Capitalizing on the success of Steam's Big Picture mode as shown in the weeks after its implementation, it seems Valve has decided to take the next step and start work on what is essentially, a living-room friendly PC package. In a conversation with Kotaku during the VGAs, Gabe Newell spoke at length about Valve's work on hardware, and its current goals - finally releasing Steam Linux and implementing Big Picture mode on it, allowing them hardware development flexibility. Furthermore, he makes mention of how he expects companies to begin releasing living-room friendly PC packages beginning next year and that these would essentially compete with the next-gen consoles from companies such as Microsoft, Sony or Nintendo.

Newell spoke about how the PC would be judged as "the better environment" for most developers and customers, and how these packages were going to "unify" the entertainment environments. However, he did state that the Valve hardware would be a "very controlled environment", stating that ultimately if one wanted flexibility, one should purchase a PC.

As excited as we are about this piece of news, it does raise certain pressing questions, namely if this indicates Valve simply entering the video-game console race, or if it is something truly revolutionary. Knowing Valve's track record, it is likely the latter, but Newell's statements so far, especially concerning the controlled environment of the hardware, hint at the former. What do you think?