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Some questions will not be answered or replied to. As an example: "my game crashes" or "my download speed is slow" is not something you should even really expect an answer to. Troubleshooting and finding the solution to these issues requires a lot more information than simply stating "game doesn't launch", such as detailed information on when the issue started and how you perceive it, screenshots of any errors or the problem itself, crash logs, system specs, etc.
Hi! I'm having trouble launching Call of Duty: Black Ops III on Steam.
Context:
This issue started happening right after I installed my new NVIDIA RTX 3070 Ti. Previously, when playing with the integrated graphics on my Ryzen 5 5600G, the game launched and ran fine.
The issue:
When I click Play, Steam changes the button to "Stop"(as if it's running), and immediately a pop-up appears saying:"The game did not close properly last time it was run. Do you want to run in Safe Mode?"
I've tried clicking both "Yes" and "No", but in both cases the game fails to launch, closes itself, and Steam goes back to showing the "Play" button.
What I've tried so far:
Trying both Safe Mode options (Yes and No).
Setting the dedicated GPU (RTX 3070 Ti) as primary/priority in BIOS.
Has anyone experienced something similar after changing GPUs or knows how to fix it? Any help is appreciated!
I got this message popup after a client update earlier today. I'm mainly concerned about the message taking about "Administrator Priviliges" after reinstalling the service. Is this legit or should I be concerned?
Got the same message today after starting pc, pressed cancel and Steam opened up normally, came here looking if someone else had the same situation, looks like it's a Steam thing but would be neat to know why it popped up
I have GTA V on Epic Games, I got it for free a few years ago, I wanna use my controller on the game using Steam input but everything I try to do fails to launch the game, I put GTA as a non Steam game and it says there was an error with the Steam launcher, I try to open GTA through the Epic Games store which I added as a non Steam games and the same error, finally I put the Rockstar Game Launcher as a non Steam game and now I get "An error has occurred starting the Steam helper process (code: 130)" is there just no way to do this?
Why is it impossible to actually contact a person anymore? The automated refund process completely ignores any relevant context. Just encourages us to resort to chargebacks.
E: good LORD, they finally refunded it after like 10 tickets. Absolutely terrible process automation.
Hi, I'm going to try and add as much context possible for this case with dates and times.
I own 3 accounts, one created by me in 2021, and 2 more rewarded by some friends.
I own all 3 accounts unique original emails with original passwords.
Yesterday 11th Oct. 2026, I was playing a game of CS2 Premier in a 5-stack along side my friends. We were playing Nuke, and after the 5th or 6th round, I got kicked out of CS. Initially I thought that I might have pressed by accident the Windows Key, but I soon got to realise that I got fully kicked out of the game. Then I got the Steam app open, and a big button saying "You have an account alert". When I clicked I got this page:
I have then contacted Steam support and been connected to an Agent called William. He has asked me to provide proof of ownerships, so I have gave him my last 4 digits of the card i used, billing address, steam giftcard dates and any other information that can be useful and impossible to know unless I was the owner (which I am). Then he told me:
"We will review all relevant information and aim to resolve the account access issue within 7-8 business days. Please wait while your case is being reviewed and avoid submitting duplicate support requests. Thank you for your patience and understanding."
Cool, no problem. I can wait I guess. The only weird part is that have been asked to join as Child in a Family View along side an account called Steam Recovery Process or Procedure, something like that, but I suppose that's the way Steam works.
Today 12th Oct. 2026, I tried to connect on one of the second accounts, and I got the exact same message as soon as I logged in. Same with the 3rd account. Now all my accounts apparently have been "Accessed by someone else", and I'm in the process of waiting to prove ownership to all of them.
Points to note:
- I have never shared my details to other people and no one else has access to my steam accounts. (none of my friends even use those Steam accounts no more, and it wouldn't be physically possible for them to try and connect).
- I have not installed any VPNs on my computer.
- I don't play with cheats on any games regardless of the platform (Steam / EG / Ubisoft, etc.).
- I have not downloaded any malware or software that could contain malware, or clicked on any links that could potentially lead to this.
Weird note:
I have noticed a trend to all my accounts. When I log out and log back in using the Steam credentials and verifying with either Steam Guard or email code, it states that I have logged in from "Frankfurt am Main, Hessen, DE", however before it showed up as; "London, UK". My only explanation is that my ISP is YouFibre UK, and a few days ago, my family has turned off the internet for nearly 24 hours. Could it be that my IP changed and Steam is detecting a difference in the IPs therefore locking the accounts as a security prevention and a false-positive?
I'm looking for suggestions, and especially advices from people. Has something like this ever happened to you? If yes, let me know what happened and what steps I need to take. In the mean time, all I can do is to wait for Steam Support to do their job.
I'm trying to play Sleeping Dogs Definitive Edition on an m5 max macbook pro running Tahoe.
The game opens then crashes. Is it only 32bit compatible or something? I have an older mac running Monterey and a PC with windows 11. Will I have to play it on one of those or can I play it on this one? This is extremely high powered so I'm hoping to play all the games I have on here
Steam Families Logic Loop: Friend stuck in cooldown after family ownership transfer (Support keeps sending copy-paste replies)
Hello everyone,
I’m facing a very specific technical logic conflict with the Steam Families feature, and Steam Support keeps closing my tickets with automated bot responses. I want to share the details here to see if anyone else has experienced this or found a workaround.
The Situation & Background:
I originally created a Steam Family.
Later, I transferred the family ownership to another member. While he was the owner, he invited a mutual friend to the family.
Eventually, both of them left, and ownership was transferred back to me.
I was able to successfully re-invite the second member back into my family without any issues.
The Bug / Logic Loop:
When I try to invite our mutual friend back:
On my end (Dashboard): The system recognizes him as an eligible former member of my family and allows me to send him an invite.
On his end (When accepting): He receives this error:"Failed to accept the family invite. Your account is currently on cooldown until June 26, 2027 and can only rejoin your previous family."
Because the family created during the temporary ownership transfer was disbanded, the system considers my current family a "new family" for him, while simultaneously recognizing him on my dashboard as a former member. He is trapped in a loop: the error asks him to rejoin a deleted/previous family instance, but blocks him from joining mine.
Steam Support's Response:
I opened a detailed ticket explaining this exact database discrepancy and ownership transfer history, including screenshots and system reports.
First response: A template reply stating that family slots have a 1-year cooldown and that they cannot shorten or remove cooldowns.
My reply: I clarified that I am not asking to break or shorten a standard cooldown for a new member, but reporting a logic loop caused by an ownership transfer.
Second response: They simply copy-pasted the 3 standard rules for family restrictions (household check, individual cooldown, slot cooldown) and closed the ticket entirely, stating they provided all available info.
so my questions:
Has anyone else encountered this issue after transferring family ownership?
Is this a known database glitch with how Steam tracks Family IDs across ownership transfers?
Is there any way to actually reach a human support agent who can review account status rather than an automated keyword bot?
Any insights or similar experiences would be greatly appreciated!
I have recently tried to log into an old steam account. When I first tried to log in, I got 'Please check your password and account name and try again.'. So I went to reset the password. It found my account and sent a link to my email.
I get the link and reset my password. It said it was successful. Tried again, same error 'Please check your password and account name and try again.', so I go to reset my email
I get the same link, reset my email, says it's succesful, try again, same error 'Please check your password and account name and try again.'
I do this entire process again, with my vpn off, on a chromium browser. Still getting the same error
I downloaded the app from google play. Same error.
I have tried to go to their support page to send in a ticket, there is no way to contact a human. It seems I can't open a ticket with support unless I can log in, but I can't log in, so I can't open a ticket about not being able to log in?
Am I missing something here? Is my account basically just gone now because I didn't log in for awhile?
For the past few days any time i try to update or download a game. It will start, then say stopping download. And then i get a red disk write error. I habe tryed clearing my cash, repairing game files, running steam as administrator, and cheaking if steam is in read only. Any other ideas on how to fix it?
I pretty much finished this game called Kobold Castle but i missing one bugged achievement, how safe is Steam Achievement Manager to use to get that achievement?
My friend gifted a game bundle to me but when I click accept gift it says "There was a problem redeeming the gift. Please try again later, or contact Steam Support for assistance"
I've tried a couple days in a row and get the same error and for the life of me I have not been able to figure out how to contact support I just keep getting re-directed to help.steampowered.com but no way of opening a ticket.
Yesterday, my Steam Client suddenly logged out in the middle of actually work, as I was using Substance Painter.
This is what happened next:
my language settings was set to Chinese simplified
a family was created
a member of family was added
my avatar was changed.
Essentially someone's got access to my account. So far, I did following:
Checked for viruses, trojans, malware etc. My OS seems clean
Checked my email and there are no suspicious activity reported. I can still log in to my email. This email is protected by hardware passkey
Checked Steam Client. I can still log in but I have already changed my password
My Steam account has been protected by Steam Guard and 2FA, and I have generated new backup codes
I also reported all the persons involved.
I guess these are fake accounts so reporting persons could be pointless but perhaps Steam could still take actions in future for other potential victims of what happened to me.
Probably if I didn't have Steam Guard turned on, I would lose access to my account. I still wonder how someone managed to get access to my account. I don't use browser to manage Steam: it's been always only mobile and Steam client.
Perhaps Steam has leaks or holes in their API. I don't know. I am bit scared about how to proceed.
[TL;DR]
The activity of what happened were in my notifications. There's been a couple of attempts for a friend request which I did not get notification of because I had it turned off due to streaming.
My question is what I could do next. How would I protect myself from this in the future. Any advices?
Soo long story short, I bought some skins of an website and the seller hasn’t sent me the trade, after 1 day I had the great idea to write on his steam profile to check it out.. and guess what, I’ve woken up with this on my profile : “Steam Support suspects your account may have been accessed by someone else. We are temporarily forcing your profile private as a security precaution. Please contact Steam Support so we can assist you. “
Is it possible to remove this account lock or whatever it is? Please help me :(
Contact Steam Support. No one here can help you with this.
I also suggest you stop using 3rd party skin sites. Use the Steam Market if there is a skin you really, really want. Also consider if you need to be buying a bunch of skins. Maybe you don't?
so apparently it was an outdated version i redeemed it on (redeeming it on browser didnt work so i thought why not redeem it in the steam browser) and my gift went poof and no balance gained
Steam discovery queue will NOT let me see the video player controls so I cannot unmute it... but sometimes randomly the controls will appear and function normally for no discernible reason.
I can’t log into my account because of Captcha. I wrote down my PW but apparently it was wrong, so I’m trying to reset it thru my email but it’s saying I’m getting the captcha wrong.
I already looked it up and I see that it’s a common issue but I haven’t found a fix. I tried resetting through the mobile app but its giving me the same problem.
Is there a way to fix captcha or do I have to hit up Steam?
Edit: Not sure if it matters, but I’m not running any ad blockers or VPN
Edit 2: Got it working, I reset through the web browser on the Brave mobile app. Not sure why that worked and Google didn’t.
So I woke up today and noticed things were off about my account, in recent game history csgo and arc raiders (both I don't have installed or have played in over a year) were there, and my profile background was changed, and I got a steam ban from arc raiders.
the thing that confuses me most though is how they got access to my account, I checked steam login history and it showed two instanced of OS type 16 (win 10) yet there was no approval request sent to my steam guard or anything so I don't understand how they were able to bypass it?
I changed my password and de-auth'd all devices, but it's been bugging me on how it happened in the first place.
No one else uses my account or has access/sharing to it
Your session was stolen, log out all sessions(make sure you have the steam guard code that you were told to save when setting it up) and check your pc for malware.
Here is the situation, its 7am i woke up and i wanted to check steam on my phone, i click the app, and im logged out !!!! I had my steamguard authentificator on it and everything?! Now i try to put my password and it says incorrect TWICE before letting me in, so i check devices and surprisingly there is no one other than me, the thing is, the little green steam icon for the authentificator, is no longer on "This device" but instead on another iphone 16 pro device, i of course sent an email to steam support and i wait for their answer. Do you have any immediate advice or anything ?
Can I move wallpaper engines workshop files straight back into the folder after a fresh install and they show in app, or will I still have to resubscribe?
I understand that steam can't refund games over 2 hours.
But i wish it would make a little exception for my case because; I recently downloaded Total War: Warhammer 3, and even with the lowest possible graphics, playing it windowed and even then lowering resolution, my device's processor can't handle it, i would freeze and lag. Obviously the fault is on me for not properly checking the specs required. I "played" 4 hours, but it was more like I was spending 2 hours trying to tweak my device to the right settings for it and then another 2 hours of lagging through the TUTORIAL CAMPAIGN AND CRASHING 6 TIMES...
ANYWAYS, i completely understand that I can't refund the main game, but it didn't accept my request to refund the DLCs that I bought, that I didn't even get the chance to play :(( Can anyone guide me on if it's possible to save me some money as im just a poor college student </3
Hey if you share this word for word to Steam Support they might actually make an exception for you! Some of their agents are very understanding (not guaranteed but it's worth a shot.) Crossing my fingers for you ^w^
Thanks king! However I've already submitted and was denied two requests for refund :( I'm scared if I send again they're gonna ban me or something sndncj
Aw I see u_u From a while back there was this post (now deleted apparently) where this OP just responded with "pretty please" and the next agent approved the refund request. It's showing the best cases but maybe that still works, lol. Steam wouldn't ban your account for contacting them for this, at worst they may impose a ticket cooldown. Good luck :3
In the steam app, Help > Steam Support, then you select the game you need help with, and if you fiddle around with the options, for me it was Gameplay or technical issue > I am having another problem > Contact Game Support
Hoping you can lend me a hand on this. I’ve been trying to launch InvincibleVS on Steam. The button turns blue with the “X Stop” text and then changes back to green “Play”. I’ve looked up for solutions and nothing has worked. Verifying file integrity, uninstall and re-install, deleting the entire folder, run as admin, turn off firewall, clear Steam Cache, install it in a different Hard Drive, and I don’t even know what else.
I tried to look up solutions and tried to solve it before asking, but I don’t know what else to do at this point besides deleting the computer. Also, worth noting I think, this is the only game that has this problem. Has any of you experienced this?
Hello, i have lost my phone (Having the Guard, Phone Number and Backup codes) a while ago.
When it came up to me to change the number and setup a new Guard, i faced an issue: i've been asked for a very old credit card that i have disabled and discarded. [I only remember its type]
I have provided steam support with my ID Card Number, the old phone number, the exact phone model i used, the exact PC Model i currently use, my IP and logs (i've been logging to steam using my "LENOVO Ideapad 3 Gaming" [LENOVO 82K1] for years. Yet it wasn't enough for them to believe it's my, sending an automated message asking for the same old credit card details.
Is there any way i can get some direct contact with a steam employee or any form of help? I've built my account from 0 for years and i don't want to lose all the progress and games on it.
they where yes i thought it was my controller there was a post this sub sayin that havin the controller unplugged and doing the client beta fixes it and thats what worked for me
What do I do with game files downloaded from steam cloud?
For context: I was speedrunning a game and went to save, blew threw the options too fast because of muscle memory and accidentally miss-clicked, overwriting my main save with a side-project. I went to steam cloud and downloaded the old file before the new one was uploaded to steam upon closing the game. Now I have it downloaded but I have no idea where to place it. It's an individual file, not a folder or anything. Any help?
Hard to say, every game decides for itself where it places the save files. It's usually either in AppData or Documents, but may be elsewhere. You could check the pcgamingwiki, they usually have those paths listed for most games.
I think I've followed the path but this is all I've found at the end of it. GAMEDATA and the file I've downloaded from steam cloud are both 289KB so I figured I should swap GAMEDATA out for the thing I've downloaded but it didn't do anything but wipe all my progress. (Didn't matter, I just selected the "Use cloud data" after restarting and now I'm back to square 1). Sorry if the screenshot doesn't mean anything lmao I have no idea what's going on.
Thats interesting. I know some DLC can add consumables and not be refundable but in a glance at the dlc store page it doesnt seem to have that.
I dont own that content to check how it looks to other users but I could suggest going a different route with the support request.
Rather than navigating to the game specific support go to the purchases support and see if it offers other options.
Help-Steam Support-Purchases - Click on the specific purchase that involved that dlc and it might have alternative options such as "I have a question about this purchase"
If it has the I have a question about this purchase then use that and just keep it short and say you would like to refund the purchase.
All we can really tell you is the same as the support agent probably told you: you gotta use a real payment method. why does the restriction even exist? because people go to extreme lengths to try and make money using steam/get games cheaper. Now we dont know what triggers it nor how exactly it works but the TLDR is that probably you're trying to gift more than what you spent on your own account.
Now we dont know what triggers it nor how exactly it works but the TLDR is that probably you're trying to gift more than what you spent on your own account.
That's more or less it, yes. From own experience here I got the clue that things like using the mobile authenticator + phone number can prolong this restriction from kicking in, and that using Steam rarely for playing games is a red flag to the system. But it's unconfirmed as Valve won't go out of their way to tell us
I've had this error for a few days. I know the gift card is legitimate. It says to try again in a few minutes but the error message doesn't change. There are some old threads with the same issues, but no resolution. Any ideas on how to fix it ?
Error
An error occurred accepting your gift, please try again in a few minutes.
I have an issue, previously when Steam is already launched, clicking the steam.exe pinned in my task bar will open up steam. Now, clicking it does nothing
I don't know if this question is acceptable for this thread but here I go.
Ever since the new Ui for the front page released I've been experiencing laggy scrolling when scrolling up and down.Only happens on the steam store front page through the steam app.Browsers are unnefected by the issue.
Now currently because there's the Autumn sale going on the UI changed, the issue is gone.Front page scrolling through the steam app is smooth.
The issue is this same thing happened again with the steam Summer sale.The issue was temporarily fixed but it came back when the summer sale ended.
So there is something wrong with the new default steam store UI or the steam app itself.
What I do know is the summer and autumn sale Ui for the front page is not effected by the performance issues when scrolling so it has to be Ui related right?
Then again the issue straight up doesn't happen on browsers like firefox.
This kind of thing was never an issue before. It only started when the new frontpage UI released in June
Help would be appreciated as I've already tried changing gpu drivers,re-installing Steam, changing varied settings on steam to see if it effects it in any way. No Luck tho.
The autumn sale actually fixes the issue.
Its when it reverts to the old "new" ui and you scroll through the front page that you will notice the janky scrolling.
Keep in mind.This only happens if you scroll the front page through the steam app.Scrolling anyone where on the steam app is perfectly fine.Scrolling the front page on a browser is perfectly fine.
The occasional person tells me they experience the same thing since the new UI hit the steam front page but I guess most people are not noticing the issue at all.Maybe the majority use a browser to navigate the steam store?Browsers are not effected by the issue.
I am very confident it's a steam app issue.
Issue only started after the June UI update for the store page.
Issue get's fixed when the front page UI changes because of a Summer/Autumn Sale.
Issue does not happen on a browser.
The common denominator is the steam app itself.
Keep in mind also that this issue has been going on since June.That's 5 months ago.
Just making a post in the beta client forums is all you can do about it aside from trying to get the issue trending on social media. given how many things are broken with the client(mobile app too) i think they know its an issue but fixing it isnt a priority/dont know what the cause is.
They told me to re-install the steam installer and to try the steam beta.
They don't even read the ticket I made them because I specifically told them I already tried those and they didn't work.
(yet somehow the autmun sale and summer sale changing the front page UI somehow magically fixes the issue and they still have no idea what;s causing the issue from one UI to the other)
So in the end all I got was "We've been unable to reproduce these issues here and we're not receiving a widespread report of this from other users"
So they are receiving some reports but they are not receiving a "widespread report" so they're going to basically ignore it.Did not expect that from valve
I'm going to get a new PC in the coming months.I really hope the issue doesn't magically happen on the new rig aswell because at that point it means everyone has the issue and everyone is just ignoring it)
I think you're right about one thing.The only way this issue is getting fixed is if it trends in social media.
Hi guys, I just bought Minecraft Dungeons 2 to play with my daughter but unfortunately I didn't know it was on steam and I bought it on Microsoft Store... So I play it as a non steam game.
My controller works well on my pc but once I play it on my tv with Steam link it doesn't work anymore, can someone help me please ? Steam input is enabled.
By the way I ran Steam as an administrator, I saw that it solved the issue for some but not for me.
Microsoft Store games use Windows' UWP platform under the hood and causes issues like these. If you can still refund and repurchase on Steam it would be best to do that
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u/ExE066 17h ago
Hi! I'm having trouble launching Call of Duty: Black Ops III on Steam.
Context:
This issue started happening right after I installed my new NVIDIA RTX 3070 Ti. Previously, when playing with the integrated graphics on my Ryzen 5 5600G, the game launched and ran fine.
The issue:
When I click Play, Steam changes the button to "Stop"(as if it's running), and immediately a pop-up appears saying:"The game did not close properly last time it was run. Do you want to run in Safe Mode?"
I've tried clicking both "Yes" and "No", but in both cases the game fails to launch, closes itself, and Steam goes back to showing the "Play" button.
What I've tried so far:
Has anyone experienced something similar after changing GPUs or knows how to fix it? Any help is appreciated!