According to Valve’s announcement, “The Steam 360 Video Player, which allows for instant playback of VR movies and other linear VR shorts and shows, is now available in beta. The Steam 360 Video player leverages the Pixvana SPIN Studio technology to enable adaptive streaming in Steam VR, eliminating the need to launch a separate application for playback of linear VR content.”
Note that Valve isn’t actually providing 360-degree content, but rather this is a video player for Steam that will support such content. So if you’re someone who is on Steam quite a bit then we guess the convenience of having a native video player that supports 360-degree videos will come in handy.
There will be a handful of 360-degree content that users can already take for a spin, such as Fox’s Alien: Covenant In Utero VR experience, Warner Bros.’ LEGO Batman: The Batmersive Experience, Rooster Teeth’s Red vs. Blue 360 episodes, and The Pacific Northwest Ballet’s Silent Resonance. You can find those on the Steam website.