PC gaming service Steam ported to Mac, lets users buy titles on both platforms at no extra cost

Valve Corporation's Steam is the leading digital distribution channel for PC games. With over 1,000 titles available for purchase, an integrated social network and database of open game servers, Steam has attracted more than 25 million users since launching in 2003.

Today, Valve officially announced Steam will be coming to Mac in April, along with Source, the 3D gaming engine used in popular games such as Half Life 2, Team Fortress 2, and Counter-Strike.

Jason Holtman, Director of Business Development at Valve said, "Our Steam partners, who are delivering over a thousand games to 25 million Steam clients, are very excited about adding support for the Mac. Steamworks for the Mac supports all of the Steamworks APIs, and we have added a new feature, called Steam Play, which allows customers who purchase the product for the Mac or Windows to play on the other platform free of charge. For example, Steam Play, in combination with the Steam Cloud, allows a gamer playing on their work PC to go home and pick up playing the same game at the same point on their home Mac. We expect most developers and publishers to take advantage of Steam Play."

John Cook, Director of Steam Development said, "We are treating the Mac as a tier-1 platform so all of our future games will release simultaneously on Windows, Mac, and the Xbox 360. Updates for the Mac will be available simultaneously with the Windows updates. Furthermore, Mac and Windows players will be part of the same multiplayer universe, sharing servers, lobbies, and so forth. We fully support a heterogeneous mix of servers and clients."