Those that like to sign up for new Steam beta features, can check out a new addition today in the form of game guides. With the launch occurring today, there's unlikely to be many around to view at the moment, but if you've always fancied yourself as pretty deft at a certain character or game, now is the chance to write up your best advice and make it available to others.
"You've probably got some favorite games that you play a lot and know pretty well," reads Valve's release statement. "Or maybe you've mastered playing as a certain class or character in Team Fortress 2 or Call of Duty. Or maybe you're just really good at finding all the hidden secrets in the latest Elder Scrolls game."
"How do you put that knowledge to use and help fellow gamers? Create a game guide on Steam... With Game Guides, you can create a guide to help fellow gamers and share your expertise in whatever game you like."
While game guides have been around for as long as game's themselves have, the quality has usually remained somewhat regulated. You have official strategy books by the likes of Prima and sites that specialize in guides like GameFAQs. Hopefully Valve will implement some sort of voting procedure, or we could see the appearance of a lot of trolling guides that designed to waste player time more than help them.
However, having the guides within Steam itself is a time saver. It means we won't have to minimize and pop up Google to find how to complete that puzzle or boss.
If you want to check out more info on the guide system, have a look here.