Xbox Game Pass could come to Steam, says Valve's Gabe Newell

Valve president Gabe Newell has said that he's open to working with Microsoft to get Game Pass onto Steam, while also confirming that the company isn’t currently interested in a competing service. 

The news of the potential partnership came from Newell himself. With the Steam Deck getting into the hands of players, the Valve president has been taking interviews. Speaking to PC Gamer, when asked if there is some kind of Steam equivalent to Game Pass on the horizon, or if he’d work with Microsoft to bring over GamePass, he said: 

“I don't think it's something that we think we need to do ourselves, building a subscription service at this time. But for their customers it's clearly a popular option, and we'd be more than happy to work with them to get that on Steam." 

This could be an intensely exciting option for Steam players, especially if games on Game Pass were compatible with the Steam Deck. Having that service on the move, while holding the processing power in your hands is a mouth-watering prospect. 

In fact, it’s something Newell has said they’ve talked to Microsoft about. When asked about bringing Game Pass to Steam Deck he said: “We've talked to people there quite a bit about that topic. If your customers want it, then you should figure out how to make it happen. That's where we're at.”

Now, it’s not clear if this is purely about Game Pass on Steam or if a third-party app would be added to the device. Regardless, the prospect is tantalizing. Game Pass on the move, not through cloud streaming, is a very exciting prospect. 

Valve's growing collaboration

Valve has been a company open to collaboration with services from third parties in recent years. Back in August, it was announced that the company was teaming up with EA to bring EA Play to Steam. This could act as a perfect blueprint to how Game Pass would work.

Of course, EA Play is bundled with Game Pass now too, so having Game Pass on the service would likely tie the two services together for Steam users.

EA Play has seemingly been a successful addition to Steam. Especially for games like Apex Legends, which according to Steam Charts, is a top 5 most played game on Valve’s service. 

Steam and Microsoft have also been working together a lot more recently. Games like Halo Infinite, Forza Horizon 5, and Psychonauts 2 are all available on Steam. Seeing Game Pass come to the service would be a natural fit. 

The question remains though, is Xbox willing to cede their Xbox app on PC and share the Game Pass access points on the platform? We will have to see about that. 

---

Here are some Game Pass deals from across the web:

• Elden Ring on the Steam Deck: Check out our take on how the game performs on the move.