theverge
Steam just turned 20 years old, and Valve is celebrating
All of Valve’s games are on sale today — because Steam is 20 years old. The company’s got a cute walk down memory lane to help celebrate, too. But don’t go looking there for a history of Steam itself… perhaps because Steam was originally a tad controversial?
It’s easy to forget: many PC gamers hated Steam at launch.
When it launched 20 years ago today on September 12th, 2003, it seemed like Valve was trying to take away our multiplayer server browsers and our DVDs. 2004’s Half-Life 2, which required Steam to play even if you bought a physical disc, made Steam look like a glorified piece of DRM.
And why pay Valve, many game publishers asked themselves, when they could build or buy their own digital distribution platforms like EA’s…
