Category: Game Releases

Play Forts Multiplayer for FREE starting now through Sunday at 1PM Pacific Time. You can also pick up the game at 40% off the regular price!*

If you already have Steam installed, click here to install or play Forts. If you don’t have Steam, you can download it here.

Forts is a physics-based RTS where foes design and build custom bases, arm them to the teeth and blast their opponent’s creations to rubble.

Build an armoured fort in real-time and arm it to the teeth. Collect resources, develop your tech-tree, unlock advanced weapons to target your opponent’s weak points, and feel the satisfaction as their fort comes crashing down.

*Offer ends Monday at 10AM Pacific Time

Moss is Now Available on Steam!

Moss™ is a single-player action-adventure puzzle game and new IP from Polyarc tailor-made for the VR platform. It takes classic components of a great game—such as compelling characters, gripping combat, and captivating world exploration—and combines them with the exciting opportunities of virtual reality.

7.17:
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* Eul’s Scepter of Divinity: Bonus movement speed reduced from +40 to +30
* Moon Shard: Night vision increased from 300/150 (base/consumed) to 400/200
* Refresher: Recipe cost reduced from 1800 to 1700
* Talisman of Evasion: Evasion reduced from 20% to 15%
* Talisman of Evasion: Cost reduced from 1450 to 1400
* Solar Crest: Base evasion reduced from 20% to 15% (active application is still 20%)

* Abaddon: Level 10 Talent increased from +20% XP to +25%
* Abaddon: Level 15 Talent increased from +60 Mist Coil Heal/Damage to +75
* Abaddon: Level 15 Talent increased from +6 Armor to +8

* Alchemist: Chemical Rage now applies a basic dispel on cast

* Ancient Apparition: Level 10 Talent increased from +60 Gold/Min to +90

* Anti-Mage: Base damage increased by 2

* Bane: Base damage reduced by 2
* Bane: Brain Sap manacost increased from 70/100/130/160 to 90/115/140/165

* Beastmaster: Base armor reduced by 2

* Bristleback: Viscous Nasal Goo now has a -2 base armor reduction

* Clinkz: Base armor increased by 1
* Clinkz: Strafe dodge now works against non-player units
* Clinkz: Strafe attack speed increased from 80/140/200/260 to 110/160/210/260

* Clockwerk: Base damage reduced by 4

* Crystal Maiden: Crystal Nova cooldown reduced from 12/11/10/9 to 11/10/9/8
* Crystal Maiden: Level 15 Talent increased from +120 Gold/Min to +150

* Dark Willow: Bramble Maze cooldown reduced from 40/35/30/25 to 34/31/28/25
* Dark Willow: Level 10 Talent increased from +20 Damage to +30

* Death Prophet: Exorcism spirit spawn interval increased from 0.3 to 0.35

* Disruptor: Thunder Strike cooldown increased from 15/13/11/9 to 18/15/12/9

* Earthshaker: Echo Slam now has 100 Initial Damage

* Enchantress: Nature’s Attendants cooldown reduced from 45 to 35
* Enchantress: Enchant slow rescaled from 3/4/5/6 to 3.75/4.5/5.25/6

* Enigma: Demonic Conversion manacost reduced from 170 to 140/150/160/170
* Enigma: Demonic Conversion Eidolon HP regen increased from 0.25 to 4

* Gyrocopter: Level 15 Talent changed from +3 Flak Cannon Attacks to +0.5s Homing Missile Stun Duration
* Gyrocopter: Level 20 Talent reduced from +45 Movement Speed to +40

* Huskar: Level 25 Talent changed from 0 Inner Vitality Cooldown to Burning Spears Pure and Pierces Immunity
* Huskar: Level 25 Talent increased from +125 Attack Range to +150

* Invoker: Catacylsm max spread distance reduced from 220 to 200

* Io: Spirits damage reduced from 25/50/75/100 to 20/40/60/80
* Io: Tether movement speed reduced from 7/10/13/16 to 5/8/11/14%
* Io: Level 10 Talent reduced from +60 Damage to +45
* Io: Level 20 Talent reduced from +20 Health Regen to +15

* Juggernaut: Base armor increased by 1

* Keeper of the Light: Chakra Magic no longer has a 25/35/45/55 manacost

* Leshrac: Lightning Storm cast range reduced from 650/700/750/800 to 650

* Lich: Frost Blast attack slow increased from -20 to -30
* Lich: Frost Blast cooldown reduced from 8 to 7
* Lich: Level 10 Talent increased from +175 Health to +200

* Lycan: Feral Impulse damage reduced from 15/26/37/48% to 12/24/36/48%

* Magnus: Base strength increased by 1
* Magnus: Skewer slow increased from 2.5/2.75/3/3.25 to 3.25
* Magnus: Shockwave damage increased from 75/150/225/300 to 90/160/230/300

* Meepo: Base armor increased by 2

* Mirana: Level 25 Talent reduced from -80s Moonlight Shadow Cooldown to -75s

* Naga Siren: Song of the Siren manacost increased from 100/150/200 to 150/175/200

* Necrophos: Level 15 Talent increased from +16% Ghost Shroud Slow to +20%
* Necrophos: Level 25 Talent increased from -1.5s Death Pulse Cooldown to -2.5s
* Necrophos: Level 25 Talent increased from +0.6 heartstopper Aura to +0.8

* Night Stalker: Crippling Fear cooldown increased from 12 to 24/20/16/12
* Night Stalker: Void cooldown increased from 8 to 11/10/9/8

* Oracle: Fortune’s End is no longer disjointable
* Oracle: Level 15 Talent increased from +90 Gold/Min to +120

* Pangolier: Fixed Rolling Thunder having no effect on units like Primal Split Brewlings and Ancients neutrals (still doesn’t affect roshan)

* Phantom Assassin: Stifling Dagger slow rescaled from 1/2/3/4 seconds to 1.75/2.5/3.25/4
* Phantom Assassin: Level 20 Talent improved from Double Strike Stifling Dagger to Triple Strike Stifling Dagger

* Phoenix: Supernova stun duration from 1.5/2/2.5 to 2/2.5/3.0

* Puck: Waning Rift silence duration increased from 0.75/1.5/2.25/3 to 1.5/2/2.5/3

* Pudge: Level 10 Talent changed from +5 Armor to +30% XP
* Pudge: Level 15 Talent changed from +75 Damage to +12% Rot Slow

* Riki: Base armor increased by 1
* Riki: Base damage increased by 4

* Sand King: Base damage reduced by 3
* Sand King: Caustic Finale slow reduced from 21/24/27/30% to 15/20/25/30%

* Shadow Shaman: Base intelligence increased by 2
* Shadow Shaman: Hex manacost reduced from 110/140/170/200 to 70/110/150/190
* Shadow Shaman: Level 15 Talent increased from -4s Hex Cooldown to -5s
* Shadow Shaman: Level 25 Talent reduced from +60 Wards Attack Damage to +50

* Silencer: Arcane Curse penalty duration increased from 4 to 5 seconds

* Sniper: Assassinate cast range increased from 2000/2500/3000 to 3000
* Sniper: Level 10 Talent changed from +15% Cooldown Reduction to +25%

* Spectre: Level 15 Talent increased from -8s Spectral Dagger Cooldown to -10s

* Spirit Breaker: Greater Bash disable duration increased from 1/1.2/1.4/1.6 to 1.2/1.4/1.6/1.8
* Spirit Breaker: Nether Strike damage reduced from 150/250/350 to 150/200/250
* Spirit Breaker: Level 10 Talent increased from +400 Night Vision to +600

* Sven: Storm Hammer Manacost reduced from 140 to 110/120/130/140

* Terrorblade: Agility gain increased from 3.2 to 3.7

* Tiny: Base movement speed increased from 280 to 285
* Tiny: Tree Throw splash damage increased from 130% to 150%
* Tiny: Grow Status Resistance increased from 20/30/40% to 30/40/50%

* Ursa: Overpower duration increased from 15 to 20
* Ursa: Level 20 Talent changed from +1s Enrage Duration to +1.5s

* Winter Wyvern: Base Intelligence increased by 2

* Wraith King: Mortal Strike skeletons now have 30% Magic Resistance
* Wraith King: Level 15 Talent increased from +25 Skeletons Attack Damage to +35

* Zeus: Lightning Bolt manacost increased from 75/95/115/135 to 90/105/120/135

Recently there’s been a bunch of community discussion around what kind of games we’re allowing onto the Steam Store. As is often the case, the discussion caused us to spend some time examining what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, and how we could be doing it better. Decision making in this space is particularly challenging, and one that we’ve really struggled with. Contrary to many assumptions, this isn’t a space we’ve automated – humans at Valve are very involved, with groups of people looking at the contents of every controversial title submitted to us. Similarly, people have falsely assumed these decisions are heavily affected by our payment processors, or outside interest groups. Nope, it’s just us grappling with a really hard problem.

Unfortunately, our struggling has resulted in a bunch of confusion among our customers, developer partners, and even our own employees. So we’ve spent some time thinking about where we want to be on this, and we’d like to talk about it now. But we also think it’s critical to talk about how we’ve arrived at our position, so you can understand the trade-offs we’re making.

The challenge is that this problem is not simply about whether or not the Steam Store should contain games with adult or violent content. Instead, it’s about whether the Store contains games within an entire range of controversial topics – politics, sexuality, racism, gender, violence, identity, and so on. In addition, there are controversial topics that are particular to games – like what even constitutes a “game”, or what level of quality is appropriate before something can be released.

Common questions we ask ourselves when trying to make decisions didn’t help in this space. What do players wish we would do? What would make them most happy? What’s considered acceptable discussion / behavior / imagery varies significantly around the world, socially and legally. Even when we pick a single country or state, the legal definitions around these topics can be too broad or vague to allow us to avoid making subjective and interpretive decisions. The harsh reality of this space, that lies at the root of our dilemma, is that there is absolutely no way we can navigate it without making some of our players really mad.

In addition, Valve is not a small company – we’re not a homogeneous group. The online debates around these topics play out inside Valve as well. We don’t all agree on what deserves to be on the Store. So when we say there’s no way to avoid making a bunch of people mad when making decisions in this space, we’re including our own employees, their families and their communities in that.

So we ended up going back to one of the principles in the forefront of our minds when we started Steam, and more recently as we worked on Steam Direct to open up the Store to many more developers: Valve shouldn’t be the ones deciding this. If you’re a player, we shouldn’t be choosing for you what content you can or can’t buy. If you’re a developer, we shouldn’t be choosing what content you’re allowed to create. Those choices should be yours to make. Our role should be to provide systems and tools to support your efforts to make these choices for yourself, and to help you do it in a way that makes you feel comfortable.

With that principle in mind, we’ve decided that the right approach is to allow everything onto the Steam Store, except for things that we decide are illegal, or straight up trolling. Taking this approach allows us to focus less on trying to police what should be on Steam, and more on building those tools to give people control over what kinds of content they see. We already have some tools, but they’re too hidden and not nearly comprehensive enough. We are going to enable you to override our recommendation algorithms and hide games containing the topics you’re not interested in. So if you don’t want to see anime games on your Store, you’ll be able to make that choice. If you want more options to control exactly what kinds of games your kids see when they browse the Store, you’ll be able to do that. And it’s not just players that need better tools either – developers who build controversial content shouldn’t have to deal with harassment because their game exists, and we’ll be building tools and options to support them too.

As we mentioned earlier, laws vary around the world, so we’re going to need to handle this on a case-by-case basis. As a result, we will almost certainly continue to struggle with this one for a while. Our current thinking is that we’re going to push developers to further disclose any potentially problematic content in their games during the submission process, and cease doing business with any of them that refuse to do so honestly. We’ll still continue to perform technical evaluations of submissions, rejecting games that don’t pass until their issues have been resolved.

So what does this mean? It means that the Steam Store is going to contain something that you hate, and don’t think should exist. Unless you don’t have any opinions, that’s guaranteed to happen. But you’re also going to see something on the Store that you believe should be there, and some other people will hate it and want it not to exist.

It also means that the games we allow onto the Store will not be a reflection of Valve’s values, beyond a simple belief that you all have the right to create & consume the content you choose. The two points above apply to all of us at Valve as well. If you see something on Steam that you think should not exist, it’s almost certain that someone at Valve is right there with you.

To be explicit about that – if we allow your game onto the Store, it does not mean we approve or agree with anything you’re trying to say with it. If you’re a developer of offensive games, this isn’t us siding with you against all the people you’re offending. There will be people throughout the Steam community who hate your games, and hope you fail to find an audience, and there will be people here at Valve who feel exactly the same way. However, offending someone shouldn’t take away your game’s voice. We believe you should be able to express yourself like everyone else, and to find others who want to play your game. But that’s it.

In the short term, we won’t be making significant changes to what’s arriving on Steam until we’ve finished some of the tools we’ve described in this post. As we’ve hopefully managed to convey, navigating these issues is messy and complicated. Countries and societies change their laws and cultural norms over time. We’ll be working on this for the foreseeable future, both in terms of what products we’re allowing, what guidelines we communicate, and the tools we’re providing to developers and players.

Play Forts Multiplayer for FREE starting now through Sunday at 1PM Pacific Time. You can also pick up the game at 40% off the regular price!*

If you already have Steam installed, click here to install or play Forts. If you don’t have Steam, you can download it here.

Forts is a physics-based RTS where foes design and build custom bases, arm them to the teeth and blast their opponent’s creations to rubble.

Build an armoured fort in real-time and arm it to the teeth. Collect resources, develop your tech-tree, unlock advanced weapons to target your opponent’s weak points, and feel the satisfaction as their fort comes crashing down.

*Offer ends Monday at 10AM Pacific Time