Steam Debuts Family Sharing

Steam have just announced a new beta that will allow people to play each other’s game libraries while earning achievements on their own profile. Hooray! Microsoft may have changed their minds about this but it’s good that someone is taking the plunge.

Steam are picking beta testers from the Family Sharing group. The first thousand users will be invited to try out the feature next week, with more being invited on a regular basis. There are already about seven thousand members in the group, so you’ve missed the first tranche. Sorry!

You’ll be able to enable family sharing on up to 10 devices at a time. This will share your entire library, not just certain games. A shared library will only be accessible by one user at a time, so you won’t be able to play the same game with your friend, or even play a different game while your friend is playing one of yours.

If you do log in while your family member is playing, they’ll have a few minutes to save and either quit or buy the game.

If you’re playing a borrowed game, you can play all the DLC that your friend has, but you can’t just buy your own DLC pack for use with their game.

Get more details from the Steam Family Sharing FAQ here.