steam offline mode - what a load of rubbish

marc2003

marc2003

marc2003

Soldato
Joined
6 Feb 2004
Posts
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England
i sold my old pc ages ago and i hadn't started steam for over a year. so when i built myself a little pc to play my old games again, i was quite pleased that steam only required a hundred MB of updates because i don't have broadband anymore. i'm using a 3G dongle which is pretty slow - and pricey.

anyway, i had hl2 + episodes working fine just a few weeks ago so i put steam in offline mode and also told it not to automatically update those games. so then i try to play episode two today but it won't let me saying it's not ready to play in offline mode even though i've played it very recently. i tried restarting in online mode and it tells me it needs to convert my files into a more efficient format. it says it will take just a few minutes of my time. as i have no choice if i want to play these games i've paid for, i let it start. but of course the first thing i do is check the downloads window and it says it wants 3GB of updates for ep1 and 6GB for episode 2. well that's ****ing great. that's about 40 odd quid on the prices i pay and it's some orders of magnitude more than i paid for the ****ing games themselves. why the **** do these ***** think it's acceptable to force updates on 6 year old single player games with no choice to opt out? to say i'm ****ed off is an understatement. hl2 still starts but i guess it's only a matter of time before they nobble that as well.

i know it's pointless whinging on here because you all have your shiny virgin/bt fibre connections and are probably laughing as you read this but i had to rant. :p
 
I agree, load of crap innit. I think the ep1/2 updates don't actually require that much bandwidth btw, the way it calculates it is 'wrong' and it doesn't actually download it all as part of the conversion. I did it the other day and 9GB would take about 5-6hrs to download on my connection, but it didn't take that long.

Another pet hate of mine is sometimes random games decide they need updating so I change it to never update this game if I'm not planning on playing it right now, but it still keeps the partial download listed in the download list with seemingly no way to get rid of it other than completing the download or uninstalling the game. I had TF2 in there for weeks once.
 
Steam updates are pure garbage for certain games its depends on the data files. Steam can only update the entire data file it cannot update the files within.

This is why its so crap at updates & often requires hefty downloads to patch minor things :(

IMO Steam's best feature is the Summer + Winter sales the rest is pretty lacking & basic considering how much money Valve made from PC gamers :rolleyes:
 
AWPC said:
Steam updates are pure garbage for certain games its depends on the data files. Steam can only update the entire data file it cannot update the files within.
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That's why all the games are being converted to this new format, in future updates should be quite a bit smaller as it'll only have to download the modified bits.

I agree though, offline mode is buggy at best and downright unusable at worst. Thankfully I've never been in a position where I've had to rely upon it.
 
HangTime said:
I had TF2 in there for weeks once.
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i'd assume all people need to be running the same version when playing online games so that's kind of understandable?? but as i only ever play single player games i'm not entirely sure if i'm right on that. :p

it just sucks that steam obviously checked online to be notified there are updates even though i put it in offline mode. i suppose i should have disconnected from the internet before running it but it's too late now. :o
 
In order to get off-line mode to work I had to disable the Network card im my computer, then enable off-line mode, then re-enable the Network card.

Nate
 
~Divine~Wind~ said:
If you have an external hdd I can dl them for you and send em mate. Just check my steam profile to see if I can dl what you want
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that's kind of you to offer but i don't have an external drive.

just out of interest for future reference, how would that work? can you create backup files which i could restore? would that work even though it's different accounts? i might have to grab myself a 32GB usb stick in a few weeks and stick a request in the member's marked wanted section. i'm too skint to buy anything right now.
 
Never had any huge problem with offline mode, OP nobody forced you to download over 3G, you could have easily used free WiFi at one of the thousands of fat food restaurants or cafes.

It is offline but content must be updated occasionally, the client too which you activated. The content optimisation process was done a fee months ago so clearly it was fine for quite a time.

No gaming platform is perfect and valve could improve it but I think it does a decent job..
 
Nate--IRL-- said:
In order to get off-line mode to work I had to disable the Network card im my computer, then enable off-line mode, then re-enable the Network card.

Nate
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running offline mode isn't the problem as such. steam starts ok and i can launch some games. it's just that it's decided 2 games need updating and it won't let my play them even though they were working perfectly fine in offline mode last week.
 
Halfmad said:
Never had any huge problem with offline mode, OP nobody forced you to download over 3G, you could have easily used free WiFi at one of the thousands of fat food restaurants or cafes.
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sure i'm going to lug my pc and 24in monitor down to mcdonalds and plug it in. besides don't they have daily bandwidth caps on the free access? i don't own any mobile devices. :/

where i live in only temporary so i cannot get any kind of fixed broadband. i can't even get a monthly contract 3G sim as my address won't show on the three website. i'm currently buying either 7GB for 25 quid or a 3GB sim from amazon for 11.50. that's fine for little steam updates and the fact i'm browsing right now. but i don't need a 6 year old single player game updating. i've never encountered any bugs or had any performance issues. all i want is a choice. is that too much too ask? evidently yes.
 
Where in the country are you Marc? If you're near Gillingham in Kent, you're more than welcome to stick your PC in the car (sure I can rustle up a spare screen) and use my broadband to get those things sorted. Much preferable to using mobile data at those kind of prices. Not a long term solution, I know, but if it helps tide you over and keep you in HL2, gotta be worth it!
 
Sadly but perhaps understandably this is where gaming is going, there is a growing assumption that gamers will have a permanent unmetered internet connection and the days where you could just install a game and then grab the latest patch as a download seem to be fading away. My work connection is about 20 times faster than my home connection so it would nice to be able to download game updates at work, but I'm not stupid enough to install Steam on company hardware. Game patches etc via http download would probably be fine.

Realistically in the modern day and age 3G dongle with data limits isn't really a viable option for anything more than a temporary situation, my only suggestion would be to play some other games that aren't requiring updates.
 
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FM works in offline mode :D.

I've never really had to use it to be honest, I know that it's better to set it up or something with Steam online :confused:. Couldn't really tell you as FM in offline mode has always worked and that's the only thing I play occasionally in offline mode now.

Other than the odd few games of FM on my MacBook Pro, I've not used offline mode since Half Life 2 was released.
 
Confused Stu said:
Where in the country are you Marc? If you're near Gillingham in Kent, you're more than welcome to stick your PC in the car (sure I can rustle up a spare screen) and use my broadband to get those things sorted. Much preferable to using mobile data at those kind of prices. Not a long term solution, I know, but if it helps tide you over and keep you in HL2, gotta be worth it!
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thanks but i'm in cheltenham, gloucestershire. a bit too far. :p

HangTime said:
my only suggestion would be to play some other games that aren't requiring updates.
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yup, that's what i'll have to do. i'm not that desperate to play them. i've already got other games on steam i've not even played yet and it's my own fault for not downloading them when i had the chance. but i naively thought i could at least continue to play the games i did have installed. how wrong i was.

i'll just have to wait until i get some more permanent housing sorted and maybe get broadband again.
 
marc2003 said:
that's kind of you to offer but i don't have an external drive.

just out of interest for future reference, how would that work? can you create backup files which i could restore? would that work even though it's different accounts? i might have to grab myself a 32GB usb stick in a few weeks and stick a request in the member's marked wanted section. i'm too skint to buy anything right now.
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Got a spare internal?
I don't mind pulling the side off me case.

I'd just copy the game files/folders that you wanted, then you just copy em over.

I normally start steam, start install, close steam, copy files over to steamapps then just reload steam, normally works fine as I've never used the steam "backup feature" just copy the folders lol

I'll have a dig around I might have an old HDD somewhere
 
It is an awkward situation you find yourself in but the downloads will not be as big as they say it is, try going to a place with free wifi and check it out and you will see it is a small file and not the monster they say it is.

I have to rant in the opposite way as the OP because an update to windows crashed my PC and after sorting that I formatted both of my SSD drives(one for boot up, one for Steam) and then steam downloaded everything I needed, I am thinking of formatting once a month now just to delete the rubbish that gets put on my system.

Origin was very good as well and I hate them normally!
 
Dunno if anyone has seen this or is interested (I'm still working my way thru the mod list so have yet to try it all out).

Basically it's a full guide for RealVision ENB as the name suggests, it's an ENB that errs on the realistic side rather than some other more filmy or saturated ENB's, also supposed to be less of a performance hit.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/30936//?
 
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