Oct 13, 2023

Team Fortress 2 - Valve

An update to Team Fortress 2 has been released. The update will be applied automatically when you restart Team Fortress 2. The major changes include:

Fixed the Clown's Cover-Up always showing the Red team skin
Fixed hiding the Pyro's head when using the Friendly style for the Fiercesome Fluorescence
Fixed the Grounded style of the Power Spike using an incorrect LOD model
Fixed Celestial Summit and Stellar Ascent Unusual effects not following moving players
Fixed missing prefix when the Strange Filter: Sandcastle (Community) item is applied to a weapon
Fixed missing prefix when the Strange Filter: Lava Pit (Community) item is applied to a weapon
Updated The Masked Fiend to fix a problem with the materials
Updated the Dell Dynamic to fix issues with the materials, rigging, and LODs
Updated the Sapped Unusual effect to fix visibility issues in bright environments
Updated Blastphomet cosmetic to fix some a problem with the materials and some minor clipping
Updated the Taunt: Borrowed Bones to add missing sounds
Updated Taunt: Neck Snap animations to fix the MVM canteen flipping while taunting
Updated the Nightmarish Storm, Acidic Climate, and Otherworldly Weather Unusual effects to fix a problem with the lock rotation
Updated the Eldritch Horror and Deep-sea Devourer Unusual taunt effects to fix a problem with flickering
Updated pd_farmageddon
- Updated .res file to work with custom huds (Thanks Aar)
Updated cp_lavapit_final
- Updated the Underworld
- Spells now spawn one per point, in a random location
- Removed some exploits
Updated pl_spineyard
- Replaced some of the materials and models
- Fixed a missing material
- Significantly improved skeleton navigation
- Reduced the health of skeletons to 130 HP
- Increased the weapon spread of skeletons to reduce their long range damage
- Increased the number of pumpkin bomb spawns
- Improved sound effects
- Various detail fixes
- Fixed being able to build in the first Blue spawn
Updated pd_mannsylvania
- Added new custom voice lines of Merasmus Gargoyle Notifications
- Better player clip and fixed players stuck in some areas
- Placed more bat's models on entire map and randomised their animations
- Improved 3d skybox
- Disabled trigger_hurt in ending sequence after 15 second when game ends
- Minor cosmetic fixes
Updated zi_murky, zi_atoll, zi_devastation_final1, zi_woods, and zi_sanitarium
- These changes are aimed to make playing as a Zombie more engaging, and to weaken the Human meta of bunkering without hurting their ability to roam and fight
  - Zombie Spy is now passively cloaked, only losing his cloak for 3 seconds when attacking or using his "Reveal" ability
    - This change will allow Zombie Spy to circumvent sentry guns that are watching large areas, and allow him to sneak into or around strongholds
  - Zombie Soldier's "Pounce" ability is now significantly higher, and has a 5 second cooldown (from 8)
    - These changes will bolster Zombie Soldier's role as a recon pick and a roof buster, capable of launching through sentry fire
  - Zombie Sniper's "Spit" ability now damages buildables
  - Zombie Sniper now drops a puddle of spit on death
    - Both of these changes will make you feel like you're contributing more with your spit, and if that's not enough, you at least get to drop one on death to cause a small area of denial
  - Zombie Pyro no longer drops small health kits
  - Zombie Pyro's "Hellspawn" passive now releases a flaming explosion on death on top of the existing gas passer cloud
    - These changes should strengthen their afterburn capability, and make them a scarier threat if you let them too close
  - Zombie Heavy's "Tank" ability now adds the Battalion's Backup buff (immunity to critical hits, 35% resistance to regular damage, and a 50% resistance to Sentry Gun damage)
  - Zombie Heavy deals 20% increased melee damage
    - Sentry and crit resistance will bring Zombie Heavy's effective hp up much higher, buffing his role as a tank that you really oughta stay away from. His slower speed is unchanged, so you're still able to run. The changes will just make bunkering much more difficult with him around.
  - Zombie Engineer's EMP no longer rolls on shallow surfaces, and now does 110 damage instead of fractional damage
    - This change will turn EMP grenades into a much more immediate threat, instantly breaking mini sentries, crippling level 1 sentries, and wounding other buildings
  - Zombie Scout's "Speed Demon" passive now comes and additional 25% jump height boost
    - Zombie Scout already has a triple jump, but increasing jump height will make him even more of a pest buzzing around your head, and better at climbing onto roofs once a hold is destroyed
  - 1/5 of the server will be converted to zombies at the end of setup (from 1/6), and will also round up
    - It's become clear that there simply aren't enough zombies selected at the start of the round. Initial pushes should be easier to perform with a couple more units.
  - Sentry Guns deal 40% damage to zombies (from 60%)
    - Engineers are simply way too oppressive. The dispenser is invaluable for the sake of ammo, and the sentry still has use as a knockback tool, but now should be significantly less frustrating to play against.
  - Demoman shield items no longer halve the damage taken by zombies
    - He was just too strong and incredibly unfun to duel. The extended reach of swords is already amazing against melee-only characters. His strong maneuverability is unchanged.
  - Zombie Medic Heal cooldown reduced to 7 seconds (previously 11)
  - All Zombies except for scout, heavy, and spy, now have +25 HP (from +10)
- Fixed a bug where Zombie Demo could detonate himself before the charge had started
- Fixed a bug where Bonk! Atomic Punch could persist through Zombie conversion
- Fixed various issues caused by Zombie Demo surviving his own charge
- Fixed issues with the Zombie HUD not correctly displaying certain strings
- Fixed exploit related to adding additional time
- Added additional HIDEHUD bits to remove irrelevant HUD elements when playing Zombie
- Added an instructional video (Thanks Funicular!)
Updated zi_murky (additional changes)
- All of the roofs have been covered in clutter such as vines and tires, and are no longer buildable
- Added more trees for cover
- Added small fence to RED spawn to make it easier for zombies to approach up the wooden stairs
- Added a ramp leading to the yellow shack's roof
- Added occluders to central shack
- Improved fog
- Improved skybox
- Improved readability of chicken wire fences, and added more around the docks
- Adjusted prop fades
- Tweaked detailing
- Fixed erroneous clip brushes
- Fixed several stuck spots
- Fixed missing television model
Updated zi_atoll (additional changes)
- Added an extension to the roof of the turbine building
- Added nobuild entities to debris that could potentially hide sneaky sentries
- Added a broken window on the turbine building
- Clipped the spiral stairs behind the lighthouse (thanks Aar!)
- Reduced performance impact of water
- Increased size of trigger_push entities on the tree tops
- Improved collision on the displacement on the beach near the fishing house
- The spinning cat has been fed
Updated zi_devastation_final1 (additional changes)
- Added new route from second level zombie spawn to the top floor
- Adjusted some zombie spawns
- Made some zombie spawn exits easier to leave
- Clipped off bottom floor stairs
- Increased Round Timer to 3 minutes and 30 Seconds
- Increased Reports of Gators
Updated zi_sanitarium (additional changes)
- Replaced some of the materials and models
- Fixed a missing material on a prop
- Fixed a pixel walk in the skybox

Oct 9, 2023

Steam Next Fest: October '23 Edition is on NOW!

Steam News - jennyj

Check out Steam Next Fest

Hundreds of Free Demos

It's time to kick off the October 2023 edition of Steam Next Fest! Today through October 16 at 10am PDT (UTC-7), play what's next from first-time and veteran developers alike from all over the world. From hundreds of free demos to livestreams and developer chats, there are upcoming games of all kinds to play before they're even released. Just don't forget to wishlist your faves to be notified when the game officially launches!

Official Livestream Kickoff

We're kicking off the full week of developer livestreams with our own live show starting at 11am PDT on October 9th. Join us on the Steam Next Fest front page for the kickoff, and stick around for developer livestreams and chats all week long.

Explore and Discover

With so many amazing games to choose from, it can be hard to know where to start. We've got your back, with lots of easy ways to explore Steam Next Fest!

Browse by category, or a game’s primary tags, to find demos in your favorite genre; you can even search by sub-genres or specific features.
Check out the Broadcast Schedule for developer-hosted livestreams and chats, and set reminders for everything you don't want to miss.
Explore your personalized Steam Next Fest Discovery Queue to find popular demos similar to games you already play.

Even More Steam Next Fest

Worried one week won't be enough? No problem. We'll be featuring this edition's most played games for another week after Steam Next Fest concludes, so feel free to make more room in your calendars!

Check out Steam Next Fest

#SteamNextFest

Oct 9, 2023

Team Fortress 2 Update Released

Team Fortress 2 - Valve

An update to Team Fortress 2 has been released. The update will be applied automatically when you restart Team Fortress 2. The major changes include:

Scream Fortress XV has arrived!

Featuring 12 new community maps: Perks, Slime, Lava Pit, Mannsylvania, Sandcastle, Spineyard, Corruption, Murky, Atoll, Woods, Sanitarium, and Devastation
Added the Bone-Chilling Bonanza Case
- Contains 25 new community-created cosmetic items that make up the Bone-Chilling Bonanza Collection
- Has a chance to give one of 4 new community-created Halloween-restricted items as a bonus item
- Has a chance to give a taunt Unusualifier as a bonus item
Added 4 new community-contributed taunts to the Mann Co. Store
- Taunt: The Crypt Creeper
- Taunt: Roar O'War
- Taunt: Neck Snap
- Taunt: Borrowed Bones
Added 20 new community-created Unusual effects
- 13 new effects for Unusual hats
- 7 new effects for Unusual taunts
All players who launch the game will receive a Soul Gargoyle if they don't already have one
- Grants access to Merasmissions and Halloween item transmutations
- Tracks Merasmissions completed and souls collected
All Halloween Contracts have been reset, allowing them to be completed again
Added new Contracts for this year's featured community maps
Completing a Halloween Contract will give players a classic Halloween item and the chance for a Bone-Chilling Bonanza Case
Continue last year's event by collecting the souls of dead players for your Soul Gargoyle by killing enemies, doing map objectives, or collecting the Soul Gargoyles that spawn in the maps
All cosmetic and taunt Cases will grant Halloween 2023 Unusual effects instead of their normal Unusual effects during the event. This does not include Crates.
Join Halloween matches by using the Special Events category in Casual
Scream Fortress XV runs through November 7th, 2023

General

Changes to help improve load times
Fixed ghost_pumpkin effect not playing correctly for the Horseless Headless Horsemann
Updated the Horror Shawl's second style to fix a problem with the materials
Fixed missing outro sequence for the Taunt: Surgeon's Squeezebox
Updated pd_farmageddon to fix blood particles for the scarecrows
Updated vsh_distillery and koth_cascade with localization fixes
Updated arena_lumberyard_event and plr_hacksaw_event to fix problems with the materials

Sep 11, 2023

Indonesian now fully supported on Steam

Steam News - kaci

After a few weeks in beta, we have officially launched Indonesian language support on the full Steam client. Players can now switch their language preferences in both the Steam desktop client and mobile app to Indonesian language.

This update makes Indonesian Steam’s 29th core language to be added to the desktop client, store, community, and mobile app, which all include ongoing translation work to support the many special events, sales, promotions, and new features that Steam launches every year.

We’re always working to make Steam accessible (and enjoyable!) to as many people around the world as we can, and supporting different languages makes it easier for folks to find and play great games, write reviews, share community content, and chat with friends.

As we’ve worked toward this milestone, which included forming a team to translate over 500,000 words, we’ve also been encouraging game developers to bring the Indonesian language version of their games to Steam. As of today, we now have over 900 games on Steam that support the Indonesian language (also includes games that don’t have words and thus work in any language).

To switch languages in Steam, follow these instructions or watch the short video below.

[smalltext]Video demonstrating how to change language in the Steam desktop client[/smalltext]

You can also set additional language preferences within the Steam store, which allows players to more easily find games that are available in other languages. The primary selection (which follows the Steam client selected language) will determine the language used to display content in the store, while secondary or additional selections will allow recommendations and discovery of games that are available in additional languages.

The Steam mobile app itself by default will follow the language selected in the Steam client, but can also be updated independently in the mobile app itself if desired.

Sep 11, 2023

Steam Client Update - September 11th

Steam News - Lawrence

A new Steam client has been released and will be automatically downloaded.

General

Added support for Indonesian language
Allow the settings window to be resized.
Fixed empty folders not being re-created when verifying a game installation.
Improved reliability of Back button.
Fixed a case where non-steam games could disappear from the library.
Adjusted the low battery notification for laptops/handheld PCs to only fire in the overlay or the main BPM window
Fixed windows being able to set minimum sizes larger than their display dimensions.
Fixed issue where some steam:// protocol handlers were not handled correctly due to case sensitivity. Example: steam://url/communityfilepage/<ugcid> was not working correctly.
Fixed issue with steam://connect/<gameserver ip>:<game server port>/<optional password> was not handled.
Fixed clicking "Play Game" links in event news causing client popup windows to close.
steamwebhelper support dialog is now shown if the main client window cannot be created at startup.

Big Picture Mode

Fixed switching from fullscreen to windowed mode when a full-screen video is dismissed.
Fixed notifications stealing focus when shown in overlay.
Fixed overlay freezing when a file dialog is shown.

Steam Overlay

The overlay tabbed browser will now wait until the overlay has been activated for the first time before restoring saved tabs.
Added an option to In Game settings that allows toggling whether overlay browser tabs will be restored when starting a game.
Fixed bug with Steam Overlay in DirectX12 not releasing resources

Steam Input

Fixed touchpad input when using the Victrix and Qanba PS4/PS5 arcade sticks
Reduced lag when switching between pages in the "Edit Layout" view for configurations with large numbers of action sets/layers/mode-shifts
Fixed the DualSense firmware update dialog from popping up when the controller was connected over Bluetooth and already up to date
Added the ability to bind Steam Input API trigger actions to button inputs

Steam Cloud

Fixed a case where Steam Cloud saves could be synced to a computer that did not have the game installed if the game was available for streaming from another PC

Remote Play

Fixed controller buttons being stuck down
Added support for 4K high quality streaming presets
Fixed occasional crash when streaming using NVIDIA NvFBC capture
Fixed occasional crash directly launching a game from the Steam Link UI
Added support for HEVC video encoding when streaming to macOS
Fixed device authorization dialog not showing if Steam Link connects while Steam is starting up

Server browser

Fixed a bug which could cause a server browser query to stop prematurely without pinging all of the servers

Library

Fixed some screenshot thumbnails on the activity feed not being properly obscured when marked as spoiler

Linux

Fixed a case where a Library Folder could be forgotten when a drive was unplugged from the system.

macOS

Fixed keyboard shortcuts not working in store Paypal web view.