Mechanism for Counting Hours Played?

[Isme]

I play my original save from drop day of the game. Don't hang me, it's how I play. I still use only the original fighter. It's very challenging to play this way, 18 or so months with a 17 slot ship.
Anyway,
When I log in, in the game select screen, the number of hours played on my original, ongoing save is shown as around 100 hours less than what Steam says on my Library page - Steam says 350 something hours which is much more like it than the 207 or so hours listed by HG on the one save on the save selection screen.
There were other saves over time that have since been deleted but all together none added up to more than 10 hours.
Ideas? Obviously this is not really important but I keep wonder what mechanism is at work.

[MechWarden]

I know that Steam counts the entire runtime, including loading the program and updating shaders, as 'time played'.

Save files counts how long you've been running that particular save, but can exclude lost time from reverting to previous saves.

[Mr. Bufferlow]

I first noted the difference after the first update that rewrote the galaxy.

I think that inital play time was dropped by HG, but tracked by steam.

I have not done the math, but seems like it about 160 hrs difference for me.

[hanleymark]

Originally posted by Mr. Bufferlow:

I first noted the difference after the first update that rewrote the galaxy.

I think that inital play time was dropped by HG, but tracked by steam.

I have not done the math, but seems like it about 160 hrs difference for me.

This is about right. I still have my original save that I play from time to time and I see this difference too.

It's not a big deal. Just keep playing.

[Wehzy]

afk time counts aswell.

[NMSPlayer]

Yes, steam counts the whole time. The game doesn't start counting until you're in the game.

[Aachen]

Originally posted by Isme:

I still use only the original fighter.

That's excellent! Are you playing sans capital ship, as well? I'm a sucker for codes of conduct, so it's always refreshing to see other people's challenges.

[MechWarden]

Originally posted by Aachen:

Originally posted by Isme:

I still use only the original fighter.

That's excellent! Are you playing sans capital ship, as well? I'm a sucker for codes of conduct, so it's always refreshing to see other people's challenges.

I'm still toying with playing and recording a Class C only run in Perma-death mode. So far my search found one person that did that on YT.

Issue is mostly the lack of drive to do the video editing.

[Loltak]

Yep notice that also, on the 70h steam play, game count 45h .
Addionnaly to previous answer I think that when you are on certain panel, like discovery/guide... game time is not counted anymore. Game seems freezes in the background.
Also when game in the background, like after a alt-tab deskop.
But not always as in the freignter, refining items still works unlike in my planetary bases (If I not wrong).

[MechWarden]

Refineries, AMUs, Gas Harvester, plant growth, and some long mission timers are all based on time stamps and not on in-game ticks; and (should) keep progressing, even when paused or logged off.

(You can't pause the game while in Multiplayer, and it keeps going)

I'm not sure if pausing the game (check settings menu, Discoveries, Mission Logs, Alt-Tabbed out) pauses the save file's playtime ticker, but it might.