Can I uninstall a Steam game without deleting the download?

[Owengee]

I'm not familiar with how this works.

I have really slow internet, so downloading a 20GB Steam game took a while. However, I'm troubleshooting an error with the game, and I was told I need to reinstall the game for it to work.

My worries is that when I "uninstall" the game, I'd need to redownload the whole thing over again, and I'm not too keen on waiting for days.

Is there a way to temporarily uninstall a game then reinstall it using the downloaded files? Thank you.

[Saint]

I don't think that's possible so you might have to reinstall everything.

[Aesthetic]

Backup the game files to another location and then uninstall the game.

When you want to reinstall, move the games back into the steamapps\common\ folder and start the download. Pause it, and then find the option 'verify integrity of game files" from the game in your library under properties

[Owengee]

Originally posted by Nightenhelser:

Backup the game files to another location and then uninstall the game.

When you want to reinstall, move the games back into the steamapps\common\ folder and start the download. Pause it, and then find the option 'verify integrity of game files" from the game in your library under properties

Thank you! I will try this. :)

[FPS]

Why the need to reinstall when you can verify the cache integrity? Steam will check the game files and the ones that are damaged|modified will be redownloaded

[raymaK]

just download the installer from web
it will delete and reinstall all files no deleting games

[Almalexia2]

Originally posted by FPS:

Why the need to reinstall when you can verify the cache integrity? Steam will check the game files and the ones that are damaged|modified will be redownloaded

That won't help you if you messed up with a mod, depending how you installed the mod. I've just messed up with Oblivion mods for example, and thought I'd do a quick uninstall to start over with a clean install, and ka-baaam, there I had to redownload the entire game again. you don't get problems like that if you buy from GOG, but GOG doesn't always have all the games you want, and the Steam sales are irresistible.

[FPS]

Originally posted by Almalexia2:

Originally posted by FPS:

Why the need to reinstall when you can verify the cache integrity? Steam will check the game files and the ones that are damaged|modified will be redownloaded

That won't help you if you messed up with a mod, depending how you installed the mod. I've just messed up with Oblivion mods for example, and thought I'd do a quick uninstall to start over with a clean install, and ka-baaam, there I had to redownload the entire game again. you don't get problems like that if you buy from GOG, but GOG doesn't always have all the games you want, and the Steam sales are irresistible.

Why did you ressurrct a 3-year-old post? And how is GOG better in this regard? You can dekete the game's folder manually for a steam game just as well.

[Almalexia2]

It's pretty hard to extricate meshes and textures when they're all mixed up, or worse, replaced. I didn't see it was 3 years old, I was looking up the topic. And it's a topical topic that applies to all of Steam's games. Anybody could for any reason want to uninstall and reinstall; it should be an option, though as plan B, backing up the game folders before you do anything to the game would probably be the best course of action. Tedious if you play a lot of games,especially bigger ones, but I suppose some games are more high-risk than others.

[Owengee]

To be honest I can't even remember making this post.

[Mr Heavy]

Of course you have to delete the whole game.