Steam and innovation

Newell argued that the PC is the leader in innovation, which then trickles down to consoles. Media formats, distribution methods, multiplayer modes and other innovations begin on PC because it is an open platform, he said.

One of Valve's greatest innovations is Steam. Business director Jason Holtman said that Steam adoption is continuing to grow rapidly, with 191 percent year-on-year growth and 1.25 million peak concurrent users. The digital distribution and community platform houses over 300 PC titles from various game makers. (Holtman also covered Steamworks, much of which Next-Gen covered here.)

In the "near-future," Valve expects to add significant new features to Steam, including driver auto-updating, a system requirements-checker, new community calendar functions and "official" communities.

Other additions to Steam will be localized pricing (not just USD), recommendations, a shopping cart and more payment methods.

But perhaps the most compelling new feature, as far as convenience is concerned, will be the upcoming ability for users to access not only their Steam games from any PC (which they can do already), but also game-generated data such as saves and configurations, which will be stored transparently in Steam's back-end. This feature, dubbed Steam Cloud, will first be rolled out in existing titles, and will be available for free to both developers and gamers.

The TF2 model

Valve's Robin Walker said that successful multiplayer games need to be considered as services that are constantly updated with new features and content.

Team Fortress 2 for PC has seen 53 updates since its launch last year, many of which are a result of direct feedback from players regarding Achievement design, class balance and map balance.

Valve said that this model--lots of little updates--is the company's model moving forward for multiplayer titles, as it not only improves gameplay and offers continuing innovation, but also curbs piracy.