Back at E3 2010, Gabe Newell shocked world when he announced Portal 2 during the Sony’s Press Conference. During his time on the stage he spoke about Steam features being available on the Playstation 3  as well as Steam Cloud. While many as well as myself speculated that Portal 2 will be cross-platform between PC/Mac Steam players with Playstation 3. We weren’t 100% sure if it was gonna happen. Valve has finally let the cat out of the bag with this release.

Valve, creator of best-selling game franchises (such as Half-Life, Portal, Left 4 Dead, and Counter-Strike) and leading technologies (such as Steam and Source), today disclosed details regarding the Steam experience designed for the PlayStation®3, which is set to debut next week with the release of Portal 2.

The first title to support Steam on a console, Portal 2 offers cross-platform matchmaking, gameplay, friends, chat, and achievements, all powered by Steam. Steam on the PS3 also saves co-op game progress and single player saved games to the Steam Cloud, enabling players to pick up where they left off on any PlayStation®3.

The Steam overlay for PS3 provides access to both PSN and Steam friends, displaying their in-game or online status and providing a quick pathway to text chats, player profiles, friend requests, and game invites. Steam Achievements are earned in lockstep with PSN Trophies and are also accessible within the Steam overlay.

Steam on the PS3 provides access to all of these features once the player has linked their PlayStation® Network account with a Steam account, which is done right within the game. A Steam user can login to an existing account, and anyone new to Steam can create an account with the click of a button.

In the spirit of Steam Play, linked players of the PS3 version of Portal 2 can also access and play their copy of Portal 2 on any PC or Mac by redeeming an in-box access code on their computer. The Steam client verifies the linked customer and then lists Portal 2 among their library of Steam games for PC and Mac.

For more information regarding Steam on the PS3, visit the Steam Support knowledge base. For more information regarding Portal 2, visit www.thinkwithportals.com.