The Steam Box game controller has some competition with the next-gen consoles on the way. The Xbox One controller, for instance, has a touted 40 improvements over the already great Xbox 360 controller, made after hours of study and hundreds of thousands of dollars of such.
Valve has reportedly made the Steam Box game controller as responsive as a keyboard and mouse, rivaling the response time built into the Xbox One’s controller, which as The Inquisitr reports, shaves microseconds off the lag between the button press and the character on screen. In the case of both controllers, the bandwidth used in the wireless signal has been increased, though the Steam Box controller is apparently faster than any major console on or soon to be on the market.
In terms of the number of buttons, the Steam Box game controller has 16 in total, beating out the Xbox One’s 11 buttons and bringing the PC experience that much closer to standard gaming. The one obstacle PC gamers have always had to deal with was a lack of quality gaming controllers that didn’t come from consoles, and now the Steam OS is bringing both worlds together.
The directional pads are radically different with the Steam Box game controller, being flat discs much like the classic Sega Master System and eliminating the joysticks entirely. Some gamers not used to PC gaming might not like that so much, as the analog stick has been a comeback mainstay since the Nintendo 64. However, the control discs are meant to replace the keyboard and mouse , which have generally always been a more accurate form of gaming control.
The action buttons themselves have mostly been relocated to better assimilate the keyboard, so console gamers might need to get used to using shoulder buttons and such more, but at least the Steam Box game controller is fully hackable, meaning that gamers can assign the buttons any function they want. Xbox One controllers will likely have maybe four presets to choose from and that’s about it.
The grip handles look bulky though, making the Steam Box game controller possibly feel like the classic Xbox variety did at first. That could be a turn-off, even though it might draw the hands toward the parts that matter.
In the end, it depends upon your preference, but for pure functionality, the Steam Box game controller beats the Xbox One controller in almost every way.