Valve's
Steam platform has been a popular publishing service for game developers for years. Independent developers have also been finding their way to Steam and their numbers are continiously growing, making it increasingly difficult for the people at Valve to decide which games to approve and publish. Game developers, especially small independent studios, often complain about lack of transparency and poor communication in the approval process. The solution?
Steam Greenlight.
Steam Greenlight is a new system that enlists the community's help in picking some of the next games to be released on Steam. Developers post information, screenshots, and videos for their game and seek a critical mass of community support in order to get selected for distribution.
The move reflects the huge popularity of crowd funded game development fueled by sites like
Kickstarter and
IndieGoGo. Valve opened
this site for more information about Greenlight.