One thing that has always been a bit of a hassle with Steam is how to handle game soundtracks: since they are sold as DLC, you have to have the base game to purchase them, and if you want to download them to your PC, you have to install the game first. Managing music is also a hassle, as Steam does not have a built-in music management feature: you have to manually search for it on your hard drive or access it from the DLC tab in the game properties menu of the Steam library. The only way to do this is to manually browse the hard drive or access the DLC tab in the game properties menu of the Steam library.

Starting today, at least for new releases, Valve has announced a new system for game soundtracks on Steam that allows them to be separated from their associated games and sold on their own as a new "soundtrack" app. This allows for many improvements over the DLC system:

All standalone soundtracks will be offered in "standard" MP3 format, but can optionally be offered in higher quality formats such as FLAC or WAV, and the soundtrack detail page and can also include "related content bits" such as album art and liner notes that can be accessed from the In addition, a new interface will be added to Steam, allowing for "general operations" such as playing soundtracks, browsing, and managing content.

The new soundtrack system is live today, but it will take some time to really make an impact, as existing soundtracks will continue to be treated as DLC unless converted by the developer. This doesn't seem like a big deal-Valve has created a tool to automate this process for developers-but until it's done, you'll have to continue to access your favorite in-game music the old crappy way. (This means that old soundtracks will likely not be converted.)

"This is an initial release for partners." We plan to launch these features more broadly, including a sale event on January 20."

This is stated in Valve's announcement.

This could be a soundtrack-specific sale or the start of a Chinese New Year sale: the first day of Chinese New Year 2020 is January 25.