Valve Also Unveils New Features for Steam

During this week, the Game Developers Conference is in full steam at San Francisco in the United States. It is there that a lot of companies involved in the gaming industry make a lot of important announcements related to upcoming titles, but also brag about the future things that they will release.

Yesterday, we saw Microsoft unveil the new features that its Games For Windows Live service would receive, including fresh anti-piracy measures and a Steamcloud-like option that would track the preferences and save games of users, just like the aforementioned option does in Valve's Steam digital delivery system.

Valve considered proper to also announce the new things that would be implemented in Steam, which is currently the most popular digital download provider out there, with a rich portfolio of publishers. One of the biggest things to appear in Steam is Custom Executable Generation, which basically creates a unique game for each user, allowing them to install it on multiple PCs without limit.

Other features that will be implemented are the already announced in-game DLC solution, which will allow players to buy new content for their games and have them available at the same time, and a matchmaking and lobby system, like the one currently implemented in the latest title from the company, Left 4 Dead.

“Delivering this extension of services on Steamworks first anniversary demonstrates our commitment to continually develop the platform to better serve the community working with these tools,” said Valve co-founder and president Gabe Newell. As we roll out these features, we continue to look for new ways make PC games easier to create and better for customers to experience.”

It definitely seems that Valve won't sit around while Microsoft launches fresh features and won't go down without a fight. In the end, the average user will gain the most, as new and interesting features will be implemented.