Delete Local Steam Files And Ten Download Game

Delete Local Steam Files And Ten Download Game Average ratng: 4,6/5 3338 reviews

Steam is now approaching 10 years old. If a game is released only through Steam, I will not play it. It is impossible to make your games available once your account has been deactivated and your information deleted or archived. Here are the sites where you can find the best games of old, free to download. They are all managed by Steam. Retail updates aren't compatible, and if you've tried to install a retail update into a steam game then that's likely why you're running into problems. So, to uninstall your games I suggest to first use the 'delete local content' on the right click pulldown menu. In the Settings panel, select the Downloads tab and you'll find the 'Clear Download Cache' button at the bottom. Then select 'OK' to confirm and acknowledge that you'll need to login to Steam again. If you're still having trouble with your downloads and any games that won't start, please contact Steam Support.

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After playing games on Steam for over ten years, I've collected quite a few games.
Unfortunately, my computer doesn't have a ton of space (150 GB hard drive.) I'm constantly swapping out (uninstalling) games, so I have space for the latest and great games.
That's what I love about Steam, though, I never lose the games I buy since they're permanently tied to my account.
This step-by-step guide will show you how to uninstall Steam games so you can save space on your computer, get rid of a horrible game (I'll admit, they're not all awesome games), or get rid of it regardless of your reasons!
Note: If you don't want to use Steam anymore, I recommend completely uninstalling Steam instead of removing individual games.
Alright, let's get started!

Delete Local Steam Files And Ten Download Game Free

Uninstalling Steam Games

Apr 13, 2014  If however the game has already permanently deleted from your computer (it's not in the Recycle Bin) then you will have to do the following: 1. Go to Steam Library and right click on Garry's mod, then click Delete Local Content. This will make Steam remove Garry's mod from the library. Double click on Garry's Mod in your Steam Library. Nov 17, 2014  a friend suggested partially downloading the game then moving the rest of the files into the download folder then verify game cache but still no luck. 0 amigafan Distinguished. Mar 19, 2011. (so that download cache & intermediate state files are removed by Steam client) 2) delete any remaining game folders (which you just deleted in Steam.

There are two ways to uninstall a game from Steam. You can do it through 'Add or Remove Programs' or by using Steam's uninstaller. I recommend the latter because if you uninstall through 'Add or Remove' programs since it'll open Steam anyway. You will have to know your Steam password, so make sure you have it handy before moving ahead. To get started, open Steam and log in.

  • Click the 'Library' tab at the top of the screen.
  • On the left-hand side of the screen, there will be a listing of all the games tied to your Steam account. Select the game you would like to uninstall.
  • Right click the game and select 'Delete Local Content..'
  • A confirmation box will pop up. Click the 'Delete' button. Voilà! Your game will start uninstalling (it might take a bit for it to be removed entirely.)

You might notice that after you uninstall a game that it's not removed from the list in the left pane. Instead, it's grayed out. Don't worry, the game has been removed and the game having been left on the list is a good thing, I promise. This brings us to the next topic: reinstalling games.

How to Reinstall Steam Games

What I love most about Steam is that I don't have to keep track of any disks or anything, I have to remember my username and password. If I don't want to play a game, I can uninstall it. If I decide later that I want to play it, I still have it.. I don't have to pay for it again.
So how do you reinstall a game in Steam? Easy!

  • In your 'Library' tab, in the left pane (the game list), select the game you would like to install.
  • Once you select a game, the middle pane will populate with information about the game. Here, under the title of the game, will be a button that says 'Install.' Click it.
  • A dialog box will pop-up telling you (approximately) how long it will take the game to download. Click 'next.'
  • The next screen will give you some options regarding icons. Select whichever options you'd like and click 'next.' The game will now download and install.

This article is accurate and true to the best of the author’s knowledge. Content is for informational or entertainment purposes only and does not substitute for personal counsel or professional advice in business, financial, legal, or technical matters.

© 2012 Melanie Shebel

  • Helped me a lot:D

  • Thanks! Simple and short tutorials like this are way more helpful than those with complicated grammar and reasons behind half of everything. Although, I do have one more question. When you uninstall the game, does it keep it's memory stored, meaning when I reinstall it, will it have everything I had done on it?

  • Thanks for the write up. Simple and to the point. I needed it to remind me how to delete games through the Steam interface.

    I know Steam sets aside empty space in anticipation that you might need it for game downloads. A huge empty block on your pc you are not allowed to touch. This has frustrated people for years. So I am not surprised some comments say they did not see that much memory freed up.

  • And what if you have someone who installed Steam on your machine, installed games, then they go and die, and you want to delete them but do not have access to the Steam account?

  • I did this with the sims 3 since my cousin likes that game and when she came over once she was bored and watched youtube videos of people playing sims 3 and 4 so I bought sims 3 for her since there was a sale at the time. When I go to re-install it a pop up appears saying 'game cannot be installed.' What do i do then?

  • I had more than 10 games and they spent 144 GB. I need more space because I want install another software and then I uninstall my games until 4 games left. When I checked, it was using 128 GB. I think there something wrong here so, I uninstall all of my steam and try install 4 games that I need. I was surprise when I checked, it was using 84 GB. How could it be?

  • Thanks Heaps . steam wanted me to install a 36Gb test server as well as the 36Gb game . NOOOOOOO. And I couldn't figure out how to destroy it. Dr Google and yourself to the rescue

    : )

  • i get this 'time out' on a game,i would like to unintsal it but it never works,it's even slowing down my computer and it's only two weeks old.how do i unintsal?

  • if its a bought game will it still be in my history

  • thanks i wanted to double check if pressing delete local content was right

  • I cant find the Library button

  • i just did it with smite and it removed it from my list is that normal Free scott adkins movies.

  • will you still have alll your progress in the game??

  • Hi! I used this to uninstall a game from my laptop and noticed the game disappeared from my library rather than it staying like you said. It was a 'Free to Play' game so does this explain it? You only keep the games you paid for?

  • how do you uninstall a steam game that isn't yours? for example my son has a game on his account he got onto my computer and installed it. now he has moved out of the house and when i try to uninstall it it opens up MY steam account but it wont uninstall because i don't have access to it. so i have this game stuck on my pc taking up space. i know i can delete the files and remove the registry entries for it but i should not have to do all this work to uninstall a game.

  • Thanks! I wasn't sure about 'delete local content' would work.

  • Interesting and Useful!! I have used Steam, however I find this useful for those that do use Steam!! Thanks for Sharing!!

Delete Local Steam Files And Ten Download Game

Steam has a built-in system for making a backup of its game files, so you don’t have to re-download a full game every time you uninstall it and want to play again later. But like a lot of Steam’s features, it hasn’t been updated in quite a while, and frankly it often manages to break the game restoration process anyway. On top of that, it’s slow, it’s clunky, and you can do better on your own.

Manually copying the files out of Steam’s game folder, then copying them back when you’re ready to play again, is much faster and more reliable. Steam’s caching system means that doing it yourself has no disadvantage versus the program’s integrated tool. If you’d like to back up your game files separately, especially to an external drive for archiving a large, 100GB+ collection or saving space on your primary system backup, here’s how to do it the easy way.

Step One: Find the Game Files

Find your standard Steam game installation folder. By default in Windows, this is located in:

In macOS, open the Finder and choose Go > Go to Folder from the menu bar, entering this path:

And in Linux-based operating systems, it’s in the following your local user directory:

This folder is divided into sub-folders, one for each game installed under Steam’s master game list. Most of them share the same name as their respective game, but some use alternate titles or abbreviations—for example, Age of Empires II HD Edition is shortened to “Age2HD.”

Remember, if you’ve set a custom game folder in Steam, your games will be installed elsewhere.

Step Two: Back Up the Games

Delete Local Steam Files And Ten Download Games

To back up the games in the Steam common folder, just copy and paste them into another folder.

That’s it. Really, it’s that simple. Ideally, you want them to be on another storage drive, either internal or external, because having two copies of the same game on a single drive isn’t particularly useful. I keep a dedicated game partition on my external backup drive, just so I don’t have to re-download 30 gigabytes of data every time I want to play Team Fortress 2.

Now, right-click and uninstall the game in Steam to remove it from your primary drive. If your game sits in your backup folder for more than a few months, you’ll probably have to download an update to it…but that’s a few hundred megabytes at most, perhaps a gigabyte or two. Compared to almost 80 gigabytes for DOOM, it’s a great saving in both time and bandwidth.

Step Three: Restore the Games

Restoring the games is also easy: first, copy the game folders from your backup location back into the Steam/steamapps/common directory you found in Step One. (You might have to delete the original folder, since sometimes there are a few left over files even after a game is uninstalled.) Once that’s done, open Steam itself.

Click on the Library tab, then find one of the games you just restored to your primary Steam folder. It’s uninstalled at the moment; click “Install Game.” Make sure that it’s set to install in the same folder that you just restored your game files to.

Now here’s the magic part: before Steam begins the “download” process, it will double-check the location that it’s assigned to install the game files. Steam examines the game folder, “discovers” the files are already there, and skips the actual download for any files it doesn’t need to retrieve from the server.

Steam will restore the game in a few seconds to a few minutes. If there aren’t any major updates needed, you’re ready to play right away.

Don’t Forget Your Save Files!

There isn’t a standard location for games to put their save files. Depending on what you’re playing, your save file might be somewhere in the My Documents or My Games folder, or it could be in the game data folder you moved around in the steps above, or in the application data folders. It might be saved on the game developer’s cloud server or with Steam’s Cloud service, or in a dozen other places.

The point is, the game installation files you backed up might not also include the game save files that actually represent your personal playtime. If you’re backing up your games to access them later, do a quick Google search for your game save location to make sure you have those files protected as well.

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