Am I allowed to swear in headlines? Some guy might complain that his four-year-old daughter reads PC gaming blogs and now he’s going to report us to David Cameron. I’m so sorry, that guy. Anyway, I’ve taken the coward’s route. I can only pray that you somehow manage to decode my intricate encryption and ascertain what I meant to say.

You know the Xi3 Piston $1000 gaming PC that was supposed to be the vanguard of the Valve Steambox console-concept? Nuh-uh. Valve have revealed they’ve nothing whatsoever to do with it after all. A name that sounds a bit rude might be the least of this thing’s problems now.



After a few weeks of making hay with the association/presumption that this thing was somehow Valve-endorsed, this is probably not the kind of thing Piston manufacturer Xi3 wanted to be made public so hot on the heels of their announcement that the Piston will cost a troubling $1000. “Valve began some exploratory work with Xi3 last year, but currently has no involvement in any product of theirs,” Valve’s communications man Doug Lombardi told an inquisitive Eurogamer this morning. Wuh-oh.

This is probably why the thing’s called the Valve-evoking ‘Piston’ rather than something with Steam in the title. More importantly, it leaves some hope that the Steambox proper will be rather more affordable. If Valve, and/or PC gaming, wants to give consoles a fright in terms of living room dominance, this thing really needs to come in under $500, I reckon. (I reckon a lot of things. (Most of them dead wrong.))

If you still want to buy a Piston, get thee here. I think I’ll stick with my big desktop PC, the 10 metre HDMI cable and wireless keyboard and mouse for my big-screen gaming, thanks. I’m lying, I can’t be bothered with that any more. I am big enough and ugly enough to admit that hunching in front of a monitor on a knackered office chair is my past, present and future.