A Valve engineer has explained why there wasn't a plan to launch a brand new exclusive alongside the Steam Machine, or to have exclusives in general.
Despite the Steam Machine being a new console-like experience, Valve has opted to take the Xbox Series X|S's approach and release it without a new exclusive game to really draw players in – despite many rumors/fanfics that Half-Life 3 is on the way. Even though the selling point of the platform has always seemed to be your whole PC library in your living room, some were disappointed to see the lack of new software to go alongside it.
And while Valve's machine isn't a traditional console, it is somewhat notable that there wasn't even a smaller bespoke title released with the hardware like the Steam Deck's Aperture Desk Job or Sony's Astro's Playroom, which acted as a Dualsense tech demo – although with Valve selling the Steam Machine without a controller in some cases, maybe that's a given.
Speaking to Bloomberg, Valve engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais explains, "Restricting where people can play a game I don’t think is a great model, at least for us," and adds that "We’re much more interested in having the whole PC catalog as our 'launch exclusive.'" And granted, that is a pretty big selling point.
That being said, I highly doubt we ever see a proper Steam Machine "exclusive." Even Aperture Desk Job, which was very much based around you playing it on a Steam Deck, was made available on the regular Steam Store. And given that the Steam Machine's high price is very much going to make it unattainable for some – something Valve engineer Yazan Aldehayyat doesn't expect to get better any time soon – it'd likely cause some outrage if that was the only place you could play Half-Life 3.
