Steam forgets FF14 is installed

[The Swan]

I'm not sure what to do about this. Sometimes, after booting my PC back up, I launch Steam, and 14 isn't "installed" any more.

It's by no means detrimental, but it's really annoying. If I go to my Steam folder, all ~11 gigs are there, and if I launch the game via the boot .exe, it brings me to the launcher, and then from there, to the client just fine. No problems.

There's no way to "verify integrity" when Steam thinks the game isn't even installed. And when I do actually go to install it, it takes a moment to analyze pre-existing data, then apparently determines that none of it actually exists, deletes it all, and begins re-downloading again. I let it do this once before, but now it's happened again, and--like I said--it's very annoying.

Anyone know how to fix this?

[Freyar]

Sounds pretty inconvenient. Do you have steam installed to C:\Program Files\?

One other option may be to have Steam regenerate by deleting everything in steam's folder EXCEPT steam.exe and steamapps. This will set Steam up to think it has nothing installed, but you can easily restore them in the way you have for XIV already. This can screw up mods too, so it may be better to copy out your steamapps folder first, get your games back on there, then copy all the content back.

Should it still happen, I'd suggest running an error check on your disk that Steam is installed on.

[Nico Yazawa]

Oh I remember that happened, it's a steam problem and not FF14. I remember steam telling me a bunch of games uninstalled but they clearly weren't. it's just an odd bug that happens rarely. I forgot what fixed it, sorry.

[The Swan]

The point is to avoid reinstalling this crap yet again. And I don't see how cutting all the data out, and then re-pasting it back in is going to fix this.

[Freyar]

Publicado originalmente por Six:

The point is to avoid reinstalling this crap yet again. And I don't see how cutting all the data out, and then re-pasting it back in is going to fix this.

The point is to get Steam to reset. It's possible it keeps losing part of what is tracking what is installed. By having Steam regenerate, you reset the Steam client itself (not games) which may resolve the issue. A lot of problems I've had with the Steam client have been resolved by regenerating.

[Asphe]

To reset, delete the .blob but that means losing all your favs, cats and more. Seems to happen if you have cloud sync enabled and Steam exits while updating the config file/etc... point is a few games go 'missing'.

Do this instead,

Rename the FF14 folder.
Start Steam's FF14 installation
Stop it when it has created the new FF14 folder
Delete the new FF14 folder
Re-rename the original FF14 folder
Pull the cat's tail and you're done.

[The Swan]

What do you mean by "losing all my favs, cats and more?"

[Freyar]

The categories (tags) you've set up in your games list. I usually see it recover these days though.

[The Swan]

Okay, so getting rid of the .blob files does nothing. I got rid of those and restarted Steam multiple times, even rebooted my PC and logged out of Steam and logged back in. Nothing.

I tried the renaming thing as well. Don't know what "pulling the cat's tail" means, but doing what you suggested, Asphe, didn't work. I'm out of ideas, save for a full re-download.

[Freyar]

I'd run a check disk (error check) on your hard disk at this point.

[The Swan]

Redownloading seems to be the eventual path regardless of what I do. I also got the idea of backing it up. I went to the option to back it up in Steam, and then the backup failed, and it said I needed to validate my data. I know what happens when it validates my data--it decides it's incomplete, there's nothing there, and it redownloads everything. Damn auto-updates started the validation, but I paused it and turned auto-updates off. I checked the FF14 file folder in /common, and apparently when Steam begins validating games, it removes all critical .exe files until it's finished. So I had to let it finish and redownload again.

I don't think a check disk will help any, but I will try anything to fix this. It's getting very old very fast.

[Freyar]

This is most definately a Steam issue, not an issue with the game itself.

When you backed up Final Fantasy XIV, you used Steam's backup utility? That's usually a bad idea as it will validate the game against the cache Steam holds. Since Steam doesn't have the current revision, it will regress you to the last milestone build Steam distributes.

To back up the content without using the backup utility (which is what most people do), just copy the content from ...steam/steamapps/common/[GAME FOLDER] to some other directory.

In the case of the regeneration example, the full process would be this:

1. Copy ..\Steam\SteamApps\common\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn to another directory.
2. Copy ..\Steam\SteamApps\appmanifest_39210.acf
3. Delete everything in the Steam folder EXCEPT steam.exe and Steamapps.
4. Run Steam and let Steam "update" (at this stage it's actually regenerating.)
5. Once logged in, exit Steam completely.
6. Copy appmanifest_39210.acf back to ..\Steam\SteamApps\
7. Copy the game folder back to ..\Steam\SteamApps\common\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn
8. Start Steam, and it should recognize that the game is installed.

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This problem is strange and one I've not seen all that often. This is why I'm starting to think it may be hardware related.

----
I'd also submit a support ticket to ValvE as well.

[wd]

In case someone else is looking through this old post and is having the same problem I had:

The way I fixed it was to take off my steam skin, and then try to install the game through he library, for some reason the skin was messing with it and once I took it off it updated the status to installed and never gave me any problems after that, even with the skin. If you weren't already using a skin and that is not the problem just open it directly through the files, it's a bad fix but will have to do :\

[TheSuit]

Publicado originalmente por The Swan:

I'm not sure what to do about this. Sometimes, after booting my PC back up, I launch Steam, and 14 isn't "installed" any more.

It's by no means detrimental, but it's really annoying. If I go to my Steam folder, all ~11 gigs are there, and if I launch the game via the boot .exe, it brings me to the launcher, and then from there, to the client just fine. No problems.

There's no way to "verify integrity" when Steam thinks the game isn't even installed. And when I do actually go to install it, it takes a moment to analyze pre-existing data, then apparently determines that none of it actually exists, deletes it all, and begins re-downloading again. I let it do this once before, but now it's happened again, and--like I said--it's very annoying.

Anyone know how to fix this?

It happens if there is a read error on your hard drive
you can fix it by going to

Steam -> settings -> Downloads -> Steam Library Folder

Then clicking on steam folder ( not game installation )

[Gwydeon]

If this doesn't work for you, try the solution here:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/39210/discussions/0/1675812484354364704/?ctp=2

[DarkyTheRogue]

This just happened to me because my pc crashed and due to steam being ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, the failing of the sync has just perma screwed this for me to the point where I have to redownload everything even though I have the 50gb folder - which will take my a whole day (: