14 DAY TRIAL // A new Steam Beta update has been released and it brings quite a few changes, but this time it's not just minor modifications. The developers have actually improved the interface and they've implemented an interesting option for the library.
Valve has released a new Steam Beta update and the developers have decided that it's time to also improve the interface. Besides adding new options and various features over time, the makers of Steam haven't touched the GUI for quite some time. It's been the same for years, but now users will notice a few subtle changes.
“Updated desktop user interface styles, simplifying common controls and navigation elements, and neutralizing overall color palette to align with Steam web pages and Big Picture mode,” reads the announcement from Valve.
The modifications made to the Steam GUI are not huge and they are not obvious from the start, but the interface is actually a little bit cleaner and follows the same pattern as the Big picture mode and SteamOS, ensuring that there is a consistency across the board.
The other major improvement added to the Steam client is the possibility to hide games from the library. Some of you might wonder why someone would need such an option. The truth is that when you have hundreds of titles in the library, you might want to prune them a little and hide the ones that you are never going to play, ever again, leaving a clean list of stuff you will definitely try.
“Add ‘Hide this game in my library’ functionality, accessible from the Set Categories menu. Games that are hidden will not show up in library filters except for a new filter called ‘Hidden,’ which will only appear once at least one game is marked as hidden. Hidden games are still available for play and will still appear on the user's profile,” is also noted in the announcement. A number of other smaller fixes and improvements have been made as well.
This is the Steam Beta branch, which means that users will need to open Settings and choose the Beta option in order to get these latest changes. You will be prompted to restart the client and then you will be able to run the new Beta build.
If you don’t have the client, you can download the Steam for Linux installer from Softpedia. This is not the actual application, but a small tool provided by Valve that downloads the actual software and takes care of any dependencies.
