According to a Russian hacking group, files have been uncovered within Steam that hint towards big changes coming to the current chat system. As it stands, the current chat system is functional but somewhat rudimentary. Steam chat doesn’t feature group options, video, audio, or images. But if the files uncovered are correct, Steam’s newest chat updates might just be putting it in competition with Discord.

The leak about the new Steam chat hasn’t been verified by Valve, but it certainly seems like something the company would be working on. In recent years, Valve has been progressively building the catalogue of items that steam uses (like the Steam link). The goal seems to be to turn Steam into a system that needs no outside resources. Fortunately, functions like seeing friends’ games or games currently being played are already built into the platform. This doesn’t exactly give Steam a leg up on Discord, but it means the gap isn’t too far off.

The biggest changes the system would offer would be in Group Chat. The new feature would include abilities to drag and drop friends into chats of any kind such as “general, off topic, memes, knitting… etc.” All of this sounds a lot like the channels within Discord, and with the ability to see which channels and chats your friends would be in, the new chat sounds remarkably like it. However, Steam’s chats would also be looking to do far more than that.

Group chats would also allow players to see their friends grouped by games they are playing, even showing what games are being played and with an option to join them immediately for any multiplayer games. Similarly, the feature will allow easy, quick access to inviting friends to play multiplayer games. The feature will also be looking to show features from games like League of Legends that would indicate how many minutes into a match your friends are and how close they are to the end of it.

There are also a few smaller features that are coming in the form of creature comforts. The new chat would allow nicknames for friends so that it is easier to keep track of people if they change their profile picture or name. The system will also allow GIFS to load inline instead of as link and may also have plans to embed or easily send out tweets.

While there would be many similarities between this new system and Discord, Steam’s new chat seems to be oriented exclusively at a Steam audience, linking the user experience, library, and friends list of people to a video and audio chat system. Discord is more of an all-purpose platform, so for the millions of gamers that use it for League of Legends and the like, little is likely to change.