bomba's House Of Flancakes

Posted on May 26th 2014 at 06:03:51 PM by (bombatomba)
Posted under Steam Streaming, bug, glitch, games, PC, Linux, Windows, Mac

[img width=700 height=437]http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c394/bombatomba77/1_zps95e79ba6.png[/img]

No doubt many of you Steam gamers have noticed the new feature available on Steam:  In-Home Steaming - The ability to stream games between computers on your home network, a feature that I've been waiting for.  Sure it has been available for a while (through Steam Beta opt in), but it just wasn't viable until now.  But now we can play our Steam libraries remotely, provided your home network isn't a stinker.  Also, those of us who choose a non-Windows OS can finally play all of our Steam games without the need for often messy compatibility layer software (Wine, PlayOnLinux/PlayOnMac, etc.).  A dream come true.  There are some bugs, but the overall goal of the project has certainly realized.





So I won't go into too deep into the details, as there are currently plenty of sources that go over how to set up the service.  There are three steps that I followed:  Have a fast home network (either partially wired or all "N"), make to to opt-in both computers into the Steam beta, and make sure the two computers are in the same subnet.  That is all.

The Steam In-Home Streaming service works good, but initially I had hoped to also get some sort of remote desktop support as well.  Why waste all that wonderful potential on just your Steam games?  After all, my whole interest in this project was to effectively create a mobile gaming platform in my house, a la streaming Windows machine secreted away somewhere and Linux client laptop out in the open.  I wasn't totally surprised to see the lack of remote desktop, so I decided to start thinking around the box.

[img width=700 height=437]http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c394/bombatomba77/3_zpsc674e5cd.png[/img]

My first thought was to try the "add a non-Steam game" option.  My guinea pigs were I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream (downloaded GoG version) and Maelstrom (installed game that requires a disc in the optical drive).  I add the games and went to my client computer, a HP Elitebook 6930p running Linux Mint 17.  IHNMaIMS appears to start, but fails and drops me back to the Mint desktop.  Something to do with DOSbox?  Not sure.  Next is Maelstrom.  Maelstrom immediately goes to a black screen and make me wait for about three minutes.  Hmm.  Something familiar about that mouse icon...  Well, the game ended up working, although it started skipping music on a loading screen while "slow network, decode" popped up on the bottom left part of the screen.  Due to my network setup, then.  A little research shows that using non-steam games in this manner are hit or miss (more than often miss, I imagine).  Time for another approach.

After that experiment I got an idea.  I fired up Maelstrom again, waited for it to get to the title screen, and hit "ctrl+shift+esc."  Sure enough, it brought up the Task Manager as well as the desktop of host computer.  Scaled to my screen, as well.  Very interesting.  The "slow network" text was flashing again, but my kids are also watching Paw Patrol on the iMac in the next room.  I must admit, seeing and then navigating the desktop had me quite excited.  I wonder...

[img width=700 height=437]http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c394/bombatomba77/4_zps7e3ec9df.png[/img]

I decided to try again, this time using an actual Steam game, specifically Fez.  I fired up the game and at the title screen evoked the Task Manager again.  This time I started IHNMaIMS from Program Files and it worked!  I played for about ten minutes (man, that is a messed up game) and ended it. 

[img width=700 height=437]http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c394/bombatomba77/5_zps600ee135.png[/img]

Next came Maelstrom, but started getting the "slow network" message again.  I could plainly hear the music as well as move the cursor, but couldn't see anything outside of the mouse cursor.  Again, this could be indicative of my network topography (which is strange).  I would like to do some more tests soon, this time with the host computer hooked up to a drop instead of where it is now (it only has about half the available bandwidth of the other computers).  I've actually thinking of designing it in a way that the host and client computer are on a separate subnet altogether from the rest of the network, but we will see.  I imagine that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Thanks for reading!


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Comments
 
Just today my wife was trying to get me off the PC so she could play The Sims. Coyly, I suggested she look into Steam's new streaming thingy. It didn't work out as I had hoped, where she would take the time to figure out how to install Steam on the netbook and set it all up, thus doing all the legwork for me, but it did deflect her interest enough so that I could keep looking up important things on the internet, like how to use an IDE port for solid state memory and what the weather was like in Texas, as well as how interesting the latest Humble Bundle was. You know, important stuff.

In the end she decided we needed some RPG's on our Nexus 7, I was able to use the PC to find and suggest the Android version of Bard's Tale and Knights of Pen and Paper, which she bought, thus saving the day and allowing me waste.....uh, I mean, learn about any number of important things, though Reddit, Craigslist and RFG of course, as well as fly a F-16 in Google Earth......

I do want to try this out though, Steam Streaming, we'll see if the netbook can handle it, I'm hopeful.

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This is bombatomba's Blog.
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So I'm an odd ball. So I am usually the last to post on a blog/forum. So I only post about weird games on weird platforms. So I have a strange relationship with commas and parenthesis. So what? Hey, at least you don't have to car pool with me to work, right? So have a heart, eat a blueberry, and don't forget to drop the empties in the box on the way out. I get deposit on those.
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