In a surprising move, Valve announces that the Steam Remote play together system is available for use by everyone, in just a little over a month since they announced the Steam Remote Play Together Beta last October. Another new feature just announced is that it now supports Android and iOS as well, a feature we didn't see coming from the beta. Lastly, to celebrate the public release, Valve has also announced a sale on coop games.
Couch Co-op Games Online
We reported last month when Valve announced Steam's new feature allowing users to host local multiplayer games online, allowing friends who don't own the game to join in. The official release of Steam Remote Play Together keeps this feature, meaning only one person has to buy the game to share with friends. The feature entered beta on Monday, Oct 21, and exactly a month later, the feature is now ready for public use.
What's notable, however, is that friends can now join in from iOS and Android devices. As long as the host who owns the game starts the game from the computer, friends who use PC or mobile devices will be able to pick up a controller to join in local split-screen, co-op, or multiplayer games.
A broadcast by Valve that is no longer available at this time featured the Remote Play Together feature in action, however, The Verge reports that they noticed little to no hiccups to the feature.
State of the Competition
Online cooperative gaming is one of the newest forefronts in remote playing technology. While similar technologies such as Sony's "Share Play" and Steam's very own "Remote Play" features have been available for a while, these services tend to have their own niches.
Sony's "Share Play" feature has been available for a while, allowing you to share your virtual couch with PSN friends. This allows PlayStation owners to pass the controller to friends for single-player or share multiplayer coop games with friends with a second controller. Sony's "Remote Play" feature, similar to the Share Play feature is available for Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS, this means that there is still hope for Share Play to be available to Android and iOS users.
What may be Steam's most direct competitor, however, is ParSec a game capturing and streaming service designed specifically for sharing games with friends. ParSec is known for what they call their "obsession to perfect peer-to-peer, low latency game streaming over a wide area network." ParSec already has most of the features that Steam Remote Play Together has just announced, so we're going to have to see how this affects the market.
Steam Sale Again
Just weeks after Steam's Halloween Sale and a week from when we expect Steam's Black Friday Sale to start, Steam slashes its prices on coop games, a perfect chance for you to try the new Steam feature. Check out the sale here.
