Vladimir Putin has signed off on a plan to create Russia’s own consoles and Steam-like platform. This is one of nine instructions that are supposed to promote the socio-economic development of the region of Kaliningrad, the Russian exclave located between Lithuania and Poland. The region is a Special Economic Zone where manufacturers can enjoy tax breaks; moreover, a silicon production facility was recently established there.
While the meeting occurred in late January, Putin reportedly only approved the instructions on Monday. The responsible for the execution is none other than Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, who has until June 15 to formulate a plan for the following objective:
Consider the issue of organizing the production of stationary and portable game consoles and game consoles, as well as the creation of an operating system and a cloud system for delivering games and programs to users.
It is a daunting task Mishustin has been assigned, that’s for sure. The existing sanctions instituted following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will make it hard, if not impossible, to create portable and/or home consoles powered by AMD, NVIDIA, or Intel hardware. Russian CPU manufacturer Baikal went bankrupt in August 2023, and besides, it was never really competitive in terms of performance.
Game consoles were never really popular in Russia to begin with, even before all three console makers stopped shipping them as part of the Western withdrawal from the country. However, Russia has always had a healthy appetite for PC games, especially shooters and MMOs. As such, the latter part of the plan, which essentially describes the creation of an alternative to Steam and SteamOS, may encounter more interest in the local gaming community. However, that does not make it any less complex to pull off. Even Epic, with its vast resources, took a while to become a serious competitor to Valve’s dominant PC platform, and it’s presently unclear what kind of budget Putin has allocated for this little project. After all, he is fighting a multi-year war.
