Given that the original justification behind he feature was returning the ability to share a game within a household that was lost (or at least made much more inconvenient) with the move to digital only, I see no issue with this. If someone is exploiting that system (not judging, I do/did too, because why not), or even has actual family in another country, then unlucky they now have to let the other party actually use their account if they want them to be able play your games. Anyone in the actual situation the feature was meant for should be unaffected aside from some edge cases like holidays.
The new family sharing is great. I am sad I cannot share it with family who lives 30 km away but in a different steam economic zone. I think on the whole it's a net positive though
If you own games ABC, and you share them with family. Each one of your family members could be running game a, and then game b, and game c at the same time! The only limitation is multiple people can't play the same game at the same time. So your entire library is available for concurrent usage.
The old classic version of steam sharing simply meant that only one person could play at a time, regardless of which game they were playing
The first time I opened an invite steam said I couldn't join, but on a whim I opened it a week later and it worked. I still live in a different city so don't know what happened.
as a trans person, can you not call everything that inconveniences you as a trans person transphobic? You're devaluing the actual struggles we have to face with "i can't play video game because of transphobia :(". Besides, there are ways to go around the region lock, just Google the "transphobia" away
I didn’t realize the new Steam family sharing was so detrimental to close ones away from each other. Their Guide & FAQ is clear with their intentions:
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.
To that end, we expect the requirements for participating in a Steam Family to change over time as we monitor its usage and add requirements to keep usage in line with this intent.
Last line is pretty brutal. Apparently even family members living in the same country & different household might be in for a surprise eventually. That’s really saddening because at first glance this overhaul sounded amazing considering a single game was locked by play instead of the whole library.
Completely anecdotal but I was able to add my brother-in-law to my Steam family without any problem and he lives about 125km from me.
The requirement is absolutely something more arcane than "same household" and Valve are keeping quiet on the actual specifics. It's possible that the fact that I've been there multiple times and have logged into Steam on their wifi in the past was enough to confirm that this is a place with close relation to me. Who knows though.
Tip: You can share your library with someone by giving them your account sign in information, having them download what they want to play, and then having them turn their device's internet off. This will allow you to continue using your account as normal, and your friend will be able to play the games they downloaded at any time as long as steam is not allowed to connect to the internet. If it is connected, they can play the games as long as you are not playing something on a different device.
*Only share your account info with someone you absolutely trust. It's always a risk to share credentials but use your best judgement.
"*Only share your account info with someone you absolutely trust. It's always a risk to share credentials but use your best judgement."
As someone who is estranged from my blood family, it's interesting to me how this category of people who I would feel comfortable sharing my credentials with maps pretty well onto who I would consider to be my found family
There needs to be some kind of gold buried somewhere in this new version otherwise I can only see it as another step on the enshittification carousel for an app that has slowly been getting worse over the years.
Nah, the new family sharing is way better. With the new vetsion, I can play games from my wife's library even if she is playing a different steam game at the same time.