Steam now lets you pin to-do lists in each game

Everyone loves a good to-do list, and now they're spreading into PC games. Along with a slew of other new features, Steam's latest update includes an integrated Notes app as part of a re-vamped in-game overlay tool. It lets you write thoughts and tasks down about the game you're playing then runs on top of the game while you play, which you can access across any PC you log into and when playing offline.

At any time you can pin the to-do list right to your gaming screen, adjusting its opacity based on your preferences. Guides, discussions and whatever is on your browser (even the show you're watching) can also be clipped to the game. 

Steam's other updates to the in-game overlay include a revamped toolbar and overview. The new toolbar has everything from chat to guides, customizable depending on fields you want to see and in either icon or list mode. The game overview will fill you in on information like accomplishment progress, friends' game play and news about that title.  

Notifications have also cleaned up a bit with less interruptions of things unrelated to you. The tray will only display newest notifications, but you can still view all if you want. The last in-game Steam update is for screenshots, allowing you to choose between large and small thumbnails, while also sorting screenshots by most recent, instead of per game. 

These features are only available through the Steam Client Beta at the moment, but if you’ve never opted into the Beta version before, it’s pretty simple. All you need to do is go to settings (it will be called preferences if you're on a Mac), click the change button where it says Beta Participation in the Accounts tab and choose Steam Beta Update. Once you restart Steam, the Beta features will become visible.

Valve asserts that a lot of its recent work has gone towards improving code sharing between Steam Desktop Client, Deck and Big Picture mode. The company claims this should allow future features to roll out quicker across the different platforms.