Recently, Steam, an online service specializing in computer games and programs, has become increasingly popular in the world, especially given the situation with the COVID-19 pandemic.
As of 2020, the total number of active users of the service, whose history began in 1999, although the platform was officially introduced to the general public only three years later, exceeds 120 million people.
Thanks to Steam, which is co-owned by Valve Software, users have the opportunity to use games that have already been purchased and activated for free, as well as receive up-to-date information about new releases. In addition, the service contains a number of communities of interest and provides chat between users.
Steam Promotion History
A special role in popularizing the service was played by Half-Life 2, which became the first game that required the installation of Steam, even if the disc was purchased in a regular store, and after activation the game belonged to only one user, and quite often the activations simply “flyed” .
A significant step forward was made in 2007, when, in order to strengthen the social component of the service, the Steam Community was launched, turning a simple computer games store into a kind of social network. In 2012, the first non-gaming programs appear on Steam, as well as a special version designed specifically for educational institutions.
We can say that Steam is a kind of service focused on pumping out users’ money through the distribution of licensed video games, as well as programs and films.
Let’s dwell on the capabilities of the service
Shop
Steam offers a huge collection of games that can be purchased for money or downloaded for free, with all content sorted into categories and genres, with in order to improve user experience, and disliked content may be returned.
Any game can be added to the library, which is a personal storage, and also bought as a gift to another Steam representative.
Marketplace
In this case, we mean the expansion of the Steam community, which allows you to both buy and sell games, as well as badges and service cards.
In order to open a trading platform and remove certain restrictions on the sale of in-game items, some of which may cost more than one hundred thousand rubles, you must have an unlimited Steam account protected for at least 15 days, and in the event that the account record imposed any restrictions, you should replenish the account for five dollars.
Of particular note is the fact that the Steam account wallet is one-way, and therefore the funds on it can be spent exclusively on the purchase of goods offered by the community marketplace or the purchase of a game. From the sale of each item, Steam takes a commission of 15%, which is paid by the buyer.
According to Valve, over the past year, 25.2 million terabytes of data have been added to Steam, and within the framework of this year, it is planned to release a Chinese version of the service to provide an increased level of security for the Steam mobile application. In addition, the company plans to develop new ways to reward users for whom the Steam community is not of particular interest, as well as a number of other projects that Valve is currently keeping secret.
