Steam on track to top record number of games released in a year

Valve has a trend of releasing more and more games per year, with 2016 seeing the release of what was nearly 40 percent of Steam’s entire library. Having already passed 3,000 titles this year, 2017 is on track to surpassing a record breaking 5,000 games.

The staggering numbers are thanks in part to the Steam Greenlight replacement, Steam Direct, as 1,300 games have been released since it launched back in June. This leaves the platform on track to releasing more games this year than the collective releases between 2006 and 2014.

Updated the number of Steam games released per year chart.

2017 already higher than 2015. Over 1,300 new games since Steam Direct launched pic.twitter.com/KySFREY44w

— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 8, 2017

The chart provided by Niko Partner Analyst Daniel Ahmad details the rise in games across the past 10+ years, including PC application software. This chart doesn’t include Steams new push into the movies sector or even downloadable content.

Steam Direct lets developers publish on Steam without an approval process but by implementing a $100 fee to do so. This means that the rapid increase in numbers isn’t likely to slow down any time soon.

KitGuru Says: This is a conflicting way of releasing games as it does offer a way for potential hits to be realised but at the same time it muddies the waters as to what is actually good with a plethora of bad. Do you think it is good or bad that so many games are making their way to the platform?

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