Valve unveiled Source 2, a more powerful engine for developers, at GDC today.

Loading

Source 2 is the successor to Valve's original Source engine, which has been used since the release of Counter-Strike: Source in 2004. It has also been used for multiple games since, including the seminal Half-Life 2. At GDC, Valve's Jay Stelly said the content-creation toolkit will be available for free, along with a Vulkan-compatible version."The value of a platform like the PC is how much it increases the productivity of those who use the platform," Stelly said. "With Source 2, our focus is increasing creator productivity. Given how important user generated content is becoming, Source 2 is designed not for just the professional developer, but enabling gamers themselves to participate in the creation and development of their favorite games. We will be making Source 2 available for free to content developers."Vulkan, formerly known as Next Generation OpenGL, is a "cross-platform, cross-vendor 3D graphics API that allows game developers to get the most out of the latest graphics hardware.""This combined with recent announcements by Epic and Unity will help continue the PC's dominance as the premiere content authoring platform," Stelly said. Valve also announced Steam Link today, an in-home game-streaming service, as well as the pricing and release month for the Steam Controller . For more news from GDC 2015, stay tuned to IGN.

Mike Mahardy is a freelance journalist writing for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter at @mmahardy