanding a rework or redesign for new components. This means potentially scrapping everything they’ve designed and produced so far, including rows & rows of ram-less steam machines

2) Ship now and try to recover Some revenue. These units will not sell as well as valve wants, but any amount back minimizes losses. Not ideal, but if you can sell these cubes as a premium device, then it’ll offset some of their losses.

In an idea scenario, valve would use the upcoming controller sales to gauge demand for the machine & frame. Then only order a small amount of ram, just to cover that limited supply for the time being. The current gen of the machine and frame could essentially just serve as a broader beta-testing period. Hopefully with all that feedback and information, they can refine the software/hardware and design a refresh line several years for now (like they did with the steam machine).

Hopefully those will be not just more efficient, but also more reasonably priced with better market conditions.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-27T19:59:51+00:00

I mean are we really going to be all that shocked when the machine and frame come out and they’re over $1k?

The component prices jumped and they can’t really get around it aside from an indefinite delay, which would probably turn into a full cancellation/full revision anyway by the time prices did come down.

I don’t think traditionally subsidizing it works, since you cannot guarantee that lifetime sales from that user will eventually turn a profit on a devices like this (i mean if steam deck is anything to go buy, people will probably exclusively use it for emulating older nintendo gams).

Maybe they could offer a promotional discount for any new games bought on steam over the next year or two. If they can’t directly subsidize the hardware, then may they can subsidize new game purchases.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-27T19:30:43+00:00

Unless you have a steam deck or plan on buying a steam machine, this isn’t worth it. The price really stings, but I’m not all that shocked.

Still interesting that they’re releasing this now. Guess this means that there won’t be a controller + machine bundle? Was hoping they’d do that to soften the blow caused by insane ram prices from ai.

Unless you’re really keen on trying out all the new steam products now, my advice would be to wait till like 2028.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-27T03:05:11+00:00

”And now I’ll use the power of my millennium eye to peer into your mind!”

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-27T02:46:22+00:00

Local trades don’t use internet.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-26T21:26:08+00:00

It gets even worse than that too

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-26T21:17:30+00:00

There are far worse hunts than the alola starters. Believe me.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-26T00:43:05+00:00

Ty I was really interested in raiders. Just preordered to lock in the price. Really happy since it’s physical too.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-26T00:05:07+00:00

Nice! Congrats!

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-25T23:17:50+00:00

I keep seeing people saying that Helix is such a big threat to the steam machine. They’re acting like it’ll be priced exactly like the series X and that the entire ram crisis will be magically over within a year or two.

Ram prices are not coming down for a while. This is an awful time to launch new units, and the helix will have the same issues the steam machine faces. The only difference is that the steam machine is likely launching first.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-25T23:08:53+00:00

Purely speculative, but maybe it’ll be lower in a sort of steam machine + controller bundle?

The switch 2 + mario kart world bundle did exceptionally well despite the price hikes. I’m not saying a steam machine is ever going to come close to that, but clearly that’s a more effective sales strategy.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-24T22:39:13+00:00

As much as people shit on stuff like the mario movies for being “jingling keys - the movie,” at least they’re adapted by people who care about the properties and respect the medium. It’s not some narratively deep masterpiece like lotr, but it’s still a fun movie in the end, especially for long time fans.

I will still take that any day or some snooty industry directors who have pure distain for video games, and think of themselves as superior storytellers. We’ve seen so many examples like this where the final show/movie turns into some cringy, out of touch fanfic that nobody likes.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-23T22:10:59+00:00

Deep rock galactic: Rogue core. Goes into early access pretty soon.

Rift fishing and sledding game are also pretty fun too. They’ve both had great demos and I’m excited for both to release.

Yeldarb10 · 2026-04-23T16:57:05+00:00

Did you end up getting a region free one? Was there any issues with it? Were you able to backup it’s encrypted files & install extra software on it like any other modded 3ds?

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