14 DAY TRIAL // The team at Valve in charge of the Steam service is announcing that it is introducing a range of user restrictions for those who have not spent at least 5 dollars or Euro in the Store or have not added the same sum to their Wallet.
The official announcement explains that using CD keys purchased from other retailers or receiving gifts will not lift the limitations placed on an account.
Valve adds, "Malicious users often operate in the community on accounts that have not spent any money, reducing the individual risk of performing the actions they do. One of the best pieces of information we can compare between regular users and malicious users are their spending habits as typically the accounts being used have no investment in their longevity."
The company has set the limit at 5 dollars or Euro in order to make sure that as many legitimate users can use Steam to the fullest.
The long-term problem is that scammers and other cybercriminals will probably spend the money as long as they can make a profit from their actions.
This might force Valve to update the spending limit or to choose another way to make sure that users are legitimate.
The limited features on Steam are: friend invites, group chart, Greenlight voting, Steam market trading, trading cards, Steam discussions, Workshop talk, web API use, and browser and mobile chat.
Limited accounts still offer some functionality
Gamers who have their Steam account features limited will still be able to activate retail games, play free trials and demos, and activate other promotional content.
Valve has been tweaking the functionality of the digital distribution service in some major ways in the past few years, adding new features and making the entire experience more appealing to users.
It will be interesting to see what the impact of the limited accounts will be on the time spent using Steam and on the transactions gamers make.
At the moment, Valve is working on the launch of its full Steam machine lineup of devices, which are coming in the fall, and also wants to introduce a new controller for them.
The company is also working with HTC in order to create the Vive virtual reality device, also set to be introduced this year.