How SteamElixir works

1. Start with the source

Steam’s news feed can contain both developer announcements and articles from outside publications. We identify first-party posts using the feed’s source information. Recognized press outlets and unrecognized sources are excluded from developer activity evidence.

Press coverage can still appear in a game’s source history, with its publication label. It does not count as a developer post or a shipped update. Open the original announcement to check wording, platform availability and dates.

Steam review totals supply the reception data. Store records supply information such as developer names and listed prices; a store link is the place to confirm the current edition, price and availability before buying.

2. Read status as a communication signal

We compare the time since the latest recorded developer post with that game’s historical posting rhythm. Recent communication can qualify as active even when the gap differs from its usual rhythm. This is an observation of public posts, not a studio’s promised patch schedule.

Actively supported

Developer communication is recent or within the game’s usual posting rhythm. This does not mean a new patch has shipped.

Slowing

The gap since the last developer post is longer than the game’s usual rhythm.

Quiet

Developer communication has been unusually quiet compared with its history.

Dormant

The recorded communication gap is much longer than usual. It does not confirm abandonment.

Insufficient evidence

The history is not reliable enough for a public verdict, or our news coverage needs a fresh check.

A completed game may have little reason to receive frequent updates. A studio may also communicate outside Steam. Silence in our record is not proof that work has stopped.

3. Separate release evidence from announcements

Automated rules use a post’s title, text and source to classify it. Recorded substantial updates include releases, major updates and significant patches. Small hotfixes are recorded separately and do not increase that substantial-update count.

Multiple posts can describe the same release. Our count is a count of classified evidence records, not necessarily unique patches. The rules can make mistakes, especially with mixed-purpose posts; classifications can be corrected after reviewing the source.

For concrete examples, see Zomboid’s Unstable-to-Stable transition and Valheim’s public releases and test builds.

4. Check which date you are reading

Posted date

When the developer published the source. A recent check does not make an old announcement new.

Last successful news check

When we successfully checked Steam for news about this game. It is not a patch date or a guarantee that Steam contains every developer announcement.

Context reviewed

When a dated explanatory selection was reviewed. This is separate from automated news checks and is not a complete patch history.

Scheduled jobs refresh news, reviews and prices in batches. Games are not all refreshed simultaneously, and failures or backlogs can delay coverage. Use the per-game check timestamp rather than assuming every figure is live.

Public status labels require high-confidence history and a successful news check within 7 days. Missing, invalid, future-dated or older check timestamps cause the public verdict to become unknown. Previously recorded sources may still be useful, but they cannot establish what happened since the last check.

5. Understand the Elixir Rating

The rating combines Steam review reception with a development-support adjustment. Reception uses the lower bound of a 95% Wilson confidence interval, which accounts for review sample size rather than using the positive percentage alone.

Positive support adjustments close a portion of the remaining distance to 100, rather than adding a fixed bonus. Silence penalties apply only where the model expects continuing support. Those expectations and weights are design choices, not objective measures of whether you will enjoy a game.

Games need at least 50 reviews to receive a rating; the ranked index uses a higher threshold of 500. A rating is not a hands-on review, performance benchmark or promise about matchmaking.

6. Know the limits, and help us correct them

SteamElixir is an independently maintained project, not Valve, Steam or a game’s developer. Questions and corrections go to the SteamElixir maintainer through our contact page.

Status calculations and classifications are automated. Oracle answers and generated dispatches use AI and can misinterpret a source. A generated summary is not a developer statement; follow its original links before relying on a claim. We do not claim that every automated result has been individually reviewed.

Coverage is limited to the records we have collected. Missing history, incorrect source labels, outdated checks and ambiguous announcements can affect the result. The score does not establish whether servers are online, a community is large, or your saves and mods are compatible.

To report an error, include the SteamElixir page URL, the claim you think is wrong, and a dated official source if available. That makes it possible to check the record and its classification.