The announcement of the new Steam Machine from earlier this month led many to believe that Valve was making a direct play against the console market, trying to capture some of the loyal users who have followed PlayStation and Xbox platforms for generations.

However, there's one key aspect that might very well prevent that from happening: price. At first, speculation was that Valve would have subsidized the hardware, similar to what Sony and Microsoft have been doing with their PlayStation and Xbox consoles. This means accepting a loss on every unit sold, counting on the fact that the real profit comes with selling games and accessories.

Valve could have done the same thing, as they also receive a 30% cut on sales from the Steam store, and they sell accessories and other hardware that w

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