Steam requires users to be at least 13 years old to use the product. Because of the platform's communication features such as open chat and community forums, Common Sense Media also recommends users be at least 13 years old to use it, although many available games are not appropriate for young teens. But with the right settings and monitoring, parents can use the platform to find and download age-appropriate games for younger kids.
Like any other app store or video-streaming platform, Steam can be extremely safe or extremely iffy depending on the content kids are exposed to. While there are thousands of family-friendly games available on the platform, many of the games on Steam feature graphic violence, swearing, or sexy stuff. Kids can also find plenty of swearing and mature content in the groups and forums.
And the trading system can expose unsuspecting gamers to scammers. However, Steam also has robust parental controls see below that can greatly reduce the risks kids face while using Steam -- if parents take the time to figure them out.
Steam supports both text and voice chat. You can add friends and chat individually or in groups with both people you know and people you don't know. You can also join public chat rooms and talk to anyone on the platform. Keep in mind that not all of these chat groups and community forums are game-related. Groups related to just about anything, from TV to sports to memes, also attract users to Steam. Many teens share their handles with each other so they can play games and chat with their real-life friends.
Steam members are generally civil, but parents may want to stay on top of who their kids are following or engaging with online. Steam offers a sophisticated set of parental controls called Family View that gives parents full control over what their kids have access to on the platform. Steam offers step-by-step instructions for setting up Family View , which are worth reading since the interface can be overwhelming and complicated for newcomers or non-gamers. However, once enabled, parents can choose whether kids can play any game or only games they've approved and added to the Family Game Library.
Family View also lets parents control whether kids have access to the Steam store, community-generated content, chat, forums, or online profiles. All of these features are PIN protected, so kids can't easily override them.
There is also the option to set your account preferences to restrict titles that feature frequent violence, gore, nudity, or sexual content and to warn about mature user-generated content, but these aren't PIN protected.
Steam profiles are public by default, but the platform does allow you to make your game details, friends list, description, comments, and group ownership private or only available to your friends list. Steam also has a security feature called Steam Guard that provides an additional level of security to an account. It uses either an approved email address or two-factor authentication via the Steam mobile app to protect accounts from hackers.
Steam itself is free to download and use, but many of the games available do come with a cost. Savvy gamers can wait for one of Steam's many sales for serious savings. Keep in mind that when you buy games from the Steam store, you can only play them on the Steam network.
Steam Wallet is a way that users can buy games or other content on the Steam store. Users can either add money to a Steam Wallet using a credit card or buy a physical Steam gift card at a store or supermarket and enter the code to access the funds.
Using Steam Wallet can be a useful way for parents to manage their kids' spending on Steam, especially since some games are pricey to download or offer in-game purchases that can add up fast. Parents' Ultimate Guide to Support our work!
Parenting, Media, and Everything In Between. Parents' Ultimate Guide to Steam. Is your gamer obsessed with Steam? Here's everything you need to know about the popular but permissive PC gaming platform. By Frannie Ucciferri. Throughout the game players will build track, creating links between cities and towns this concept of a "link" is important as it governs many aspects of the game.
Unlike 18xx these links are owned by players although this does not prevent others from using them. Players earn money by transporting goods across links to destination cities, for every link used the owner's income is increased by one. Obviously players will attempt to build track so that they can transport goods using only their own links but this is not always possible.
Further, they'll want to create as convoluted a set of links as possible—if you can send a good on a long, tortuous route over five of your links you'll be much better rewarded than if you take the direct route. So much for efficiency. This sums up the basic framework of the game but there is much in the way of features and complications.
The most noticeable and important feature are the roles—each player will choose one of the seven available each round and they all have special abilities, some of which are very important. For example, the "Locomotive" role lets you upgrade your train. Initially you can only move a good over two links and so it's imperative that you upgrade so that you can make use of longer routes.
Other roles let you build four pieces of track instead of three , transport goods before the other players there are a limited number on each city or upgrade a town to a city. Altogether there are seven different roles and some of them are significantly better than others. Since only a single player may select each role in any given turn, the auction to determine player order is critical.
All the more because money is tight in this game, very tight. There is some help though but it comes at a big price—shares. The catch? Since there's no way you can buy these back, they'll forever be a chain around your neck.
Things are so dicey at the start of the game that it's very easy for players to enter a "cycle of death". If you don't have enough money to pay your expenses shares and upkeep on your train you need to reduce your income for every dollar you're short. Of course this means you'll start the next round not only with a reduced income but you'll need to take out more shares which increases your expenses which then makes it even harder to pay your expenses next round.
It won't take too long for such a player to go bankrupt so an incredibly careful eye needs to be paid to finances during the early turns. Often the loss of a single dollar can cause a player to enter a death spiral so it's not something that can be taken lightly. For the most part players tend to be concentrating on their own sections of the board throughout this phase so any such problems are usually the player's own fault.
Still, it's something that must be paid close attention to. Eventually, as track gets further developed and engines are able to cross more and more links, the players' incomes will increase such that the need for loans is greatly curtailed and expenses are readily met. At this point the competition for the limited number of goods starts to heat up.
The goods are colour coded and must be delivered to a city matching this colour. Since they belong to no one, any player is free move any good to a valid destination. If multiple players have the ability to move a particular good, then it's probably best to move it before your opponent gets the opportunity to do so. Finally, after a set number of turns the game ends and scores are calculated.
For the most part this will be a player's income minus the number of loans taken as if those loans didn't already hurt enough but there are also points awarded for the amount of track built over the course of the game. Not all of his games are favorites of mine Lords of Creation, Election USA ; but most of them are real winners, being tremendous games of strategy.
When I first picked up the box and looked at the back, I thought that the board was drab and boring and delayed playing it. Once I saw it set up for the first time, I was floored, seeing little wooden bits all over the table.
When one wins a game of Age of Steam, it is an accomplishment; as the scores reward both good strategy and tactics. Age of Steam has entered my top ten games; and with expansion maps continually coming out, it will probably stay there for quite some time.
The basic game of Age of Steam uses a partial map of America, depicting the Great Lakes area - split up into hexes, with twelve cities and fourteen towns in various places. The twelve cities are split up into two groups - western half of the board and eastern half, each city having a number from one to six and being one of four colors purple, blue, red and yellow.
Each player takes a pile of discs in their chosen color and places several on two-player aid boards. A pile of hexagonal track tiles is placed in the box lid, and then goods are placed. Ninety-six goods cubes in five different colors purple, blue, red and yellow are placed in a cup or bag, and then two are randomly placed on each city three on Pittsburgh and Wheeling.
Each city has a matching column on the player aid the Goods Display with three spaces - in each of these spaces a random good cube is placed. These cities also have a matching column on the player aid with two spaces with random good cubes placed in each.
A turn marker is placed on a turn track at the start position, and the first turn is ready to begin. There are ten phases to each turn in which all players participate.
Players then determine play order through a bidding sequence. Each succeeding player must increase the bid or move their token to the last available space on the track.
The top two bidders must pay the full amount of their final bid to the bank; the lowest bidder pays nothing; and all other bidders pay half of their bids to the bank. Each of these actions takes place in a specific phase, except for Locomotive, which allows the player to immediately increase their token on the Engine Track by one.
The fourth phase is the Build Track phase, where players build track tiles on the board. There are some rules when building tracks A good can only be moved to a city that matches its color.
Each section of track connecting a city or town counts as one link, and players may only move cubes the amount of links equal to where their token is on the Engine Track. For each link of their own color that the cube passes over, the player moves their token one on the Income Track. Once all players have shipped a good, increased Engine Track, or passed, the same thing is repeated one more time.
The next two phases, Collect Income and Pay Expenses, can be combined. Each player receives an amount of money equal to the number their token is on the income track. However, they must pay to the bank the sum of the shares issued and the number of links their token is on the Engine Track. In the Income Reduction Phase, players move their tokens back a certain amount of spaces on the income track, if they are above The number moved back is determined by how far their token is on the track.
There is then a Goods Growth Phase. After this, four dice are rolled for the western cities, and then four for the eastern cities.
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