Valve Opens Steam "Early Access" For Pre-Release Titles and Game Play

Valve’s Steam has historically embraced and even cultivated the gaming community around it, from creating the Steam Community to Steam Greenlight to the recent Linux beta for more experienced users. To that end, Valve announced an Early Access section to its gaming library where players can poke around with titles that are still in development.

For gamers, this is a lot of fun, as they can both watch the evolution of various games as they develop over time and also participate as beta testers, giving developers their input and ideas. For developers, this gives them a host of players to help them test out features and create new ones.

Kenshi

Starforge Alpha

Prison Architect
Top to bottom: Kenshi, Starforge Alpha, Prison Architect

Steam will make it easy to update games as bug reports and other feedback rolls in, and players can communicate with each other, as well. There are a dozen titles coming to Early Access, which include the following:
· 1... 2... 3... KICK IT! (Drop That Beat Like an Ugly Baby)
· Arma 3
· Drunken Robot Pornography
· Gear Up
· Gnomoria
· Kenshi
· Kerbal Space Program
· Kinetic Void
· Patterns
· Prison Architect
· StarForge
· Under the Ocean