Valve corporation has announced a new tool that will allow Steam Developers to easily sell or reward players with in-game items based on variables like play time and achievements.

“With this service, a game can easily drop items to customers based on playtime or can grant items based on specific situations or actions within the game,” Valve wrote on the official Steam blog. “These items can be marked as tradable through Steam or sellable via the Steam Marketplace. Developers can also configure recipes for crafting different combinations of items that result in more rare, unique, or valuable items.”

The system comes in the form of a series of software APIs that include tools that support and track persistent in-game items without requiring the use of external servers to log the information. The inventory system allows developers to make items that are either purchasable or offered as free rewards.

This style of inventory reward system has been used successfully by Valve for several years, most notably in its free-to-play team-based shooter, Team Fortress 2. While players can purchase Team Fortress 2 items with real money either in-game or through the Steam Marketplace, they can also earn items by completing achievements, participating in special events, or simply by playing frequently over time.

As Valve mentioned in its announcement, these items can also be made tradeable, allowing players to trade out unwanted rewards with one another to get an item they want. Items can also be made sellable on the Steam Marketplace, which would allow players to earn cash for their Steam Wallet to be used on game downloads or other virtual items available on Steam.

The games that would likely benefit the most from the new system would be free-to-play games, which often rely on unlockable items to maintain user interest and generate revenue. Players who are willing to pay for the items could have the option to do so, and players who would rather save their money could earn the items by playing longer or trading for them with others.

The new Steam Inventory feature is currently in the beta testing stage, and developers can access the new APIs through the Steamworks Developer API library.

Image credit: Steam/Valve Corporation