Valve has issued a rare statement after claims it was rejecting games with AI-generated assets from its Steam games store. The notoriously close-lipped developer of the Half-Life series and de facto gatekeeper of PC gaming distribution said its policy was evolving and not a stand against AI. Steam has a review and approval process much like any app platform, and its rules on content aren’t always clear until developers test them with edge cases. So it was with one indie dev who posted in a subreddit for like-minded game developers using AI, saying Valve “is no longer willing to publish games w ..read more

Tesla owners: Go check your cars. You have some new toys. The latest OTA update added a bunch of features; most notable, Steam, which brings along thousands of games. This app, however, is limited to Model S and X vehicles with 16GB of RAM (only found in vehicles made in 2022). Elon Musk tweeted in July that Tesla was adding Steam support. The Beta version in this update even adds support for Steam’s cloud synchronization, allowing for games to be resumed in the vehicle or any Steam device. Better yet, the OTA update finally added Bluetooth support gaming controllers while using Arcade Mode. T ..read more

This may feel like déjà vu because Google itself mistakenly leaked this announcement a few days ago, but the company today officially announced the launch of Steam OS on Chrome OS. Before you run off to install it, there are a few caveats: This is still an alpha release and only available on the more experimental and unstable Chrome OS Dev channel. The number of supported devices is also still limited since it’ll need at least 8GB of memory, an 11th-generation Intel Core i5 or i7 processor and Intel Iris Xe Graphics. That’s a relatively high-end configuration for what are generally meant to be ..read more

Streaming service Netflix is expanding its gaming lineup once again with the launch of two more titles, which will begin to roll out globally starting today at 5 PM ET. Among the new addition is Riot Games’ “Hextech Mayhem,” a League of Legends story, which is also available through other gaming platforms and marketplaces, including Nintendo Switch, Steam, the Epic Games Store, and GOG.com, where it’s offered as a paid download of $9.99. The other new title, “Dungeon Dwarves,” comes from Canadian developer Hyper Hippo, a company founded by Club Penguin co-founder Lance Priebe in 2012. Both of ..read more

Igor Bonifacic Contributor Igor Bonifacic is a contributing writer at Engadget. More posts by this contributor Valve’s Steam Deck will go on sale February 25 US airlines warn C-Band 5G could cause ‘catastrophic disruption’ Following a two-month delay, Valve’s Steam Deck will launch on February 25th. In a blog post the company published on Wednesday, Valve said it would open orders to the first batch of reservation holders that day. Those customers will have 72 hours to purchase the handheld. If they don’t use the opportunity, Valve will release their spot to the next person in the reserva ..read more

A new challenger has emerged in the gaming hardware category. Game distribution giant Valve today announced the launch of Steam Deck, a $399 gaming portable designed to take PC games on the go. The handheld (which has echoes of several portable gaming rigs of years past) features a seven-inch screen and runs on a quad-core Zen 2 CPU, coupled with AMD RDNA 2 graphics and 16GB of RAM. Storage runs 64GB to 512GB, the latter of which bumps the price up to $649. The built-in storage can be augmented via microSD. Image Credits: Valve Naturally, the thing is custom built for Valve’s wildly popular ..read more

Efforts to slow the spread of COVID-19 have led to a global economic downturn, but the gaming industry is booming. With hundreds of millions of people sequestered in their homes, game usage has spiked. And while the economic repercussions will persist after people cease physical distancing, gaming is positioned to fare well during a recession. Video game usage increased 75% during peak hours Video game usage during peak hours increased 75% in the first week many Americans began staying home, according to Verizon data. Game distribution platform Steam set a record for peak concurrent users (mor ..read more

For the billions stuck at home during the global effort to flatten the curve, gaming is a welcome escape. But it’s also a bandwidth-heavy one, and Microsoft, Sony and others are working to make sure that millions of people downloading enormous games don’t suck up all the bandwidth. Don’t worry, though, it won’t affect your ping. A blog post by content delivery network Akamai explained a few things it is doing to help mitigate the tidal wave of traffic that the internet’s infrastructure is experiencing. Although streaming video is of course a major contributor, games are a huge, if more intermi ..read more

Co-op video games are wonderful. Alas, it’s not always possible to get everyone in front of the same TV — and not all co-op games have online play, so playing across the internet is out. With that in mind, Valve has been working on something it calls “Remote Play Together” that it’s planning on rolling into its Steam game launcher later this month. By more or less tricking the game into thinking all players are in the same room, it’ll let you remotely play with your friends generally local-only multiplayer games. Valve published on its developers-only Steamworks site a note about the upcoming ..read more

Like most companies, much of what Valve (the company behind the hugely popular Steam game store) tinkers with behind the scenes never sees the light of day. Concepts are born, torn apart and rebuilt, and sometimes tossed away without anyone outside the company ever seeing a hint of it. Seems Valve is trying to change that, giving users an opportunity to provide feedback on potential new features before they’re fully baked. The company has just debuted a new project it calls “Steam Labs,” which will give super-early adopters an early peek at concepts that may or may not eventually make it into ..read more