The Steam client evolves daily with new features to keep the competition at bay.
The Steam platform needs no introduction. Launched in 2003 to some skepticism, it has become a must-have for PC gamers, leaving far, far behind all the competing platforms that have sprung up since the success of its publisher, Valve. Steam boasts the largest catalog by far, with numerous exclusives. What's more, although its client has long been criticized, it is now an accomplished, complete and feature-rich piece of software, but this hasn't stopped Valve from continuing its development by regularly adding new features.
The arrival of new options on the Steam client © Valve
The latest of these arrived on February 12, but is still only available on the Steam client beta channel. It's a new feature designed to make the many reviews left by gamers more complete and accurate. Until now, these reviews were simply enriched by the presence of the player's playing time: time at the time the review was submitted and total actual time for the player in question. Now, in addition, it is possible to have information on the hardware configuration of the player who left the review. The idea, of course, is to provide a little more information to help understand the review: if the player criticizes the game's fluidity, but has a slightly slower machine, the owner of a faster machine can assume that it will work better for him.
This new feature has not yet been rolled out to all Steam users, as it is still only in the beta channel. What's more, Valve is sparing its community, as the option remains optional. Also optional is the option to share frame rate data. This involves sending information back to Valve and Proton's developers. By sending such information on game fluidity, Steam enables developers to help Proton evolve in the right direction. Given the extent to which Proton is the key to the success of SteamOS and the Steam Deck, it's easy to see why Valve is making efforts in this area. That said, the option can easily be deactivated by players, and in any case is only available for machines running SteamOS.
