Steam's Storefront Overhauled With Personalized Discovery

If you opened up Steam recently and found yourself facing some rather shocking motif changes, you're not alone. The entire layout of the Steam store has been completely overhauled to better represent the kind of games that you want to buy, you would like to buy, and games you might buy.

The discovery update went live on September 22nd, this past Monday, ushering in a brand new era for searching, browsing and carousing Steam's massive library of games. Valve was proud to boast the addition of more than 1,300 new titles over the past nine months and having more than 100 million registered users.

Alden Kroll of Valve (because apparently they don't all have official titles) commented about the new change, saying...

Valve has added all new customization features for the store layout, offering gamers the ability to modify and alter what they see on the main page.

Using the customization tabs from within the client window, it's easy to pull down the menu, modify what you want to see and then rest easy knowing that Early Access games will no longer pop up anytime you check out the “New Games” tab.

Alternatively, you can have the opposite setup: you can make where the only new products that come your way are Early Access titles, updates for games you already own or news and info on games you don't already own. Valve is putting the power of curation back into the hands of gamers.

I don't know if this will fix all the problems that people have complained about regarding Steam, but at least the complaints about terrible games showing up in their home store will no longer be an issue... well, sort of. A lot of the games will be curated around your interests, or rather, titles you're likely to buy based on what you already own or have shown interest in.

There's also an all new “Queue”, where gamers can explore different games suggested to them based on their preferences. It will send you to a game and offer up all the relevant information to tempt you into purchasing or downloading the title.

In addition to this, there are “curators”... storefronts that allow gamers to follow certain groups that recommend specific games and buying trends.

Additionally, you can even filter the curator lists so you can find exactly what you're looking for from the games that appeal to your specific tastes.

My only gripe is that the way curator lists are setup isn't necessarily the most appealing thing, visually, but they have time to work on the storefronts and get them to appear a bit more aesthetically apropos.

The new change to the Steam storefront is already in effect and you can start browsing and carousing the new layout right now.

For more info feel free to visit the official website.