Valve introduced a new stable update for the Steam Client across all platforms today, addressing various bugs and introducing exciting new features like game recording and enhancements for native Linux gaming.
The highlight of this update is the addition of Steam Game Recording, a built-in system that allows users to effortlessly record and share their gameplay footage. This feature can run in the background, automatically capturing gameplay moments, and can be accessed through the Recordings & Screenshots section in the View menu. Valve emphasized the versatility of this feature, from capturing highlights to documenting entire gaming campaigns.
On the Linux front, the update brings significant changes to improve the gaming experience for Linux users. One notable change is the default support for running native Linux game titles in the Steam for Linux runtime 1.0 (scout) instead of the legacy runtime environment. This update aims to enhance compatibility across various Linux desktop distributions. Users have the option to disable this feature by using the -compat-force-slr off option on the Steam client command line. Additionally, developers can now choose the Steam for Linux runtime for native game titles.
For Linux gamers, the update also includes improvements in detecting and passing commands to a running Steam client, as well as a command line option to prevent Steam from inhibiting the screen saver during activity. The update ensures that Steam always defaults to X11 when the environment variable is set to Wayland and extends Steam Play fixes to third-party compatibility tools. The global toggle to disable Steam Play has been removed, acknowledging that Steam Play is now always enabled on Linux.
In addition to these changes, the update addresses several bugs, such as slow startup on Linux systems with reverse hostname lookup issues and incorrect DPI scaling factors for non-GNOME based sessions. Other fixes include resolving crashes when launching steamwebhelper and addressing common miscellaneous crashes.
The update also includes other notable changes, such as the re-enablement of remote installs via the streaming dropdown, improved detection of other computers for streaming and peer downloading, support for AV1 video streaming on high-end systems for Remote Play, and wired Xbox controller support on macOS Sequoia. Furthermore, the update introduces Invert X and Invert Y support in Mouse Regions.
Overall, the new Steam Client update offers a range of improvements and fixes to enhance the gaming experience across different platforms. Users are encouraged to check the release notes for more detailed information on the bug fixes included in this update. To update to the latest version of the Steam Client, users can navigate to the Steam menu and select the Check for Steam Client Updates option.
