Steam is currently the largest platform for purchasing video games online and playing. This means, no matter whether you like it or not, in all likelihood, you are using it.
Steam seems to be a pretty simple service, however, it has many useful features which you might not be aware of. This article will provide you information on the functions of Steam which you might find handy.
The game library
There are a couple of things you can do to customise your game library and make it more convenient for usage.
Organising your games in the library
If you have purchased a number of games through Steam, you have certainly thought about the options offered by the platform for viewing the games.
There is Detail View which is probably the most informative one. At the same time, it might seem as less prettier than Grid View which presents the games in a very neat way by the cost of reducing the information showed.
There is also List View which is not particularly popular among the users of Steam. Actually, this particular type of view has several useful options for sorting games which are going beyond typical alphabetisation. For example, a great way of sorting your games is by the size on your disk. This one can immediately show you the options which are taking the greatest amount of storage on the disk.
Setting custom icons on Grid View
Many Steam users are experiencing the same issue with using Grid View. Unfortunately, in many cases it does not display any descent icons which does not look aesthetic and does not make the games well-visible. This view tends switch beautiful icons of the games to something indistinguishable, remove icons altogether or just cover them with the score of reviews.
Not everyone knows that this problem can be solved by setting custom images. In fact, there are entire collections of wonderful images which can be used as icons in your Steam library.
More on the categories of the Steam library
Detail View of the library provides Steam users with a number of categories which are great for sorting the game titles and making your game collection more comprehensible. Of course, it might not be such a problem to the people who have just started using the service and have just purchased their first games. In fact, many gamers have already been using the platform for quite a long time and might have managed to buy hundreds of games through Steam.
In order to provide some order into your game collection, you can try special programmes which have been designed specifically for the Steam users. One of the most popular of them is Depressuriser which can create categories based on the genres of the games and assign the titles to these genres.
Extra filters for Steam
It is also possible to use external library filters for Steam which are available outside the gaming platform. Some of the filters available to the Steam users are features, platform, genre as well as supported language which is a quite rare way of categorising your games.
In order to use such external tools, you will need your Steam ID. A profile URL can be used instead as well.
Other ways of customising Steam
The appearance of Steam is featured by elegant and aesthetic colours of black, grey and blue. While many people find this design great, some Steam users also would like it to be different. If you find such an appearance of the platform too boring, you can easily customise it.
It is possible to download other skins which are available in the large collection of options which should be moved to the “skins” folder available within the “Steam” folder. Once you do it, you will be able to find your new skins through the interface menu under Steam’s Settings. In order to actovate the changes of the skins, you should restart the programme.
The Steam music player
Not all of the players are aware of the fact Steam has its own music player. In order to reach it, you should go to the View and choose Music details. Another option is going to Music Player through the View option as well. With this option, you will be able to listen to the soundtracks of selected games.
Even though you might find the way the music is organised in your player not perfect as there might be overlapping tracklists and multiple entries for particular games, yet, the mere fact there is such an option available to the Steam users is really great.
Steam and security
You should also know about a possibility of making your Steam profile more secured. It definitely has sense since Steam is used for purchasing games online in the first place, thus, it is better to take some extra precaution measures in case anyone has access to your email account and password.
It is recommended to use two-factor authentication for this purpose which can be done through the Steam app for your smartphone. Actually, securing your account is the only useful thing you can do with this app, however, this will help you to protect your account. Alternatively, you can use your email account for two-factor authentication.