Valve will now let people checking out Steam Early Access titles know whether a game has not been updated in over 12 months. 

SteamDB spotted the change, which takes the form of a warning message that appears at the top of the Early Access developer Q&A and lets consumers know when the project in question was last updated. 

Valve has also updated Steamworks to detail this change. 

"If it has been more than 12 months (one year) since the developers of a game have updated the game and posted an 'update' type event to tell players about it, Steam will add a note to the store page, just above the Developer Questionnaire letting players know that the game has not updated in a while," Valve wrote.

"This notice will appear when either of the following criteria has been met:

• It has been more than 12 months since a build has been assigned to the 'default' branch in Steamworks.
• It has been more than 12 months since the developer has posted an 'update' type event, communicating to players about the update (This includes all three 'update' type events: Major Update, Regular Update, or Patch Notes)" 

For as long as it has existed, Early Access has featured titles that have flat out been abandoned by their developer.