Steam question

[The_OG_Nelta]

Lets say, I download a game on one steam account, and log off that account. And try to play that game on another steam account without opening it from steam, but from the start menu, would this work?

[Kaisha]

Are there actually Steam games that use the Start Menu?

Last I checked, even the exes for the games within the Steam folder are encrypted, and very likely do a check based on the current active account.

[Pikarya]

The shortcuts are from C:\Program Files\Steam\steam\games and are just shortcuts. They do nothing but tell Steam "Hey startup this program and if the account in question has the game, run it."

So yeah, you can't just play the game locally. The account must have the game registered on steam to play regardless if its on your HDD.

Note: There is a way to play locally, but it does break games at times (You can torrent Half Life 2/etc. without playing on Steam, or without a key. But it is completely offline, and illegal at that.

[fishstix]

fool, could've just asked me first.

[Avanarius]

Almost all games are encrypted.

I bought GTAIV off steam (shitty port) and this game appears to be one of the few exceptions to this rule. It's exe's are unencrypted in it's own folder.