Steam Big Picture Thread

[Pericolos0]

Hey guys, I figured I should create a spin-off thread from my local multiplayer games thread .

 

So I've been toying around with setting up the ultimate steam big picture setup for my apartment. I wanted to see if I could get the full console experience like you get with a ps4 using steam. This means:

 

-Being able to sit down in my couch and start up SBP with a controller

-Being able to control everything with a controller, I don't ever want to be using a mouse and keyboard in my couch

-Media controls. Stream videos, watch netflix etc

 

So far I've managed to get it to be 99% there the way i want it to be, and I'm pretty damn impressed with SBP . I think they still have ways to go for this to be a proper console replacement for the mainstream user, but it's already a great starting point.

 

Let's use this thread to share hardware/software setups and share ideas on how to make the experience better. 

 

 

 

HARDWARE:

 

I had to get a few things to get everything hooked up. I spent about ~150$ on cables, controllers and other equipment. More than I planned to spend, but still way cheaper than actually getting a console .

 

For my setup I have a projector set up in my living room which has a VGA connection. I used a VGA cable splitter to clone my primary monitor and hook it up with the projector. I'm using this one which uses a USB plug for extra signal strength: http://www.startech.com/AV/Splitters/VGA-Splitters/2-Port-VGA-Video-Splitter-USB-Powered~ST122LE

 

This way, I'll always have my primary monitor turned on when I turn on the projector. I don't need to go into any display settings to turn it on.

 

For sound I already had my pc connected to my surround sound system, so that takes care of that.

 

I also bought 2 wireless XBOX360 controllers. Make sure to get a PC receiver for them. You can order ones that are bundles for PC with a receiver. I've successfully tested one receiver with 4 wireless controllers, and it works perfectly.

 

And finally I also got a Nyko charging base, so I can keep the controllers right next to my couch and always fully charged . I like it because it just connects to a power plug, you dont need to have it hooked to your pc.

http://www.nyko.com/products/product-detail/?name=Charge+Base+S

It comes with 2 rechargeable battery packs

 

 

 

With all this, all I have to do is turn on my projector, grab a controller, and hold down to xbox button to start up SBP. Holding down the xbox button for 3 seconds will start up steam in big picture mode, even if you had other stuff running on your computer. It'll even turn on your computer if it was on stand-by mode. Really cool feature which is crucial to make the console experience work.

 

Of course this is just my setup, there are many different ways to set it up. If your PC has a HDMI out option, that's better than my VGA setup, as it's digital and can also carry audio. I'd be interested to hear if anyone has tried out any wireless solutions. I'd love to hear about any wireless HDMI solutions. If that works well I could also setup steam to work with my bedroom tv .

 

 

SOFTWARE:

 

Steam Big Picture works great with a controller if you only play the games that are officially on steam and 100% controller compatible. SBP will actually tell you if a game is controller compatible, partially compatible or not at all, which is great. However it makes the library pretty limited, and you can greatly extend it with some hacks.

 

Some game are partially compatible, which means they need either a mouse or keyboard at some point. For example trackmania 2 requires a mouse to get through the maniaplanet menu. Dark Souls 2 needs a keyboard to type your name (even though everything else is controllable with a controller).

I don't want to ever leave my couch for any of these things, so I've been looking for ways to emulate mouse and keyboard control with a controller.

 

mouse control:

http://nirklars.wordpress.com/xboxmouse/ - this handy little software will allow you to press a button combo on your controller to turn on mouse emulation. Really useful to navigate menus in some games. If you are hardcore you can probably use it to play CIV5 too . However the button combo (LB+RB+B) is kinda crappy, because pressing B als causes you to go back or even exit a game in some cases. Not ideal. 

 

So I adjusted to source code so it uses LB+RB+X, which works a lot better. I also turned off all the other extra features that you don't really need. 

You can get it here: http://www.brameulaers.net/filez/xboxmouse_steam.rar

Just unrar it anywhere you want, and link up the .exe to your windows startup folder so it's always on . Toggle it on or off using LB+RB+X, and press X to mouseclick.

This is obviously a hacky solution but it's better than nothing. Valve is obviously trying to fix this issue with their proprietary steam controller, but it would also be awesome if this feature was built into steam. Fingers crossed someone from valve is reading this.

 

keyboard control:

The steam "daisy" keyboard popup seems to be working really well for most games, however not all of them seem to use it (dark souls 2 for example ). I havn't found a good hack to get around this yet, if anyone knows of a good on screen keyboard overlay, that works with a controller and that I can run on top of software, let me know! 

Meanwhile this is the biggest drawback of SBP so far... for some games you just have to use a keyboard every now and then.

 

If anyone has a 360 chatpad, let me know if that works on PC .

 

*UPDATE*: found another good solution for keyboard+mouse, simply use your phone! If you have android, you can use this free app: http://remote-control-collection.com/

 

 

MEDIA:

For playing media I simply have XBMC installed, and launch it from within steam as a non-steam app. I even gave it a separate media category. Works perfectly so far! Exiting XBMC returns you back to steam as well. XBMC could probably use a thread of it's own so I won't go into detail on this . 

more info: http://xbmc.org/

[Pericolos0]

NON STEAM GAMES & EMULATORS

 

Valve has been gracious enough to allow you to add a non-steam game to your steam library. Adding a non-steam game will (usually) still give you the steam overlay and allow you to exit the game, take screenshots etc. However if you have an xbox controller, pressing the home button on a non-steam game will also pop up a battery indicator, which simultaneously makes steam lose focus. I found this very annoying, but thankfully you can get rid of it by uninstalling "Xbox 360 Controller Accessories". Now steam should never lose focus and you won't be able to tell the difference between a steam and non-steam game .

 

Installing non steam games also allows you to get emulators working. Right now I have successfully gotten the following to work:

 

SNES

 

I'm using ZSNES: http://www.zsnes.com/

 

for full controller control:

 

-make sure it's set to run full screen

-make sure to set up the controllers in input

-in the misc menu, you can set "control GUI with gpad 1", turn this on to control znes with your controller.

-in the misc menu, go to misc keys and set up a button to exit zsnes. On my setup I exit zsnes by pressing down the right thumbstick. znes doesnt work with the steam overlay unfortunately.

-put all the ROMS you like in a folder znes is pointing to by default

 

On steam I just have the zsnes executable set up as a non steam game. I found that this works well enough .

 

PS2

 

I'm using PCSX2: http://pcsx2.net/

 

setting up PCSX2 could probably use a thread of its own, so I wont go into too much detail about that. You'll need to get a PS2 BIOS ROM "somehow" and turn your ps2 dvd's into ISO files to run them. You can private message me if you need help with these things .

 

my settings in PCSX2 are whatever the defaults are, and I also set it to render at 2x native resolution. PS2 games scale up pretty well this way, makes them feel HD . I also had the set the sound module to directsound. Don't forget also to set up your controllers!

 

to link up a game on steam, create a .bat file. This is the bat file i set up to run ICO:

"C:Program Files (x86)PCSX2 1.2.1pcsx2-r5875.exe" --fullscreen --nogui "C:gamesps2ICO.iso"

so the first line points to your PCSX2 exe, then turn on full screen and dont load the GUI, then second line points to your executable.

 

Now, change the extension of the file from .bat to .exe

You can now add it as a non-steam game.

 

But wait! steam will give you an error trying to run the .exe, so now name the file back to .bat, and in steam, right click on the game and go to properties. In there, also change the shortcut path back to .bat. Now it will load correctly .

 

You can also point the shortcut directly to the command in your .bat file. Which is what I did here:

 

Now on SBP, you can start the game directly! It will even work with the steam overlay, and you can use that to exit the game. The experience is surprisingly smooth, even though the setup is a little annoying.

 

What it looks like in steam: http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/38602454270575521/1FD0745EE5DB4D1EE6BF4AF51DA9B36803EFB52A/

 

~More to come~

[Pericolos0]

Please share your setups and tips, and let me know if you have any questions about anything

[DrywallDreams]

I had an old PC lying around that I stuck SteamOS on, it's nice.  Having the purpose-built compositor is so nice, so shit inevitably hits the fan, I never hit a desktop (also streamed PC stuff has controller mouse mode, which is super nice).  Just if there were more Linux games...

 

This is just making me think of the Steam controller, when is that thing going to come out?  I really want to try that thing

Edited September 28, 2014 by Marcem

[Squad]

With all this, all I have to do is turn on my projector, grab a controller, and hold down to xbox button to start up SBP. Holding down the xbox button for 3 seconds will start up steam in big picture mode, even if you had other stuff running on your computer. It'll even turn on your computer if it was on stand-by mode. Really cool feature which is crucial to make the console experience work.

 

I wonder how that works. Does it work like that by default or are there any settings for it/addons that need to be installed first? I've never noticed it before, because my Xbox boots instead

[Pericolos0]

works like that by default for me, but I don't have an xbox sitting around here so I dont have that problem. I guess you just need to unplug yours

[Pericolos0]

I had an old PC lying around that I stuck SteamOS on, it's nice.  Having the purpose-built compositor is so nice, so shit inevitably hits the fan, I never hit a desktop (also streamed PC stuff has controller mouse mode, which is super nice).  Just if there were more Linux games...

 

This is just making me think of the Steam controller, when is that thing going to come out?  I really want to try that thing

 

I've tried it and while cool, it still felt like they have a long way to go with it . I hope they can come up with something that's at least as good as the xbox controller, with an optional extra mouse control that feels good. I'm not sure if a steam controller that tries to be as good as a mouse would be the right solution though. Some games are just made to be played on a desktop. I'd rather see the mouse control as a nice extra on it.

[Pampers]

What projector do you have? Can you get decent projectors for a decent price now?

[Pericolos0]

I have this one: http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/jsp/Product.do?sku=V11H373120

 

You can get these for ~800$ if you look around. It's served me well for almost 5 years now, had to replaced the lamp twice and replaced the optical block once using parts from a broken one. I highly recommend it, though you need to take good care of it  

[Squad]

works like that by default for me, but I don't have an xbox sitting around here so I dont have that problem. I guess you just need to unplug yours

 

I'll probably do that. I really only use it for DVD's and I hardly ever buy movies anymore. Been relying on streaming services for that, looking into Netflix now (yeah, I know, it's only available here for a few days ).

[El_Exodus]

You just made me trying SBP again I didn't like it earlier with my 2+1 monitor setup, because i had to change my display settings everytime i wanted to use it. But i'm cloning now my primary monitor via Windows 8 onto my TV so i don't have to change the settings everytime i want to use it. And i kinda like it that way. My setup is simple. I have my TV connected directly to my graphics card and then i simply start SBP with the Xbox 360 controller. I used to have a wireless keyboard+mouse kit, but either are they broken or the battery is empty They are perfect for these "special" issues when you might need something to type for example. There is also a keyboard with an integrated touchpad. I don't have one yet, but i think they are pretty good to hide in the couchtable Like this one: http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Wireless-Keyboard-Multi-Touch-Touchpad/dp/B005DKZTMG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1411867859&sr=8-1&keywords=logitech+k400

 

I think i might use SBP more often now.

Edited September 28, 2014 by El_Exodus

[Pericolos0]

I found another solution to the keyboard+mouse problem.. use my phone!

 

I just tried this out and it works perfectly: http://remote-control-collection.com/

Works great with my android phone. I'd still prefer to use the controller, but at least this solution doesn't feel like a weird hack. I'll probably use this until there is a better solution .

[Pericolos0]

I had an old PC lying around that I stuck SteamOS on, it's nice.  Having the purpose-built compositor is so nice, so shit inevitably hits the fan, I never hit a desktop (also streamed PC stuff has controller mouse mode, which is super nice).  Just if there were more Linux games...

 

How is the picture quality and input lag for streaming games like that? Good to know they have mouse emulation for that too

[DrywallDreams]

 

I had an old PC lying around that I stuck SteamOS on, it's nice.  Having the purpose-built compositor is so nice, so shit inevitably hits the fan, I never hit a desktop (also streamed PC stuff has controller mouse mode, which is super nice).  Just if there were more Linux games...

 

How is the picture quality and input lag for streaming games like that? Good to know they have mouse emulation for that too

 

Going through several walls on a 2.4 ghz n adapter (server on ethernet, client on wireless), the picture quality wasn't too bad, but it would constantly drop frames at 720p/30, when it was running fine, input lag was unnoticeable in games like Tomb Raider.  Running on a Macbook with a good wireless card (AC, was doing 5.0 ghz N, also more walls), picture was near perfect at 1080p, input lag was basically what you get from a TV anyway, and it was all going at 60 fps.  It's real good.

Edited September 28, 2014 by Marcem

[Pericolos0]

That's awesome! Is it possible to stream non-steam games as well?