Steam Family Options Out of Beta: Now available to all users!

[WYP]

The moment many of you have all been waiting for, Steam Family Options are now available to all users in the main client.

There are many of you guys out there who are both PC Gamers and parents whom would like to give access of their games to their children, without allowing them to go crazy your credit card or play with scary Aliens and Zombies.

Valve are now opening their Family Options beta to the public allowing a account to restrict access to games, store, community and friends while in Family options are enabled, allowing a concerned parent to limit what their child can use. Steam can be restored to full functionality by the entry if a PIN code chosen by the parent.

Valve say;

It’s time for a family meeting.
We understand every family has its own approach to establishing rules and setting limits when it comes to media, entertainment, and games. We hope most families talk through these issues together and find ways to agree on what’s realistic and fair. It sometimes seems there are as many family policies as there are families. So with Family Options, we’re introducing a new way for parents and families to establish their own rules together, using Steam.

Whether a Steam account is your own or your child’s, you can use Family Options to limit an account’s access to a subset of its content and features. With Family Options, access to Steam Store, Library, Community, and Friends content and features may be gated by the entry of an additional PIN.

Here is instructions on how to set up Family Options on your steam account.

Setting up Family Options for your or your child’s Steam account

We encourage you to create a Steam account with your child. If you and your kids find Steam to be a bit too overwhelming when parents aren’t around to help, now you can manage access to content and features using Family Options. You may also choose to enable Family Options on your own Steam account, if, for example, you’re worried about the kiddos going crazy with the credit card or the scary zombies while using Steam on your computer.

To enable Family Options, log into the account your child will use and visit Settings, where you’ll find the option to manage “Family Options” under the Family tab (or from the Family Options button in Big Picture mode). From there, step through the wizard to select the content and features you’d like to be accessible while in a PIN-protected Family View.

While this may not be in the interest of many of you parents who have been crying out for this feature may finally relax.

This functionality should work well in Valve's favor as they try to invade the living room with their upcoming Steam Machines, a place where certainly more families will work off a single account.


Source - Valve

 

[TheOuterOne]

So, if I'm getting this right: my friends can play games from my steam library if I give them permission to? Awesome!

 

[WYP]

So, if I'm getting this right: my friends can play games from my steam library if I give them permission to? Awesome!

No, it is simply a method of locking down an existing account to make it more suitable for use by younger users.

for example, if i had children and i wanted to allow them to have access to my pc or a steam box/machine so they can play Fez or Portal or something but didn't want them to be able to access more adult titles like GTA or Left 4 Dead etc, I could simply enable family options to restrict that account unless a PIN code is activated. This allows myself to fully use my Steam Account but only grants my child access to the games and features what I as his parent have deemed suitable.

I apologize for linking the wrong picture in this article previously, i didn't realize I placed a picture relating to family sharing and not family options. (this has now been fixed)

This update does not include family sharing, this feature sadly is still in beta.

 

[TheOuterOne]

No, it is simply a method of locking down an existing account to make it more suitable for use by younger users.

for example, if i had children and i wanted to allow them to have access to my pc or a steam box/machine so they can play Fez or Portal or something but didn't want them to be able to access more adult titles like GTA or Left 4 Dead etc, I could simply enable family options to restrict that account unless a PIN code is activated. This allows myself to fully use my Steam Account but only grants my child access to the games and features what I as his parent have deemed suitable.

I apologize for linking the wrong picture in this article previously, i didn't realize I placed a picture relating to family sharing and not family options. (this has now been fixed)

This update does not include family sharing, this feature sadly is still in beta.

Ah, right. Well, family sharing would be definately awesome & helpful!