Huge Warning For Steam Deck Users Installing third-party launchers and games

hey Deckers I have some bad news now this change has not broken absolutely everything but it breaks a lot of stuff but I did need to get your attention this is really breaking a lot of guides I'm seeing tons of comments on the channel and I can see that a lot of other creators are going to be affected by this as well if you're just installing stuff directly from the steam store then you're not going to run into this issue but if you are side loading or adding apps from other parties things like third party launchers or games that require special launchers Etc then this will affect you this change seems to be removing all compatibility files when you remove a non Steam app from Steam now doesn't seem like a huge problem and actually for the most part is quite beneficial to actually clean up a lot of those unwanted files but if you're using an installer to install another game for example most of our steps in our guide are to remove that installer as part of the process and then point a new game at the direct app XE that you just installed right so for example if you've just installed the Battle.net launcher then that will install in the compatibility folder the program files for the actual launcher itself we then say remove the installer.exe from Steam and then read add a game of the Battle.net XE directly however the files that you just installed are actually in the compatibility folder of the installer which Now by you removing it has deleted those install files now this especially goes for genin impact and all the third party launchers like Battle.net Uplay epic games and many many more the Final Fantasy install for example I will try and Link this video to those guides so that people can get ahead of this but it will be a breaking change for pretty much all of the guides that are out there with third party launchers or installer files unless you are able to install those programs to a separate folder on your steam deck so that when you do remove that file then it deletes the installer files only and you can still go and find the files that you just installed the alternative is to actually just repoint the target of the installer file to the new XE so instead of removing it from Steam just go into the properties and change the target it's a little bit more fiddly but that will prevent those files from being removed now we don't know exactly when this change was introduced it's definitely in the preview channels and beta channels but we are seeing people reporting this on some of the stable updates as well this is an undocumented change as far as I can see I don't see any documentation saying that they are now cleaning those files up when they're removed from Steam and that's why we had programs like the deul loader plugin to remove compatibility folders that were left over from uninstalled games so it's definitely a positive move from valve however it does break a lot of the guides that are out there let us know in the comments below if you've been affected by this and whether you can confirm what version you're on to see where this is affected thanks for watching and see you in the next one

Channel: Steam Deck Gaming

Views: 46,432

Keywords: steam deck, steam deck gaming, steam deck gameplay, steam deck installers, steam deck missing files, steam deck comaptibility folders, steam deck ff14, steam deck launcher issues, steam deck battle.net, steam deck uplay, steam deck epic games launcher

Id: Qu-Kriz1TZ8

Length: 3min 23sec (203 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 21 2023