Some sort of disc-to-digital service

[MartianBuilder]

I was brainstorming about a sort of service that Steam could have where you could pay a small fee and convert all your old disc-based games to Steam so you could play them on any computer without putting in the actual disc. Sorry if I'm comparing apples to boats here, but, Vudu. Vudu has an option where you can insert a DVD or Blu-Ray into your computer, it'll scan it and you can pay a small fee to transfer it onto your Vudu library. I was thinking, maybe Steam could have some kind of service like that. It would reduce the clutter of having a disc-based game library, and it would be more convenient as well, so why not?

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

1. You don't need to pay at all to do this.

2. You can already redeem games you own if you have the cd keys for them, such as Warhammer series.

3. It's completely up to the devs/pubs that holds the IP rights to choose to allow you to use your CD copies with the CD keys for them to redeem a Steam copy version.

[MartianBuilder]

Actually, as I was seeing in the Steam client, there is an option that will open a list of programs you have installed and you can click on any one of them which will import it into the Steam Library, even though that's basically just a shortcut to it and that would only work on computers you have those games installed on, correct?

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

" add non-steam game " as what it say will add a short cut to what you have installed on your system, but it will not bypass anything if the game required the CD to play.

Yes it's a shortcut, and yes it will only add shortcuts whatever you currently have on the system. No it will not transferred to another system.

[JamesF0790]

Valve can't do this. They can't just hand out licenses. This isn't like a physical store where you buy stock and then resell it. Valve merely provides a platform for people to sell from. They can't grant you a license only the developers can. I mean I'd love it it was possible but I'm afraid it's not.

[FPS]

What would prevent using the same cd on multiple accounts?

Also, most of the older games on Steam aren't that expensive anyway, and you can wait for the sale to add them to your library for a small fee

[Sleepy Yoshi]

Vudu has agreements in place with several studio's which is why they are able to offer this service for movies from said studio's. Just by having deals with approximately a dozen studio's they can offer over 10,000 titles. The gaming industry is a very different landscape in terms of releases per studio, defunct studios/publishers etc which would make this significantly more difficult to do on a meaningful scale. Don't get me wrong, not something I'm opposed to by any means, but logistically I just can't see it working overall for games.