14 DAY TRIAL // Just a few moments ago, March 28, 2016, Valve pushed a new stable update for its Steam Client, for all supported platforms, including Mac OS X, GNU/Linux, and Microsoft Windows.
We've just received the new stable update on our Linux gaming rig, and we can report that the stars of this release are SteamVR and, of course, the awesome Steam Controller device. Additionally, there are some small In-Home Streaming and Big Picture improvements, as well as bug fixes for the Mac OS X platform.
We reported last week, when Valve pushed yet another Steam Client Beta update, that Steam Controller received a lot of attention, and it looks like all those cool new features have landed in this stable release. Among them, we can mention new Show Keyboard, Take Screenshot, and Change Action Set bindings.
"Users can now add additional action sets with their own sets of bindings. Action sets can be added/deleted/named as appropriate and selected via a binding. Note that unlike mode-shifts, action sets completely replace all currently active bindings, and can have their own mode shifts and so forth," says Valve in the announcement.
More Steam Controller improvements, new SteamVR features
Steam Controller owners will also be happy to hear that they're now able to use the Joystick Click and A/B/X/Y as Mode Shift buttons. Also, a new pop-up menu has been added to the Big Picture overlay to display the Action Set activation, and user-definable action sets are now available for legacy games.
Among the new SteamVR features implemented in the today's stable Steam Client update, we can notice Desktop Game Theater support, and a new Desktop overlay button, the addition of a VR section to the Big Picture library, along with a SteamVR entry in the jump list options. Moreover, SteamVR is now automatically launched after an update.
Of course, numerous bugs reported by users during the Beta builds have been patched in the new release, and we've attached the entire changelog below just in case you're curious to know what exactly has been changed. In the meantime, we recommend updating your Steam Client as soon as possible. To force the update, go to the Steam menu and click on the "Check for Steam Client Updates" entry.