Zadalon: Free music in steam (can add without base game)
TheMonkofDestiny: Most of it doesn't register to an account it would seem and in some cases was already freely available outside of Steam (Kyle Gabler's music for the Tomorrow Corporation games, for example).
What do you mean it doesn't register? It does not appear on your licenses page? (not to be confused with library)
Themken: Strange, it registers just fine for me, or all those I have tried so far.
I have the Steam client open then click on the link in the list then click on 'Install' button and when it asks whether to open with Steam I say yes and then I cancel the installation unless I want it on my pc right away.
"Your milage may vary" is applicable here :P Generally it should work and that's all I have to say about that :P
Themken: Strange, it registers just fine for me, or all those I have tried so far.
TheMonkofDestiny: It may be that some of them are marked as "free to play" which will temporarily assign them. I'll admit, I did not run down the entire list so if there are some that are listed as "free" then that would explain the difference.
NOT TEMPORARILY - if game is "free on demand" or "no cost" then it assigns license PERMANENTLY to your account (not to be confused with library) and it WILL stay there until you manually remove it from your account or (in some very rare cases) developer disables specific license. Even if you uninstall it the LICENSE will still be on your account. It may not appear in your library but will still be available for you.
Themken: Just like some always free games cannot be added to your library, only downloaded and played. You are most probably correct.
If you see free to play game and you click "get" or "install" it WILL assign you a license but sometimes it may not appear in your library. Having it in library has NOTHING to do with having a license for it. You can totally download stuff that is not in your library if you have license for it (either from store page or using developer console - mind you it is mean for developers and so it is generally not meant to be used by users and therefore not a normal way of dealing with things like this).
Themken: Also, leave the library and re-enter it to check it took hold.
A better and more reliable way of checking if you got assigned a license is visiting your management page and then activated keys page ("Account Details" and then "View licenses and product key activations"). Because free to play games may often not appear in your library but you will still have licence assigned. Same goes for game demo when you get it and then you add full game - demo will not be visible in your library but you will still have license for it
(it is in fact so resilient that in some cases not even support would be able to remove demo or free package assignment to your account from their db - why it matters and what I mean by that?
I'm just gonna say "Hitman 2016 Intro Pack" and leave it here - tldr - I discovered [after already activating it] that package was improperly configured [I conducted quite an investigation of db] by developers and it was impossible [just strictly IMPOSSIBLE. PERIOD] to get "Bonus Content" while owning it -
I made valve nuke the package
[no not from my account, FROM THE STORE, license serving for this specific subid is permanently DISABLED now and it is no longer possible to get it now]
and then from my account but even after they essentially nuked it it kept reappearing on my license page :P Just a bizzare example ;)).
There is a difference between "free on demand" (mostly used for free to play games and those that are free ALWAYS as well as free weekends) and "no cost" (mostly used for "promotional packages" like free games offered free for a limited time without cards, partner keys, game industry shows special keys, and some other bizzare example cases). Those are technical terms from valve systems btw (you will not see subid for a game marked like that on valve store page). There are technical differences on how these licenses are seen and how it relates to account.
There is also one more major thing and this may explain why some of packages are harder to assign and get than others - it was only pretty recently that valve made internal system change allowing soundtracks to be assigned independently (they essentially made it a non dlc now) and many soundtrack packages are still not marked so (it is up to the developer to make a change) so some may still require game to be owned because they are still seen as dlc internally in system, just fyi.
(Luke)
