If you're not familiar with Pig Picture, it's a new beta product released by Valve on Monday that promises to make the company's Steam gaming platform more TV-friendly. And it succeeds at that challenge; Tthe Big Picture interface apes the best interface tricks of set-top boxes and game consoles. Big bright buttons with stripped-down and easy-to-navigate interfaces abound.

Most impressively, Valve has implemented a new lotus keyboard method for typing without a keyboard that uses the thumbstick of your Xbox or PS3 controller to let you type. Instead of laboriously navigating to each letter, you navigate to a general part of the alphabet by pressing in a general direction on the stick and then move in a second direction to choose a specific letter with your second stick.

It's more complicated to explain than the typical on-screen keyboard, but in action it's both faster and more elegant.

The problem with Big Picture isn't with Steam's design but with my own set-up. It's an ideal solution for gamers with a very specific tech loadout. A big TV relatively far (but not too far for screen-mirroring) from their PC that's loaded up with the kinds of FPS and casual games that translate easily to a controller. With my small apartment and eclectic taste in games, Big Picture is more of an interesting diversion than a new way of gaming.

In some sense it's unfair to knock Valve for failing to release a beta product that's all things to all people, and I want to stress again that Big Picture does some truly impressive things. The lotus keyboard in particular is an interface innovation I expect to see on every set-top box and game console in a few years. Still, if I want more from Big Picture it's because Valve certainly seems to be expecting (or at least hoping) for more from it as well.