Synergy Skin

The first attempt at a Steam skin, Synergy skin for Steam is a very blue take on Valve’s original interface design, designed by user Shalva.

Colors & Design

Color-wise, it’s blue. Really, really blue. The backgrounds are a mix of dark blues; the text is a mixture of blue and white, the borders are blue – nearly everything is blue. So if blue is what you like, Synergy skin will immediately be worth an experiment.
Design-wise, this is an old-looking skin, and that’s pretty obvious in a couple of areas – no more so than the hideous back and forward arrows, which look like they’ve come straight from Office 2011’s ShapeArt.
Unlike older skins, however, there are no issues with the Steam Big Picture button overlapping other user interface elements, so Synergy is still usable with current versions of Steam. It even has a custom icon for Big Picture Mode, which is a welcome feature.

Legibility

Despite being a lot of blue, the designer clearly has a good grasp of contrast as reading the text is not an issue anywhere within Synergy skin, even where the text is dark blue on darker blue. The rest of the text is white on darker colors, so there are no complaints in this area. Text size isn’t an issue, either.

Usability

Despite some of the clunkier interface elements, Synergy skin is easily usable. There are no glaring issues, no moved or lost menus, no overlapping elements and support for Big Picture is included.

Verdict

Synergy is still a good skin. For the first attempt at skin making, it’s really rather impressive. I’m particularly keen on the use of the scratched marble texture on Steam’s address bar and menu bar, and the way that the texture continues on the borders and down to the status bar is particularly pleasing.

Screenshots

Click on the images below to enlarge and see better!

Synergy Skin Changelogs

• Does not exist!

Installation Instructions

1. Download the skin file below, you should get an archive with the “.zip” or “.rar” extension.
2. Extract the ZIP or RAR and move the folder to:
   • Windows: C:/Program Files (x86)/Steam/skins
   • MAC OS X: right-click Steam.app and choose show package contents then /Contents/MacOS/skins
   • Linux: ~/.local/share/Steam/skins/
3. Open the Steam interface and in top tab, click on “Steam” / “Settings”.
4. Then open the Interface section.
5. Find the option “Select the skin you wish Steam to use (requires Steam to restart)” and choose the skin that you want.
6. Completely shut down and restart Steam.
7. That was all; now you must have another interface.

Disable/Uninstall

• Only go back to the Interface tab in Steam’s Settings and select a different skin.

The chat and friends UI doesn't load? Then you have to disable the new UI for them. We posted a guide on how to do this, take a look here.