In a new blog post addressing Steam users this week, Valve says that "the memory and storage shortages you've likely heard about across the industry" have affected its "exact shipping schedule and pricing". The team goes on to say that "we planned on being able to share specific pricing and launch dates by now", but this component crisis has halted those plans at the time of posting.
"When we announced these products in November, we planned on being able to share specific pricing and launch dates by now. But the memory and storage shortages you've likely heard about across the industry have rapidly increased since then. The limited availability and growing prices of these critical components mean we must revisit our exact shipping schedule and pricing (especially around Steam Machine and Steam Frame)."
Valve does reassure fans that "our goal of shipping all three products in the first half of the year has not changed", but basically, there's more work ahead to get everything in line for a smooth launch for Steam Machine and Steam Frame. We'll have to see how this all shakes out, as we're definitely curious to see how the company's competitor to Xbox shapes up this year, even if we're not sure exactly when it'll come out, and how much it'll cost at this time.
Speaking of Xbox, we're also curious to see if this component shortage ends up affecting Microsoft's next-gen plans at all. In recent days, bits of news about the next-gen Xbox have begun circulating again - although it looks like late 2027 is the earliest we'll see it at this stage. Will things be any better by then? Some of us aren't so sure, but AMD and Microsoft still sound pretty confident on their next-gen plans for now.
