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Sir.Voltron Jul 24, 2019 @ 5:38am
Transfer game to my child's Steam Account
Apologies in advance as I feel this has been asked plenty of times before, however, I havent been able to find anything recently.

I have been using Steam for years now and have all my games in the one account. I purchased some Lego games for my son who loves playing them. I used my account as he does not have his own pc..... until now. I have built myself a new pc and cleaned up my old one and have now set it up for him (this is more because I tend to need my computer after work when he wants to play his games after school).

Now that he has his own PC I want to set him up with his own steam account. Obviously this will mean he has no games in his library.

I have no interest in the Lego games and want to transfer/gift whatever you want to call it these Lego/Young children games to his account so he can play on his computer. Is this possible? Everything I have read says no but i'm hoping something has changed?

I simply cant understand why it SHOULD'NT be possible to give them to him and have them completely removed from my account (I/we dont even care if his progress is cleared permanently and he has to start again). Surely Steam isnt so "backwards" and "consumer unfriendly" that they wont allow it as it puts up a very good case for physical media purchases over DLC purchasing, especially since that the games arent getting cheaper.

I have looked into family sharing but I feel this to be a terrible "work around" as I wont be able to play any of my games at the same time as my son playing a Lego game.

Any help would be appreciated. I'd love to contact Steam direct but cant seem to find any contact information.

Thanks!

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Showing 1-12 of 12 comments
Aachen Jul 24, 2019 @ 5:43am 
Licenses cannot be transferred, but the service does offer the family share feature.
Kargor Jul 24, 2019 @ 6:17am 
Originally posted by BootN:
I simply cant understand why it SHOULD'NT be possible to give them to him and have them completely removed from my account

It's part of the business model: anything sold to one account stays on that account, forever. There are no "used" games, no splitting-up of bundles etc.

Originally posted by BootN:
I have no interest in the Lego games and want to transfer/gift whatever you want to call it these Lego/Young children games to his account so he can play on his computer.

Now, I could go on that the Warner Lego games are on sale "a lot", usually at the 4.99 pricepoint or slightly below. That only works for games that are still being sold, though. If you're referring to other games -- they probably get sales too.
Last edited by Kargor; Jul 24, 2019 @ 6:30am
Dr.Shadowds 🐉 Jul 24, 2019 @ 6:39am 
You can do either:

A. Family share with him.

B. Buy games when on sale for his own library.

Now to inform you, and answer your questions.

1. You can't transfer/sell digital games once attached to the account, this have been a thing for over 15 years, and not something new either, this is also in the policy as well.

Steam isn't the only platform that does this either, there console market, mobile market, and other PC platforms as well.

2. You can get him Lego games whenever they do a sale, either checking on isthereanydeal.com for 3rd party retailers, or wait for it to go on sale on Steam. Majority of Lego games goes around $5 when they go on sale. Newest one such as 2018 and 2019 may still go around $10 ~ $20 when they go on sale.

3. You can contact support, but heads up, they can't help you with your issues as they only suggest what we have suggested already.
Steam support > My account > Data related to my account > Scroll to the bottom click on contact support.
ZanyScum Jul 24, 2019 @ 7:14am 
I get your reasoning for your case.
But imagine you are a seller of a game and people are able to "move" their games when they don't want them any longer. Like selling them after they played them? Would you want them to be able to do that? No, you would not.
Crazy Tiger Jul 24, 2019 @ 7:21am 
Hijackers would love to transfer games.

- hijack account
- transfer games
- yay, free games

Originally posted by BootN:
I have looked into family sharing but I feel this to be a terrible "work around" as I wont be able to play any of my games at the same time as my son playing a Lego game.

Actually, it's designed for your case. Set your sons account to offline and both you and he can play.

Licenses are for 1 account. That always has been so, but with physical media that couldn't be enforced. Digitally, it can.
Hanomaly Jul 24, 2019 @ 8:32am 
Originally posted by fauxtronic:
It would enable a black market too.

This is probably the biggest reason why transferring games isn't possible, or won't ever be possible. Companies don't like the black market.
J4MESOX4D Jul 24, 2019 @ 9:32am 
Originally posted by BootN:
I simply cant understand why it SHOULD'NT be possible to give them to him and have them completely removed from my account
Publishers and developers would not stand for this practice which is why Steam and no other digital platform in gaming allow for it.

This would create a black market for videogames and/or see pubs/devs lose out on revenue. I could buy a game for £50, finish it and then sell it under the table to another account for £25 - someone gets a cut-price bargain, I get half my money back and having played the game and the publishers lose out on a sale. It would probably obliterate the entire Steam Store in one day.

If something doesn't exist, there is usually a very good reason for it.
ElvisDeadly Jul 24, 2019 @ 10:02am 
Originally posted by J4MESOX4D:
Originally posted by BootN:
I simply cant understand why it SHOULD'NT be possible to give them to him and have them completely removed from my account
Publishers and developers would not stand for this practice which is why Steam and no other digital platform in gaming allow for it.

This would create a black market for videogames and/or see pubs/devs lose out on revenue. I could buy a game for £50, finish it and then sell it under the table to another account for £25 - someone gets a cut-price bargain, I get half my money back and having played the game and the publishers lose out on a sale. It would probably obliterate the entire Steam Store in one day.

If something doesn't exist, there is usually a very good reason for it.

This ^

It would be used to sell digitial copies of games second hand.

Also, as with most of these issues you have to understand how things work.

You never really bought a copy of a game that you can do with as you please. You bought a licence that enables you to play a game on a specific account. Its not the same as buying a physical copy of something, legally you own nothing you are allowed to trade or sell on
Last edited by ElvisDeadly; Jul 24, 2019 @ 10:03am
david.fischer.ch Apr 1, 2024 @ 12:41pm 
Hello,

I am on the same boat but our main focus is to transfer game progress / savegames from our account to our child's account.

We already are using the family sharing feature (+ playing offline whenever necessary to allow us playing to our favorite games while our children are playing to Lego games).

Does the official support can provide an answer to this question, is it feasible?

Games : Stray, Lego *, Worms WMV

Thank you.
nullable Apr 1, 2024 @ 12:57pm 
Originally posted by david.fischer.ch:
Hello,

I am on the same boat but our main focus is to transfer game progress / savegames from our account to our child's account.

We already are using the family sharing feature (+ playing offline whenever necessary to allow us playing to our favorite games while our children are playing to Lego games).

Does the official support can provide an answer to this question, is it feasible?

Games : Stray, Lego *, Worms WMV

Thank you.

Valve doesn't support games made by other developers. The games you listed are just regular single player games. The save games are just files on the local machine playing the game, it's not hard to move those files around. You can look them up individually. Or you can use something like https://www.gamesave-manager.com/

Save games generally won't be tied to a Steam account, game account, or a game license, unless it's some kinda of MMO/online only affair.
Ogami Apr 1, 2024 @ 1:00pm 
Nothing to do with your question directly but i recommend switching to the new Steam Family BETA in the client settings under "Interface".
Its much more efficent then the old Family Share.
You now can create "Steam Families" with up to 6 members, adults and children and everyone in the family shares all their games with each other.
Best is there is NO playing restriction anymore. You can all play at the same time even if the games all belong to the same account and family shared games can now even be played offline, not just by the owner.

Also for your question, you could use a website like PC GAMING WIKI to look up where the save games for the games in question are located on your PC.
But many games lock their save games to the Steam account who created them so even if you copy them to your childs PC/save location they might not be reconized.
Last edited by Ogami; Apr 1, 2024 @ 1:01pm
Bruce Apr 1, 2024 @ 2:17pm 
This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.
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Date Posted: Jul 24, 2019 @ 5:38am
Posts: 12