Steam Movie Purchases: Movie Downloads Replaced With Streaming Only Option

[(TPT) Trinsic]

I just talked to cheru, one of the devs of Branching Paths on the forums, a Documentary about Indie Games in Japan. I dont like movies being wallled behind streaming only options for film. He let me know that Steam's only option for films now is streaming. Can I get some clariity on this decision as to why steam cant offer a DRM free download option? Or better yet why it was removed, because i was able to download "Indie Game", the move as a download.

[Gus the Crocodile]

IGTM isn't a video file - well, not directly, at least. It's packaged into its own launcher/player thing, which is why it's treated differently. I think Free To Play, Valve's Dota 2 film, used to work in a similar manner if I remember correctly, but it appears to have been converted to a streaming video now too.

In any case, yeah, I'd very much like downloads to be an option.

[(TPT) Trinsic]

Originally posted by Gus the Crocodile:

IGTM isn't a video file - well, not directly, at least. It's packaged into its own launcher/player thing, which is why it's treated differently. I think Free To Play, Valve's Dota 2 film, used to work in a similar manner if I remember correctly, but it appears to have been converted to a streaming video now too.

In any case, yeah, I'd very much like downloads to be an option.

I see, so maybe its not an option unless developers release their own movie player with the video file.

[RioDragoon]

Sorry for piggybacking off of this post, but I felt like it's better to add onto the topic of movie downloads than make a whole 'nother topic arguing for the same thing.

I would love to use steam as a digital movie service alongside my digital games, almost especially and exclusively because stuff like anime doesn't exactly have a site where you can buy them and choose to download them for offline/on-the-go, that particular medium only has streaming and disc options, which bothers me. Steam could really make some headway in digital film distribution if they made it a requirement that there should be a download option submitted for every film/TV show provided on steam. More options are always better, and to be honest I don't trust steam keeping a robust movie catalog if their only options for customers is to rent/stream. We should be able to take our purchases on the go for travel and enjoy them in places without wi-fi or without eating up data bandwidth.