Any disputes are to go forward in court instead of arbitration,' according to Valve, which is facing a class-action suit for 'allegedly maintaining an unlawful monopoly' in PC gaming.

Previously, Steam’s user agreement said that “you and Valve agree to resolve all disputes and claims between us in individual binding arbitration” for all disputes related to Steam, your account, hardware, or the company’s content and services. The new agreement eliminates any mention of a binding arbitration policy.

If you booted up Steam in the last 24 hours, then you probably saw the pop up window asking you to agree to a new Steam Subscriber Agreement (SSA). Valve laid out the changes in an official blog post on the Steam Community forum,

Valve used to have a forced arbitration clause in its subscriber agreement, but that's no longer the case.The Latest Tech News, Delivered to Your Inbox

Valve are likely up to something hardware-related again, report NotebookCheck. Their next chunk of plastic and wires – following the Valve Index, Steam Deck and Steam Deck OLED – could swap PC gaming’s favoured x86 architecture for ARM, the type of processor favoured by the Nintendo Switch, Macs, and mobile phones.

If you live outside the United Kingdom or EU, you might've had a pop-up lunge into your Steam game today informing you, helpfully, that updates to the Steam Subscriber Agreement had affected your consumer rights.

Legal experts consider this a win for Steam users, even if most of them will likely never take Valve to court. Consumers are usually required in such agreements to arbitrate and n