Steam 1.0

Steam is a digital distribution platform for games. It is available for Windows and Mac OS X. Although Steam is available for both systems, that doesn't mean the games offered on Steam are available for both of them as well.

Sadly, the Mac OS X version of Steam is relatively new and game development for the Mac is recent, so the Mac doesn't have as many games available as Windows. Hopefully, this will change in the near future. At first, Steam only delivered games by Valve, but it now boasts an extensive list of developers that distribute their games via Steam.

Once you have Steam installed in your system, you can use it to browse all the available games, download demos, and purchase full-featured games. Via Steamworks, users of Steam can access to multiplayer matchmaking features on some games. This service can pair users based on various criteria, but is often used to let users play against others who have similar skills.

Steam offers a very smooth game browsing experience. The graphical user interface gives an outline the games and represents their screenshots and descriptions. You can use the search feature to find games by a keyword or genre. You can also do this from the website, but Steam is stable enough to be an excellent browser-free experience.

All in all, there are some excellent games on Steam. The service works well enough, it is social, free and very easy.