In what may be considered the most unexpected twist of the decade (we are not even two years in!), Valve has decided that Steam must consume every digital software market rather than just the digital gaming market.
Yes, Valve has decided that Steam must also sell software. In a news post that went up today, Valve has announced not only that software ranging from creative to productive applications, the first of which is planned to be announced on September 5th, but those programs will also take advantage of Steams features such as automatic updates and Steam Cloud saving. Also added to the mix is that software developers will be able to submit their programs to Steam Greenlight, a soon-to-be implemented feature where community members will vote on which games and pieces of software will be admitted to Steam without Valves sanction.
If you are looking for more details, those are the only concrete facts that have been confirmed. According to Valve employee Mark Richardson, this shift in focus was caused by “Customer Requests” that involved said customers asking for software to be sold on Steam. Also, the first instance of the word ‘Software’ is put into double-quotations. Speculation away!
I think I understand where this is coming from. Valve is worried about Windows 8, but it also understands that the only way to prevent people from migrating to Windows 8 is to support applications as well as games, because very few people use their PCs for the sole purpose of gaming.
By doing this, Valve may just convince developers to stick with Windows 7. Smart move if it works, and sets Valve up as a competitor to Microsoft and Apple. There's an OS on the way, surely.
That would made sense. It wasn't long ago that Gabe Newell said of Windows 8 that it is a “catastrophe for everyone in the PC space”.
Speculation time : Perhaps Valve is also working on their own Tablet, OS, or Console, which really wouldn't surprise me. Guess only time will tell.
Who are these people who asked them to start selling Apps? I'd like to meet them. 😀
First thing my brother-in-law said when reading about this: Yay! Discount Excel! Spreadsheets for alllll! 😛
Can't wait to see what they're offering. This could be interesting 🙂