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Backing up Steam savefiles

The Black HunterThe Black Hunter The key is a minimum of compromise, and a simple,unimpeachable reason to existRegistered User regular
edited October 2010 in Moe's Stupid Technology Tavern
I need to reformat my computer, this will be the first time I have done so.

The issue is, my internet is utter shit, it took something around 20-25 hours to download Mass Effect 2 on steam. It also used up half my monthly net cap.

I bought some DVD-Rs, and was hoping to backup the game files to them

I tried through steam but apparently my D:/ drive is not an existing directory.

heeeeelp

any other helpful steps for backing up my computer and going through with the format would be very helpful

The Black Hunter on

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    RohanRohan Registered User regular
    edited October 2010
    Do you have a second drive in your machine? I have Steam installed onto another drive in mine and it really saves on having to re-download everything, or pack everything using Steam pre-format and then repack once done. That option is in there, I just don't know where, because I've no reason to use it myself.

    If you do have a second drive, just copy the Steam folder over, then when once you have finished your re-format and installation, just install Steam into the same folder, launch it, it'll update and boom, all done.

    Rohan on
    ...and I thought of how all those people died, and what a good death that is. That nobody can blame you for it, because everyone else died along with you, and it is the fault of none, save those who did the killing.

    Nothing's forgotten, nothing is ever forgotten
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    The Black HunterThe Black Hunter The key is a minimum of compromise, and a simple, unimpeachable reason to existRegistered User regular
    edited October 2010
    so I could, in theory, just copy the files of the games from the steam folder onto a DVD and then just paste it all back in once done?

    The Black Hunter on
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    RohanRohan Registered User regular
    edited October 2010
    Yeah, absolutely. To be more precise, if you are in need of space, just copy the Common folder inside Steam onto the dvd, install Steam again after the format, copy the folder back in, restart Steam... voila.

    Rohan on
    ...and I thought of how all those people died, and what a good death that is. That nobody can blame you for it, because everyone else died along with you, and it is the fault of none, save those who did the killing.

    Nothing's forgotten, nothing is ever forgotten
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    DHS OdiumDHS Odium Registered User regular
    edited October 2010
    Make sure you actually get your save files after backing up your steam files. Not all of them are stored in the Steam directory, some might be in My Documents, and others in harder to find hidden folders. For each game you want to keep your saves for that isn't part of the Steam Cloud, do a search online for their savegame location.

    DHS Odium on
    Wii U: DHS-Odium // Live: DHS Odium // PSN: DHSOdium // Steam: dhsykes // 3DS: 0318-6615-5294
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    The Black HunterThe Black Hunter The key is a minimum of compromise, and a simple, unimpeachable reason to existRegistered User regular
    edited October 2010
    excellent, thankyou

    The Black Hunter on
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    DehumanizedDehumanized Registered User regular
    edited October 2010
    Yeah, save files are stored wherever the fuck the game wants it to be. Life would be way simpler if every developer just used the %User Folder%\Saved Games\ folder, but alas almost none of them do. You'll want to scrub the following locations (at the least) to attempt to get your saves backed up:

    %appdata%
    All visible user folders (my documents in particular)
    subfolders of each game
    program files

    Dehumanized on
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