Valve made a whole bunch of announcements at GDC in the last few days, showing off the Steam Link, finally announcing when they aim to get the long-awaited Steam Machines out on sale and revealing that a new version of their Source game engine, Source 2, was upcoming.

Now more details on Source 2 have been released into the public, and Valve say that while Source 2 will be free and no cut of the profits will be asked for there is one stipulation for its use – you must sell any game made using it on the Steam Store.

Valve’s Erik Johnson explained that they are making it a mandatory thing for Source 2-made games to appear on Steam, probably so that Valve will be able to see some revenue from their new game engine (anything sold on Steam has 30% of the revenue going to Valve).

Of course, this doesn’t mean that a game has to be exclusive to the Steam store. You’re allowed to sell it anywhere else or any way else; be it through other digital stores, platforms or in physical copy shape. It just has to be on Steam as well as those other places.

And given that Source is free, doesn’t take a profit cut and gives access to a lot of Steam’s in-built system such as the Steam Workshop; the making it necessary for a game to be released on their digital store really isn’t going to drive many game developers away from Valve’s new engine.

At GDC Microsoft took an angle with their presentation that puts focus back on gaming on PC and Xbox. To that end Microsoft are bringing two of their key console ventures to Windows 10.

The first is the ID@Xbox program, a way for independent game developers and studios to produce and self-publish their games for the Xbox consoles. Now Microsoft are expanding it across to PC to help the same developers bring their new games to PC easier than before.

The second is the Xbox Live SDK which is going to be updated to account for development on Windows 10, part of Microsoft’s recent push to make universal apps that work across Windows computer, consoles and smart devices.

This is on top of the fact that all Xbox accessories going forward will be made compatible with Windows 10 as well as a wireless adaptor for the Xbox One controller being released.

Nvidia announced another addition to the Shield lineup last night, debuting an Android-based device capable of 4k playback and capture. The device is intended to be used in the living room, and Nvidia cited a number of reasons for using the Android OS.

“First, it’s based on the most popular OS in the world. Second, the richness of the Google Play store, with it huge range of applications,” Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang said. “Third, it syncs with all my other devices. Finally, it has an incredible voice search capability.”

He then went on to demonstrate video playback, voice capture and a variety of other features. The unit will featuure a very simple remote that can also act as a bluetooth reciever, as well as having touch sensitive volume controls. Android TV functionality is baked in, and users will be able to access a library of TV, movies and more.

Of course, Nvidia is primarily a gaming company, and games were well represented during the presentation. Current games being ported over include Portal, Crysis 3, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, The Witcher 3, Metal Gear Rising: Revengence, The Talos Principle and more. A common theme of the gaming side of the presentation was the ease of getting these games up and running on the system with little difficulty and no loss of features.

The box will pack a Tegra X1 processor with a 256-bit Maxwell GPU and 3GB of memory. On the external side, it has a MicroSD slot, Micro USB 2.0 port, gigabit Ethernet port, HDMI port and two USB Type-A 3.0 ports. Its an impressive bit of kit, and Nvidia is promising that it will ship bundled with the Shield Controller for $199 (USD)

The VR headset that Sony revealed last year, Project Morpheus has been given a release time. Sony are aiming to release Morpheus in 2016.

At GDC Sony revealed that they are hoping to get its VR headset out into the market in the first half of the next year, showing off their latest prototype and details on its specifications.

Morpheus will feature a 5.7 inch, 1920×1080 RGC OLED display with a refresh rate of 120hz, and what Sony promises will be “super low latency”. It will also have a 100-degree field of view and the last prototype’s three LEDs for positional tracking has been upped to nine to improve the accuracy. The overall design has also been tweaked to allow users to equip and take off.

Sony Worldwide Studios president Shuhei Yoshida spoke to the crowd about the device saying that the reason so little had been heard of it since GDC last year was down to the fact that they were using both consumer and developer feedback to modify and improve the device. There have already been some tests with some tech demos such as with diving simulator The Deep.

After having had them announced as coming a while ago, Valve has finally put a release time on the long-awaited Steam Machines they hope to enter the console market with.

Valve revealed that the Steam Machines will be released towards the end of the year in November, starting off with a number of different models made by Alienware, Falcon Northwest and over a dozen more firms that have partnered with Valve for the manufacture of the hardware. Valve have said that Steam Machines will be priced similarly to games consoles and will deliver a higher performance than they do.

As well Valve announced that they’re also releasing a new product that will add streaming functionality to the Steam Machine. Called the Steam Link, it is a separate piece of hardware that will allow you to stream all Steam content from a PC or Steam Machine to any room of the house using the house’s local network. It will support 1080p at 60Hz with low latency. It is set to be priced at $49.99, with a Steam Controller thrown in for another $49.99 in the US and will also be released in November. Valve have yet to set the prices for other countries.

As well Valve announced the launch of the Source 2 game engine, which will be set up for the use of professional developers and gamers who create content for the Steam Workshop to be able to use efficiently and easily. More details are expected to be announced later this week to say when it will be available for use.