It is set in the Alps, where players can participate in several winter and action sports disciplines, skiing, snowboarding, paragliding and wingsuit flying.

With later downloadable content, mountains in Alaska, Japan and Korea were also included in the game and rocket-powered wingsuit flying, sledding, BASE jumping, and speed riding were incorporated as additional sports.

Steep is an online multiplayer extreme sports game set in an open world environment of the Alps, centered on the Mont Blanc, the tallest mountain in Europe, which can be explored freely by players.

These drop zones serve as fast travel points that allow players to reach different parts of the game's world without having to actually move that distance.

[8] The game has a trick system, which allows players to perform special maneuvers such as spinning and grabbing while they are skiing or snowboarding.

The game features a nonlinear story, that follows the chosen player characters as they seek to become a winter and extreme sports legend.

To achieve the rank of "Ultimate Legend", the characters have to attain legendary status in all six disciplines the game has to offer.

The "Road To The Olympics" featured a new story campaign, in which the player character, an aspiring winter sports athlete, has to complete a series of events to qualify for the 2018 Olympic Games and become the first athlete to win gold medals in all three freestyle disciplines: big air, slopestyle, and halfpipe.

[17] The developers were also inspired by the renewed interest in the skateboarding game Skate 3 after it was re-popularized through Let's Play streaming events performed by YouTubers and others.

[15] Manceau claimed that the game was a "passion project" and a "natural progression" for the studio,[19] and that it was designed to be accessible for newcomers and complex for fans of the genre.

[20] However, one of the professional skiers, Matilda Rapaport, died while shooting a promotion video for the game in Farellones, Chile due to a sudden avalanche accident.

[21] The game was revealed with a trailer and playable demo at the 2016 Electronic Entertainment Expo as the closing act to Ubisoft's press conference.

[citation needed] Access to the Road to the Olympics DLC was removed from the game in 2022 to comply with third party rights.

[33] He noted that the trick system was aimed at accessibility and thus did not provide a feeling akin to the Tony Hawk's series of video games.

[37] He called the physics of the game "satisfying" and noted that they managed to find a balance between realistic and arcade approaches.

"[37] Also, he praised the game's open world, which he described as "gorgeous" and also "just awe-inspiringly gargantuan", with its "grandiose, attractive environments".

"[32] Similarly, Hafer noted that the paragliding path was the least entertaining of the four initial play styles but if a player wanted to complete the game, he was forced to do these events.

[14] The decision to only include freestyle disciplines in the story while completely omitting skiing events such as Super-G or giant slalom added to that sentiment.

He questioned the decision to include the Korean mountain ranges where the Olympics took place but not making them accessible in freeride mode.