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Valve’s Steam Store is set to expand way beyond gaming next month, as the company looks to add all sorts of programs and apps to broaden what it offers.

Come September 5^th the Steam Store will house not just an extensive catalogue of great PC and Mac games, but also applications from productivity to learning. The move is expected to be a reaction to both Apple’s popular Mac App Store, and the forthcoming Windows Store for Windows 8 devices.

Valve made the announcement today officially, stating;

“The Software titles coming to Steam range from creativity to productivity. Many of the launch titles will take advantage of popular Steamworks features, such as easy installation, automatic updating, and the ability to save your work to your personal Steam Cloud space so your files may travel with you.

More Software titles will be added in an ongoing fashion following the September 5th launch, and developers will be welcome to submit Software titles via Steam Greenlight.”

Whether the store will be able to rival Apple and Microsoft with lower prices for the same apps remains to be seen, as Valve hasn’t detailed its pricing strategy. Valve’s advantage over its rivals lies in its existing Steam Store, with fast downloads and installation, easy updating through the one store, and also cloud storage.

Valve and its Steam service has gathered a huge and loyal fanbase amongst gamers over the years, and we suspect this is a ploy to get them buying their apps and productivity software from the same place, rather than going elsewhere. On the other hand, from our experience a lot of gamers have a preference for getting their software without paying, from dark

Let us know your thoughts on our comments below or via our @Gadget_Helpline Twitter page or Official Facebook group.

Via: Valve