I disagree, there are many early access games that are far from complete, like DayZ as an example, that have had many users. Albion Online is a much more polished game, the game is very playable in its current state. It just needs more content. But being on Steam, the game would reach a much wider audience, which is a good thing. I think once Beta starts by buy Albion Online Gold, this would be a great time for the Steam community to get access to the game.
Thats good to hear. Its not we I think the game is bad or anything like that - far from that! So far the game is the best thing gamingwise that happened to me for a long time, but the Steam community is a special one, that needs constant hand holding and flashy things to point them into the right direction at the start. And I think we all have seen a lot of games getting bad rep just because some Steam tards couldn't get along with it.
Steam is the open source online distribution and community platform for valve software (half-life series, counterstrike series, farcry, teamfortress 2, dota2, left 4 dead series). Users of steam can submit 'workshop' modifications, modeling, skins, maps and all other user content through steam workshop, which shares the content with the entire community. Steam also allows players of certain games to buy and sell in game items through their marketplace (steamcommunity.com/market), paid for with the steam wallet (which can be loaded by credit card). Steam is a global phenomenon, and valve's games are the industry standard for what games in their genre should be. steam games are not only played by hundreds of millions of players each month and millions of unique players each day, valve games are pay once and play for years or free to play. Valve's dota2 (f2p), counterstrike:global initiative and teamfortress 2 (f2p) make valve oodles of money through player's buying of in game cosmetic items.
Steam is the best online gaming platform, full stop. Albion Online Silver is available on PC, Mac, Linux and partially through mobile devices. SteamOS, a linux based free operating system and SteamMachines (oem distributed prebuilt gaming boxes) are helping lead the development of Virtual Reality games on the Occulus rift. While SteamOS is still in beta, their intent is to bring a console's best features (ease of use, haptic response controls, plug and play livingroom entertainment, future virtual reality) to every PC or SteamMachine in the world.