Remember Fremont, that supposed SteamOS device from Valve that popped up in Geekbench's CPU results and according to some sources is a new console designed to connect to TV sets and running AMD CPU and GPU hardware? Well, now Valve has trademarked "Steam Frame" a new brand for use with gaming consoles and peripherals.
The shizzle here involves a couple of new trade mark applications by Valve centred on the term "Steam Frame", as spotted on Reddit yesterday. The more interesting and specific of the two says, "STEAM FRAME™ trademark registration is intended to cover the categories of computer game consoles for recreational game playing; video game consoles; video game accessories, namely, controllers for video games."
That's about as unambiguous as it gets. Of course, applying for a trade mark doesn't guarantee that trade mark gets used. It could even be an intentional distraction designed to draw attention away from some other naming scheme or project.
But if you take it at face value, there's a good chance Valve is indeed planning some kind of console and it's going to be known as the Steam Frame. Is it the same device as that Fremont box that turned up in Geekbench?
As we previously reported, Fremont was said to run a de-featured version of AMD's Hawk Point APU with the iGPU "removed" and AMD's Radeon RX 7600 discrete GPU inserted. Supposedly, it's a TV focused console running SteamOS.
Then again, maybe "Steam Frame" will be the branding for the long awaited new Valve VR headset, codenamed Deckard. It's been noted that SteamVR's "overlays" feature is also being renamed to "frames", supposedly to coincide with the Steam Frame. Then again, there's no reference at all to VR or headsets in either of the trademark applications.
Of course, if you wanted to get really speculative, you might suggest Valve could be planning to align the new console with the release of the long-rumoured next Half-Life game, supposedly codenamed "HLX", which some sources claim is well into its development cycle and could be released any day now.
No doubt, tying any new Half-Life game to the release of a new Valve console would be a compelling proposition with a good chance of supercharging early sales. And Valve has form when it comes to restricting releases to at least certain device types, what with Half-Life: Alyx being a VR-only title.
According to some sources, this is all part of Valve's broader restructuring and push into hardware, that also includes the aforementioned Deckard VR device and the second generation Steam Deck.
For now, all of those details, including a mythical Half-Life game remain rumour at best. All we know for sure is that Valve wants to reserve the "Steam Frame" brand for use with a possible console. But it's still very hard not get excited about what could be coming. Watch this space.
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