Steam Guard will completely restrict account access

“Enabling maximum account security prevents the account from being accessed from any computers other than those you explicitly authorize,” says one of Steam’s new localisation strings.

Intel hardware is optional

Steam Guard will be able to identify a computer using software only; this will be inherently less secure than hardware identification but better than nothing. The system that already prevents stored login details being copied to different computers will presumably be used.

Multiple computers can be activated with email codes

But only when Steam Guard is running in software mode. Sensibly, the weak point of authorising other computers (given the dependence on email account integrity that it entails) is disabled when hardware identification is active. There is no word yet on what will happen should your CPU explode when your account is in hardware mode, but the process will surely bear similarities to recovering a lost password.

Steam Guard will be added to Steamworks

This is odd. The full quote is “available to third parties to incorporate into their own applications through Steamworks,” but why would anyone want to re-implement what Steam already gives them? I can only speculate that either this is marketing hype (like the utterly redundant CEG), or that Steam is going to start natively supporting limited activations. While Valve have tolerated this in the past, actually offering it as a part of Steamworks — if that is the plan — would be a big step.

And why does the release say “applications”, not “games”? Perhaps just a slip-up…

Steam Guard will be under your control

Notwithstanding the above, enabling Steam Guard on your Steam account is optional.

This might seem like an pretty good move by Valve, but there is a bogeyman. Intel’s new tech falls under Trusted Computing: the practice of using purpose-built hardware to ensure that a computer can be trusted to be upholding certain conditions. Most often those are that unauthorised code isn’t running, but in this case it’s that a single, particular CPU is in use. The key is that unlike DRM, which is always grounded in software, a good implementation of Trusted Computing cannot be broken without physical access to the computer (and an electron microscope).

The rights and wrongs of this are a matter of personal opinion. But having seen Steam suffer suspicion and even hatred while it was establishing itself I can’t help but be if not quite pro-TC, then anti-anti. It’s certainly clear that Steam Guard will make the world a better place.

Five mods have been given special access to the Steamworks SDK and will be releasing future versions over Steam. The news was announced by the co-op HL2 mod Synergy, probably earlier than it was supposed to be:

I would also like to inform you that we will be releasing Synergy and future updates through Steam! Valve Software has allowed us to do so by giving us access to the Steamworks SDK.

We are honored to be one of the four (sic) first selected mods to be given this opportunity. We will certainly put this to good use!

For you players, this means that you will see Achievements and Stats coming to Synergy in later updates. (Not to mention the automatic updates, provided by Steam.)

This plugs the final gap in Steam’s handling and presentation of mods; now they are to all intents and purposes they are free games, including, apparently, support for sub-mods. Previously mod teams had been told they were too small for Valve to support, and before that that their work was one day going to be distributed over Steam’s Peer-to-Peer network.

Although Steamworks doesn’t by itself give a game a presence in the Steam store, the more popular mods are already listed and are unlikely to be removed just to comply with Valve’s rules for commercial games.

The names of the other four mods have been found referenced in Steam’s content registry (thanks AciD):

• Age of Chivalry
• D.I.P.R.I.P.
• Insurgency
• Zombie Panic: Source

And Synergy, of course. There’s no known date for when Valve will start extending offers to other mods, and knowing Valve most likely isn’t one at all!

Are you a PC developer or publisher who isn’t using Steam or Steamworks yet?
If so, read about why Steamworks is the PC gaming platform of the future. When you’re ready, get in touch.

This site covers many of the technical details under Steamworks’ hood. The links below cover some of the basics; once you’ve signed up you’ll get access to much more in depth information about how to make use of all Steamworks has to offer.

Scanning the API documentation it seems that using the tech really is as easy as Valve have made it out to be. Authenticating a multiplayer client takes a single line of C++, and the ever-tricky problem of sending data directly from one client to another is much the same. Valve don’t recommend that developers use the Steam server browser however, which is an odd thing to say considering it’s been one of Steamworks’ selling points in the past.

The other publicly-available page, Running your game on Steam, details the practical aspects of getting your content to Valve. This amounts to:

1. Create the image
2. Apply any special settings
3. FTP it
4. Wait until it appears later in the day

Again — incredibly, liberatingly simple.

So simple in fact that there isn’t much more to say about it! So here’s GamesIndustry.biz’s recent Steam interview with Doug Lombardi to keep you occupied instead.

Do you use Steamworks? I’d love to hear from you!

Jim Rossignol [RPS]: What do you think about Steamworks?

Steve Gaffney [Splash Damage]: It’s great. We need someone to look after the PC platform, and only Valve are really in a position to do that. There’s no downside to it.

Paul Wedgwood [SD]: And there’s a big upside for Valve – to control the PC platform via more Steam subs. But that is a positive thing for other developers.

Jon Hicks [Official Xbox Magazine]: You’re not worried that Valve could turn around and start holding the platform to ransom?

Gaffney: Perhaps, but Steam is like a third platform now. It’s that big. There’s the 360, the PS3 and Steam…do you not think?

Tim Edwards [PC Gamer UK]: I completely agree, I’ve just never heard anyone say it out loud. Every gamer I know has a Steam account, and uses it regularly.

That makes Splash Damage’s next game a Steamworks title in my book! There are some vague details about what we can expect from it in the full interview.

Needless to say, I also agree with Gaffney and the other Edwards that Steam is the PC platform now — it would be madness for a developer to forgo Steamworks, even if they were to employ only its simple distribution and update functions.

(The updated Quake Wars demo Wedgwood talks about was released on Steam unannounced. Oops…)

I will instead leave you with Andy Simpson’s guest opinion piece from last year, for reasons which should become clear as you read it, and Rock, Paper, Shotgun’s interview, which does an excellent job of demystifying a press release that left a lot of its readers in the dark.

I’m sorry about this.