Steam Workshop celebrates 55 million downloads in its first year

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Yesterday was Team Fortress 2’s Manniversary and now Steam Workshop has turned one years-old. It’s been a hectic year for the fledgling mod transmission system and, like any loving parent, Valve have collated a set of statistics that summarise the success of their child’s first twelve months.

Making an announcement through their blog, Valve reveal that “Today, there are 16 shipped titles on the Steam Workshop, with many more currently preparing for launch and in various stages of private testing. There are almost 300,000 items, ranging between models, animations, maps & levels, scenarios, and even full games made in GameMaker Studio. Those items add up to over 55 million downloads. Workshop contributors for TF2 and Dota 2 combined have been paid millions of dollars for the items they’ve created now on sale. The Workshop is also regularly one of the most visited destinations in the Steam Community.”

That’s all immensely impressive. Though Valve also hint at what’s to come, emphasising the debt their company owes to modders “Our goals are to:

  • Make sure that content creators have the tools they need to keep doing what they do best
  • Add more ways for content creators and customers to communicate
  • Enable a broader base of content creators, contributing to the community in a greater variety of ways and mediums”

There doesn’t seem to have been a better time to polish up your modelling skills and get in on board this wagon. A good starting oppornity would be the Polycount modelling contest.