5.5 million people watched Valve’s Dota 2 documentary over the weekend

Valve’s Dota 2 is one of the biggest online PC games partially because it is free. Now, Valve’s Dota 2 movie Free to Play is one of the most-watched documentaries ever for the same reason.

Last Wednesday, Valve released Free to Play: The Movie on Steam and YouTube. Since then, more than 5.5 million people have watched the documentary about the company’s popular multiplayer online battle-arena title. Valve claims this makes it one of the most-watched documentaries ever over an opening weekend — although it obviously has an advantage over movies like Michael Moore‘s Fahrenheit 9/11, which was only available in theaters and charged for admittance. Valve isn’t charging for its film, and it isn’t even running ads on the YouTube video. That makes Free to Play more a piece of marketing for Dota 2 while Fahrenheit 9/11, the top-grossing documentary ever, earned nearly $24 million in its opening weekend.