Valve had surprised the world last week by announcing that Steam Big Picture would be coming to televisions around the world 'soon'. Just a few days after this announcement, they've clarified on just how 'soon' this was - and hold onto your TF2 hats, because Big Picture will be opening up to Steam-using members of the public September 10th.

If you're wondering what Big Picture even is, think of it as Steam built for the television. Its graphical interface is designed for ease-of-use via controller, and its been formatted to display as best it can on HDTV sets. For now, the idea is that Big Picture will make things easier for gamers who want to play their favorites on the family's 50 inch plasma instead of their 17 inch bedroom monitor. If this is something that interests you, it may be a good idea to open up Steam tomorrow to see if you can access the beta.

Valve hasn't stated whether Monday will bring gamers an open beta or a closed invitation system, but their foray into the living room is a long-awaited gesture that will undoubtedly have some kinks to work out. The company hasn't stated a timeframe on when they think Big Picture will be ready for its final release, but the next few weeks will be an important test-run for the product.

The company denied that they were working on any of their own next-generation console technology earlier this year, but then proceeded to begin working on wearable hardware sets for their games. Whether the Big Picture is simply intended to bring the Steam platform to a bigger screen, or potentially lay down the tracks for an eventual Steam console, remains to be seen. Either way, we're excited at the thought of having a better system in place when we want to play with our gravity guns on a glorious flatscreen television.

We'll keep you posted as more news about Steam Big Picture comes out.

What do you think about Steam Big Picture? Is this a feature you'd be interesting in using?

-

Follow me on Twitter @Makelevi.

Source: New York Times