Steam Link Game-streaming App: Better Than Expected Less Than Ideal
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class="cnetReview row" section=""> This is turning out to be a big year for cloud gaming. Nvidia's GeForce Now service is still in beta but going strong, ios and now Valve has extended its game-distribution platform Steam's in-home game-streaming capability to iOS and Android devices that connect to the same network as the host system. The Steam Link app, which Valve launched today, brings the ability to sling your game library to an Android phone, tablet or TV or an iPhone, iPad or Mobile Games Apple TV ($179 at Apple), as long as you've got a Steam host system connected to the same network as your device.
Like many cloud services, Steam requires a 5GHz or Ethernet connection between the host and the router, Mod APK apk download as well as between the host (which can be Mac or PC) and the device. Screenshot by Lori Grunin/CNET I only had a few hectic hours to try out the prerelease version of the app, so didn't I get to test important features like the Android version (I love my stopgap Moto G5 but discovered post-purchase that it doesn't support 5GHz Wi-Fi), voice chat handling, multi- and third-party controller capability (I only used the Steam Controller) or tablet performance; I'll update this once the final Android app is available and the iOS app has been approved by Apple and become available via the App store.
How it works Valve's been lagging in its app development if you judge by its current Steam mobile app (on both Android and iOS), which is clunky, Game Cheats ugly and missing some capabilities. So it's set the bar pretty low in what we expect from the company on mobile. In that sense, Apk download the clean, easy-to-use interface is a welcome surprise. There are three steps to setting up the system. First, you enable and set up Steam's in-home streaming feature within the desktop Steam application on a host system attached to your network.
If you've never used Steam's streaming, you should note that it completely takes over your system, simultaneously displaying the streamed game review [https://forum-kredytowe.org]. That's because it sends whatever's coming off the video card to the app. It also means your streaming box or phone has to be attached to the same network and the bandwidth needs to be pretty constant. Then you connect your Bluetooth controller to the device. As noted earlier this week, Steam quietly enabled Bluetooth support in the Steam Controller in preparation for this launch.
This can get tricky, especially if you move it from device to device, because of Bluetooth idiosyncrasies. Screenshot by Lori Grunin/CNET When you launch the Steam app on your device -- I used an Apple TV 4K to connect to a Sony XBR-65A1E as well as an iPhone 8 Plus -- it lets you choose a host computer to connect to, pair a controller (if you haven't already) and test the network connection. The default bandwidth requirement is 15Mbps and the best is 30Mbps.
The latter is sufficient in part because you're capped at 1080/60fps. That looks surprisingly good on a 4K TV, though, both at full screen and letterboxed, mobile apps and it's perfectly fine on smaller phone and tablet screens. When you hit play, it looks and behaves just like in-home streaming: Big Picture mode launches on the host computer and from there on you use Steam on the target device as usual. How it fares As a replacement for a Steam Link box to play on a TV, mobile apps it's great; now that streamers are common, the extra box is superfluous (if the app is available on that platform).
It may take some fiddling to figure out the optimal display settings if the host system's display has a different aspect ratio or resolution, but trial-and-error Mod APK (forum-kredytowe.org) doesn't take long. The in-network low-bandwidth requirements also make it less sensitive to latency caused by other people using the local network. Even letterboxed, the game Ori and the Blind Forest looks stunning and full-screen Cuphead is a retro-modern masterpiece.
Screenshot by Lori Grunin/CNET I'm less sold on it as a way to play Steam games on a phone because a lot of PC games don't translate well, both to the small screen and to the controls.
