Where can I purchase the Sots ultimate collection (all 3 games in one) with the box, cd and op manual?

so far the only places that have the game are Steam, Direct to drive and a few other software download places. I don't mind downloading but I really wanted the instruction manual and the story book?    

Are Steam and Direct to drive as good as Stardock when it comes to downloading games from their websites?

If they are not then I will wait on Impulse to get them

So if I want to download Sword of stars gold collection or the new ultimate collection I should use steam until stardock gets them?

How is Steam when it comes to customer support?

Steam's customer support ranges from good to nonexistent, depending on the issue.  They do not offer tech support for any games; you have to contact the original company.  They - in theory - have a blanket no-returns policy, but people have received refunds on a case-by-case basis by contacting Steam support.  Steam has an excellent friends/community system which is integrated inside many games offered on Steam. Most games also support the Steam overlay, which offers access to the Steam community service

As long as Steam operates, you can re-download at any time. You can backup your files as many times as you want. You can install the game on as many computers as you want.

However, Steam games requires that you be running Steam and that you are logged into your account when you launch the game. Only one computer at a time may be logged into Steam.

Steam - very rarely - has outages for server updates, which has been known to kick people out of games (though I believe that has been fixed.)

Steam is also known to have odd pricing policies. Some games can be gotten very cheaply, particularly during their periodic sales.   But other games cost significantly more than they do in stores, particularly on the European version of Steam.