The Valve and Steam Platform Discussion Thread

[felipepepe]

Well, there's the Top 70 RPG list, we can take reviews from there. Or pool them from reviews that Codexers wrote already on Steam.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

The problem with receiving recommendations based on what your friends are playing is that if you have a lot of friends the software is going to recommend you everything.

• Changed user-tag reporting to no longer need a specified reason. Since the list of available tags is pre-approved now, the only reason to report a tag is if it is improperly applied to a specific game.

• DRM is more clearly called out in right-hand column.
• Added a screenshot viewer for quickly viewing high resolution screenshots.

This is nice, though.

 

[Bubbles]

Well, there's the Top 70 RPG list, we can take reviews from there. Or pool them from reviews that Codexers wrote already on Steam.

Just sort them by cumulative hours played by group members.

Like FUCKING BEING ABLE TO SEE THAT YOU OWN A GAME before entering its store page.

Ohh, you're a senior citizen! Now your news items make a lot more sense.

 

[Bubbles]

Here's the change log:

Spoiler

General
- Changed ‘New Releases’ to ‘Popular New Releases’ to filter out less popular titles and provide a more functional release list.
- Adding colored indicators wherever titles are listed that show the item is in your library, on your wishlist, or in your cart.
- Updating the main ‘Games’ drop-down menu to link to tag pages for most popular genres. Browsing genres pages through these links now come with the benefit of the powerful filtering controls on the right-hand side of each tag page.
- Adding a main ‘Software’ drop-down menu for quicker browsing to specific software genres.
- Updated the visual design, layout and typography of the store to reflect a more contemporary Steam brand direction (also commonly referred to as “Making the store blue”).
- Removed the ‘Recommended for you’ page. This page has been replaced by the entire home page of Steam.
- Most areas of the store now default to showing you games only for the operating system you are currently browsing from. This can be overridden by changing the ‘Customize’ options in many sections or by removing the OS filter (for search results and genre pages).

Home Page
- Updated with new visual styles.
- Main capsule now includes recommendations based on games you’ve been playing.
- Main capsule by default excludes titles that are already on your account. This setting can be changed by clicking the ‘customize’ button.
- Main capsule added a ‘Customize’ button which lets you toggle showing Top Sellers, Early Access, Games you’ve already bought, Recommended for you, Pre-purchase, Software, DLC.
- ‘New on Steam’ section now offers a ‘Customize’ button which lets you toggle showing Early Access, Games you’ve already bought, and Software.
- ‘Recently Updated’ section now offers a ‘Customize’ button which lets you toggle showing Early Access, Games you’ve already bought, and Software.
- Added a new ‘Recommended For You’ section to the right-hand side to highlight games that Steam recommends for you based on what your friends recommend, what's on your wishlist, or similar to games you have recently played.
- Added Discovery Queue entry point (see below for details on Discovery Queue).
- Added Steam Curators entry point (see below for details on Steam Curators).
- Added a Recommendation Feed to the bottom of the home page. As you scroll down the page, this section shows you products recommended based on what you've recently played, what your friends recommend, what's on your wishlist, and well-reviewed titles from categories across Steam.

Added New Discovery Queue Feature
- A queue of 12 titles personalized for each user, which includes recommended titles, new titles, and popular releases.
- Added an entry point for the Discovery Queue on your home page, which takes you to the first title in your queue.
- Each user has controls to customize their queue by toggling the inclusion of Early Access, Unreleased, or OS specific titles.
Added a link to queue from ‘for you’ drop-down menu.

Added New Steam Curators Feature
- Added a display of popular curators to follow on your home page (Recommended curators will appear once there are enough popular curators in the system).
- Once you follow one or more curator, the Steam Curator space on the Steam home page will show you specific titles recommended by curators you follow.
- Added a link to Steam Curators from ‘for you’ drop-down menu.
- Added a page where you can find all the products recommended by curators you follow, sorted by titles that are recommended by the most number of curators at the top.
- On each product page, added a display of popular curators that recommend that title. If you follow any curators that recommend that title, those curators will be listed first.

Product Pages
- Updated with new visual styles.
- Added queue controls to each page so you can quickly jump to learning about another product.
- Added a ‘Not Interested’ button to each product page so you can indicate which products you don’t wish to see recommended or featured to you.
- Percentage of positive and negative reviews for each product is now summarized at the top of each product page.
- Changed “Join Official Group” to “Follow” for games to more accurately describe the benefit of creating a relationship with that game. Following a game means you will see announcements from that game in your community activity feed.
- Changed the order of features in the right-hand column to remove redundancies and prioritize friend activity.
- For titles that are in your library, the page now move all the relevant information to be together in one place, so you can see the game is already in your library, launch the game, see how much you’ve played, and write a review.
- DRM is more clearly called out in right-hand column.
- Added links to view any 3rd-party EULAs required by the product.
- Added a screenshot viewer for quickly viewing high resolution screenshots.
- DLC lists on product pages now indicate which items are already in your library, on your wishlist, or in your cart.
- Updated the product page background images to have different masking and coloring applied to match new visual styles.
- Written description and special announcement areas are now default to being collapsed to make it easier to scan down the page and find reviews. You can expand each section to read more if you wish.
- System requirements for titles with multiple OS support will now display a set of tabs and default to showing the requirements for the OS you are viewing from.
- Changed user-tag reporting to no longer need a specified reason. Since the list of available tags is pre-approved now, the only reason to report a tag is if it is improperly applied to a specific game.

Browse by Tag page
- Updated the visual presentation of featured titles at the top.
- Items featured at the top no longer include items already in your library or that you’ve indicated as ‘Not Interested’.
- Paging through lists of titles now remembers which page you were on.

Browse Free to Play & Browse Early Access pages
- Updated with new visual styles.
- Now includes multi-select filtering controls in the right-hand column to help narrow down search results based on tags, product type, feature, operating system, or language.
- The default tab on these pages is now ‘Popular New Releases’.

Search page
- Updated with new visual styles.
- Now includes multi-select filtering controls in the right-hand column to help narrow down search results based on tags, product type, Steamworks feature, operating system, or language.
- Updated page to function as browse page for more types of items. For example, ‘Items under $5’ and ‘Items under $10’ now point to the search page, which provides more powerful controls for filtering or sorting the results.
- The filters you apply and the page you are on will be remembered when you click into a game page and then use the ‘back’ button to return to your search results.

Browse Demos page
- Updated with new visual styles.
- Added filtering controls to narrow results by tag, feature, or operating system.
- Added pagination to allow for deeper exploration into the list of demos.
- Demo page remembers which page of results you are on when you use the ‘back’ button in Steam or your web browser.

Steam News pages
- Updated with new visual styles and larger type for improved readability.

 

[evdk]

What a fucking joke, every update is worse than the previous one, whether it is some stupid shit like badges or attempts to modernize the look of the site.

It looks like a giant, unhelpful mess. There are three different parts of the site dedicated to suggestions. GOG Galaxy couldn't have came at a better time

Don't be overly butthurt just because it's different. This update adds some essential stuff previously available only in "Steam Enhanced" browser extensions. Like FUCKING BEING ABLE TO SEE THAT YOU OWN A GAME before entering its store page. Also, a convenient look at a game's rating (positive, mixed, negative) when you search.

Well, I already had Steam Enhanced for that and it did not make my eyes bleed.

 

[sbb]

The redesign actually *looks* pretty nice. The old page was getting boring as hell. One thing I'm not so keen on is how far down that list of releases you can sort is. It's pretty damn near the bottom of the page, blocked by a bunch of useless customizable shit.

 

[Explorerbc]

Don't be overly butthurt just because it's different. This update adds some essential stuff previously available only in "Steam Enhanced" browser extensions. Like FUCKING BEING ABLE TO SEE THAT YOU OWN A GAME before entering its store page. Also, a convenient look at a game's rating (positive, mixed, negative) when you search.

I usually know what games I own, even though I have a lot of crap in my library, and even if I don't, waisting a few seconds to go to the page isn't that much trouble to make it an essential feature. The rating statistics are cool but again not something of great importance.

You are right that they added some nice stuff, but right now the most important thing for me is that they messed the frontpage. It is like they are trying to force us to buy even more stuff we'll never play, bombarding us with games from everywhere.

"You played a multiplayer game. Here is another multiplayer game you might like (even though one is an RTS and the other a MOBA)"
"Check your queue with these new popular games you didn't visit (maybe because I didn't care to visit them)"
"Here are some suggestions from your curator"
Ffs it even has a section for suggestions from my wishlist. What's the point of suggesting me a game I already wishlisted before.

Maybe I am overreacting but it really doesn't look pleasant to my eyes or helpful in some way to me as a consumer. But yeah, the sad truth is that I will probably get used to it in time.

 

[Infinitron]

Well, there's the Top 70 RPG list, we can take reviews from there. Or pool them from reviews that Codexers wrote already on Steam.

A challenger appears! http://store.steampowered.com/curator/6855993/

 

[Sam Ecorners]

Kodex Kurated KWAlity

GOGOGO!

 

[felipepepe]

Well, there's the Top 70 RPG list, we can take reviews from there. Or pool them from reviews that Codexers wrote already on Steam.

A challenger appears! http://store.steampowered.com/curator/6855993/

Although it isn't all that bad.... W2, D:OS anc CKII?

 

[Bubbles]

Also, a convenient look at a game's rating (positive, mixed, negative) when you search.

This helps the publishers more than the players, since it only shows the ratio of good reviews to bad ones. Doesn't matter if all the helpful reviews are negative, as long as there's a deep reservoir of positive one-sentence reviews around.

 

[FuriousGamer87]

Come on Codex, someone become a curator already.
Use the catchiest one liner from the reviews itself with links to reviews here for muh publicity.
Here a example that we can rip off inspired from

 

[Zed]

Make me an officer in the steam group, I wanna curate games! Wop wop wop

 

[Infinitron]

Come on Codex, someone become a curator already.

Anybody here can become a curator if he wants - nobody's stopping you. However, if we found an official Codex group, we can have multiple curators representing us. Put together a team of all the quality codex reviewers - Roxor, felipe, etc. And you too, Zed.

Currently discussing this in the staff forums - we'll see what happens.

 

[Kos_Koa]

Yeah, not too sure about the overall review score being displayed. I liked that some people left thoughtful review posts, and it encouraged you to read through them for valuable bits of information. Now it seems like people will flood most games with one sentence reviews just to affect the overall score.

Fortunately most codex approved games are Very Positive. There might be after all.

 

[Ninjerk]

Come on Codex, someone become a curator already.

Anybody here can become a curator if he wants - nobody's stopping you. However, if we found an official Codex group, we can have multiple curators representing us. Put together a team of all the quality codex reviewers - Roxor, felipe, etc. And you too, Zed.

Currently discussing this in the staff forums - we'll see what happens.

Can you share a single... curation?

 

[garren]

Time to make an official separate thread so we can discuss what games to curate?

 

[Infinitron]

BRO TEAM: http://store.steampowered.com/curator/3373079/
Total Biscuit: http://store.steampowered.com/curator/1370293/
PC Gamer: http://store.steampowered.com/curator/1850/

Already have thousands of followers.

 

[Bubbles]

Fortunately most codex approved games are Very Positive. There might be after all.

If anyone wants to use Steam as the new Metacritic, here are some choice ratings:

100% Wizardry 8
98% Skyrim
97% Borderlands 2
97% ME 2
97% New Vegas
96% Oblivion
96% Grimrock
95% Fallout 2
94% DotA 2
94% Arx Fatalis
94% Final Fantasy VII
93% Lords of Xulima
93% Original Sin
90% Dragonfall DC
90% Age of Decadence
88% Risen
88% Wasteland 2
88% Fallout 3
86% Gothic 2
86% BG2:EE
84% Alpha Protocol
83% Wasteland 1
81% Wizardry 7
79% Dead State
73% Risen 3
72% MMX
72% Blackguards
64% Realms of Arkania II: Star Trail
57% Age of Decadence Demo
51% RoA: Blade of Destiny (Original Version)

It's scarily accurate.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

You are right that they added some nice stuff, but right now the most important thing for me is that they messed the frontpage. It is like they are trying to force us to buy even more stuff we'll never play, bombarding us with games from everywhere.

Well, halfway down the page is the usual list of new releases + the daily deal to the side, so you can just look there and ignore the rest if you want to.

 

[Menckenstein]

http://store.steampowered.com/curator/4852280/

 

[AN4RCHID]

The only list you need: http://store.steampowered.com/curator/4550433/

 

[Clockwork Knight]

http://store.steampowered.com/curator/4852280/

ftfy

 

[Clockwork Knight]

METAL GEAR SOLID V: THE PHANTOM PAIN
"This series is nuanced, progressive, and even feminist."

http://store.steampowered.com/curator/4852280/

ftfy

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

Awful colors.