If you’re a gamer that belongs to the PC Master Race (long live our infinite RAM chips and may our processors always be water cooled) then chances are you use Steam to buy all your favourite games. Steam, to those of us who love consoles, is an online digital distribution platform developed by Valve Corporation that offers Digital Rights Management (DRM), multiplayer gaming and social networking.
Steam also provides the user with installation and automatic updating of games on multiple computers, and community features such as friends lists and groups, cloud saving, and in-game voice and chat functionality. The software provides a freely available application programming interface (API) called Steamworks, which developers can use to integrate many of Steam’s functions into their products, including networking and matchmaking, in-game achievements, micro-transactions, and support for user-created content through Steam Workshop.Though initially developed for use on Microsoft Windows, versions for OS X and Linux operating systems were later released. Chatting and shopping applications for iOS and Android mobile devices have also been written.
But for local based users of Steam, there’s always been one feature of Steam that’s been irksome; the prices in the steam application were always displayed in Dollars, resulting in hordes of gamers having to always have a calculator handy when perusing the Steam Store.
No more.
In an email sent to all UAE based users of the service, Valve announced that Steam will be priced in United Arab Emirates Dirhams from the 10th of November onwards. Any remaining money in your Steam Wallet will be converted from U.S Dollars to Dirhams on the 10th, at a conversion rate dictated by the market value at the time of conversion. This is great news, especially with the upcoming Christmas Steam sales that I for one can confirm will leave me broke. Hopefully we’ll even get to see the Steam Cards that are already being sold in gaming outlets across the UAE have their value priced in Dirhams as well.
Steam is also set to use Indian Rupees for their Indian store.
You can download Steam here.
