Global Gamers Struggle with Steam Outage
- Steam outage reported worldwide causing gamers to be unable to access the network.
- Status monitoring service Downdetector observes a sudden surge in people experiencing issues with Steam.
- Gamers around the world left devastated by the impact of the outage.
Online video game streaming service Steam experienced a significant outage on Saturday, impacting gamers globally. Reports of access issues surged, particularly after 1 PM, as users flocked to Downdetector to report problems. Many players encountered an error message stating, "There was a problem communicating with Steam. Please try again later," while others were offered the option to play in offline mode. The majority of the reported issues originated from users in the UK and Europe, although gamers in Japan and other parts of Asia also experienced connectivity problems. Frustrated players took to social media to express their disappointment, with one user lamenting, "Steam is down on a weekend?!" and another fearing they had been hacked due to the sudden inability to log in. In addition to login issues, some users who managed to access their games reported errors related to the feature that tracks their gameplay time. The outage has raised concerns among the gaming community, particularly as weekends are peak times for online gaming. Valve Corporation, the owner of the Steam platform, has been contacted for comment regarding the outage. Steam, which was launched in 2003 initially for Valve's own games, has since expanded to include a wide array of third-party titles, with popular games like Diablo 4 and Apex Legends currently available on the platform.