Introducing The Steam Trading Card System

Valve is a company that likes to take risks and innovates in ways other companies don’t. Their inventory and item crafting system for Team Fortress 2 changed how the community interacted. Now it appears that they are doing it again. This time with, trading cards? We got a Press Release from Valve today and it reads:

May 15, 2013 — Valve, creators of best-selling game franchises (such as Counter-Strike, Half-Life, Left 4 Dead, Portal, and Team Fortress) and leading technologies (such as Steam and Source), today announced Steam Trading Cards, a new service that rewards gamers for gaming on Steam.

 

Released in beta today, Steam Trading Cards allows customers to earn Steam rewards for playing the games they love. Those who participate will receive game-specific trading cards that can be collected to earn rewards such as game badges, profile backgrounds, emoticons, coupons, and more.

 

The group of titles participating in the Steam Trading Cards beta includes Don’t Starve, Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Team Fortress 2, Portal 2 and Half-Life 2. The service will expand over the coming months to include many more titles on Steam.

They seem like they are taking what they did with TF2 and bringing it to the entire system. Some of the cards can be obtained just by playing the game while some need to be collected through other means.

The biggest feature that this is bringing is the Badge Crafting. Players can take certain cards they’ve collected and craft them into badges. Badges give the player experience points that level up their Steam Profile. This gives them on gameplay bonuses like avatars, emoticons for chat and more friend slots. The big feature you can get are random rewards. These can range from profile showcases for certain games, background image wallpapers all the way up to free DLC and discount coupons.

For more information on the new cards or to sign up for the beta head on over to the official trading card page.