Valve Announces Family Sharing On Steam, Can Include Friends

Deathspawner writes "Valve has today announced its next attempt at a console-killer: 'Family Sharing' is a feature that will allow you to share your Steam library with family and close friends. This almost seems too good to be true, and while there are caveats, this is going to be huge, and Valve knows it. As Techgage notes, with it you can share nearly your entire Steam library with family or friends, allowing them to earn their own achievements, and have their own saved games. 'Once a device is authorized, the lender's library of Steam games becomes available for others on the machine to access, download, and play. Though simultaneous usage of an account’s library is not allowed, the lender may always access and play his games at any time. If he decides to start playing when a friend is borrowing one of his games, the friend will be given a few minutes to either purchase the game or quit playing.'"

Comments

Re:Steambox

[hairyfeet]

No it is NOT, by your definition then your phone is now a PC, in fact EVERYTHING that can hook up to a TV and play games is a PC by that lousy definition!

For the record it is a CUSTOM CONSOLE OS that is designed to turn one of several approved hardware configs INTO A CONSOLE, no differently than how the Xbox N and PS4 are both AMD X86 APUs running a custom OS...are those PCs too to you?

A PC is a GENERAL PURPOSE computer and this is NOT a general purpose OS, you will NOT get office applications, video editing, or anything other than the ability to play games and a browser...that's it, that is all. Now unlike the DRM crippled consoles you WILL be able to install another OS and dual boot...where did I hear that before? Oh yeah, the first gen PS3 likewise could boot another OS.

But if we go by your definition then frankly there hasn't been a console since the PS2, since the X360 and PS3 and Wii used PC chips (PowerPC and Cell, both of which you can buy from IBM in a tower if you like) so they too are just "PCs that use a TV instead of a monitor to play games". The ONLY difference between the Xbox N,PS4, and Steambox is the Steambox will allow more than one hardware choice, that is it, that's all.