I am asking this because Outland is free until tonight on the Steam store and if you get it is permanent. However, due to internet restrictions, I can't download it right now. However, I managed to open Steam and click 'Add Game' from the store and I then went to Outland's page and clicked 'Install Now'. Then it took me to the page where it said:
- How To Download Games From Steam Without Paying
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- How To Download Games From Steam Without Buying
Thank you for purchasing Outland, it has been installed to your steam library
Then it said to click a link to install it, however, I don't want to currently. So if I just add it to my library is that enough to claim it or do I have to physically install it to my PC?
3 Answers
Dec 4, 2018 - Struggling to find great games on the Mac App Store? You need to let off some Steam. Here's how to use the Steam games distribution platform. Now that you have downloaded Steam it is time to start downloading and installing your Steam games. This is how you should go about doing that for free, or paid, Steam games. Arber Berisha. Once a game is activated on a Steam account it can't be activated in another Steam account, it is locked to that Steam account. If you wish to install and play your games on a different computer then simply download Steam onto that computer, Login to your Steam account, then download the game. How to activate a Steam key.
Provided you have added the game to your library while it was free, you will be free to download it whenever you like. You can also download it onto other devices too (via your steam account).
Yes, once the game is in your Steam Library you get to keep it regardless as to whether or not you installed the game on your PC.
When you clicked 'Install Game', Steam registered it to your account and provided you with a game key similar to the ones you get from the Humble Bundle or when you purchase a download code from a brick and mortar store. That game key is what signifies your ownership of the game and it's virtually linked to your account now.
From personal experience, I have acquired Minion Masters and Limbo through similar promotions without installing them, and both of them are still in my library. so I assume that for this game, the same rule applies.
Note that Valve is extremely hesitant to remove games from user libraries without their consent. In recent memory, even when games have been removed from the Steam store because the developer was banned, players who owned the game could still play it. for example, people who have bought Digital Homicide games before DH was banned from the store can still download and play them.
Valve has removed games from user Steam libraries in 2 scenarios:
- Some (but not all) games that had essential external services disabled that prevent the user from meaningfully playing the game. Note that this has to be explicitly requested by the publisher of the game..
- Games where the license key has been revoked by the retailer, most frequently because the payment processing has failed (chargeback from the card owner is the most frequent occurence).
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The new experimental feature of Steam allows you to play Windows-only games on Linux. Here’s how to use this feature in Steam right now.
You have heard the news. Game distribution platform Steam is implementing a fork of
This new feature is still in beta but you can try it out and play Windows-only games on Linux right now. Let’s see how to do that.
Play Windows-only games in Linux with Steam Play
You need to install Steam first. Steam is available for all major Linux distributions. I have written in detail about installing Steam on Ubuntu and you may refer to that article if you don’t have Steam installed yet.
Once you have Steam installed and you have logged into your Steam account, it’s time to see how to enable Windows games in Steam Linux client.
Step 1: Go to Account Settings
Run Steam client. On the top left, click on Steam and then on Settings.
Step 2: Opt in to the beta program
In the Settings, select Account from left side pane and then click on the CHANGE button under Beta participation.
You should select Steam Beta Update here.
Once you save the settings here, Steam will restart and download the new beta updates.
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Step 3: Enable Steam Play beta
Once Steam has downloaded the new beta updates, it will be restarted. Now you are almost set.
Go to Settings once again. You’ll see a new option Steam Play in the left side pane now. Click on it and check the boxes:
- Enable Steam Play for supported titles (You can play the whitelisted Windows-only games)
- Enable Steam Play for all titles (You can tryto play all Windows-only games)
I don’t remember if Steam restarts at this point again or not but I guess that’s trivial. You should now see the option to install Windows-only games on Linux.
For example, I have Age of Empires in my Steam library which is not available on Linux normally. But after I enabled Steam Play beta for all Windows titles, it now gives me the option for installing Age of Empires on Linux.
Things to know about Steam Play beta feature
There are a few things you should know and keep in mind about using Windows-only games on Linux with Steam Play beta.
- At present, only 27 Windows-games are whitelisted for Steam Play. These whitelisted games work seamlessly on Linux.
- You can try any Windows game with Steam Play beta but it might not work all the time. Some games will crash sometimes while some game might not run at all.
- While in beta, you won’t see the Windows-only games available for Linux in the Steam store. You’ll have to either try the game on your own or refer to this community maintained
list or a better-looking web version of the same to see the compatibility status of the said Windows game. You can also contribute to the list by filling this form. - If you have games downloaded on Windows via Steam, you can save some download data by sharing Steam game files between Linux and Windows.
I hope this tutorial helped you in running Windows-only games on Linux. Which game(s) are you looking forward to play on Linux?
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