It's no secret that Valve has struggled trying to refine their discovery
system for
Steam, which can sometimes seem like finding needles in a haystack.
Gamasutra has word that they are gearing up for another rewrite of their
automated system, and are looking to provide further curation tools to allow the
community to further this process. Here's a bit from their summary of points
made during
a presentation
at Unite Europe 2017:
These basic features begin with new sorting and filtering options and
settings that allow people to directly highlight the kinds of games that they
either do or don’t enjoy.
But beyond just that, Valve is in the process of completely rewriting a
replacement for its existing automatic recommendation system. When complete, the
new system should be able to examine a player’s library and individual playtimes
to individually curate game recommendations based on their actual interests and
gameplay habits.
As Kroll explains, this means that the games the algorithm puts in front of
players are more likely to be a better fit, ultimately boosting the chance a
recommendation has to result in a purchase.
At the same time, Valve has a handful of changes for Steam’s existing
discoverability features in the works. Part of this is an expansion of the Steam
Curators section of the platform that brings live streams, video reviews, and
other curator-created content to the forefront of the section.