Steam Major Updates and New Look

Being the most popular online distribution platform, Steam has decided that it needs to undergo some serious changes. As of next week, you can expect some serious updates in your Steam client. You can forget that lame-looking green background, and prepare for a much cooler black background for starters. This is but one of the changes and updates coming to Steam. Here is the full list:

Guest Passes
Allow owners of certain Steam games (purchased either via Steam or at retail) to let their friends play games for free, for a limited time trial. The first game to take advantage of this new feature will be Day of Defeat: Source. Beginning the week of January 8th, owners of DoD:S will each receive a guest pass to give to a friend. So if you own Day of Defeat: Source, watch your games list for your guest pass to appear, and then send it to a friend.

Background client updates
Since the Steam client was first released, it has always kept itself up to date, but now, it'll do so without making you wait during startup. Instead, it will acquire new updates in the background and then (once they're downloaded) ask if you'd like to restart & apply them. Steam will also let you know what's new whenever a new update is ready to apply.

Games list Favorites
Steam's catalog of games has grown quite a bit over the past year or so. If you're like most Steam users, the list of games you own has grown pretty long. Time to organize! Soon you'll be able to try out the new Favorites feature in the My Games tab of Steam. Once you've selected a game as a Favorite, it's available for quick access at the top of your list. If you wish, you can also collapse the Installed and Uninstalled sections, leaving only your Favorites in view.

New look
Steam's getting a new coat of paint. They've stripped away all the non-essentials and created a new streamlined appearance, and it'll be available in five different colors.