Valve outlines new Steam Family Sharing plan

Valve outlined its plans for a new Steam family sharing program currently entering beta testing on the PC games platform, and it’s meant to make game ownership less of a headache for households. You can opt into the beta program from Steam Settings and the Interface -> Client beta participation options. “Household” is loosely used at the current point, as Valve has few-to-no restrictions on who counts as a family, though that will likely change over time. “While we know that families come in many shapes and sizes, Steam Families is intended for a household of up to 6 close family members,” Valve said in the beta announcement. “To that end, as we monitor the usage of this feature, we may adjust the requirements for participating in a Steam Family or the number of members over time to keep usage in line with this intent.” Valve didn’t say how they might enforce the “close family in the same household” criteria. Whatever the definition, here’s how it works. Anyone who joins the family group has access to all