Does the Backup & Restore process just re-download your games?

[j3envolio]

Hi all,

I recently moved out to a place with very limited internet. Yesterday I had to reform my laptop (Ubuntu 20.04), but before I did I took a backup of all the games I had downloaded in Steam. I used the Backup & Restore feature found in "Steam" > "Backup & Restore Games...". The backup itself too a while, and ended up being around 100GB. I reformatted my machine, installed Steam, and started restoring the backup.

I'm confused by two things:

1. Why does Steam have to be in Online Mode in order to restore a backup?
2. It looks like Steam is just re-downloading the games over the internet, and not using the files stored in the backup folder at all.

I'm looking at my downloads page in Steam now, and it's just downloading the games. Fieldrunners is currently at 155mb/267mb...Why is this happening? I'd already downloaded the games before reformatting my laptop, all the games files should be in the backup folder created by Steam, no?

Am I completely misunderstanding how the Backup & Restore feature works with Steam?

[mimizukari]

It has to be in online mode to verify ownership and cache of game files you backup, and then it'll download any files that weren't verified from cache.

[Ogami]

In the future, DONT use the backup function. Its really not very good.
Just copy over the game files from your steamapps/common folder to a external drive or similar, and also copy over the correct "appmanifest" file for the games you backup.
Those are in the steamapps folder.

If you want to play those games again just move the game files folder back to steamapps/common and the appmanifest for that game to steamapps.
Then restart Steam and voila, the game will appear as installed in your library and ready to play.

I have a 8TB "Archive" HDD just filled with "backups" like that and never had a problem this way when i wanted to play something.
At most the game had so download a recent patch.

[j3envolio]

Originally posted by Kurumi Tokisaki:

It has to be in online mode to verify ownership and cache of game files you backup, and then it'll download any files that weren't verified from cache.

Ah ok, that makes sense. It's inconvenient, but it makes sense.

Originally posted by Ogami:

In the future, DONT use the backup function. Its really not very good...

Yeah, while waiting for this download to complete I've been researching other methods of backing up. Apparently there are some weird things to watch out for when backing up a Steam library on Ubuntu, but for the most post your solution looks like it should work. Thanks for the heads up! Maybe it's time Valve retired this Backup & Restore function.

[Kargor]

Originally posted by J3envolio:

Maybe it's time Valve retired this Backup & Restore function.

Or they could make it useful. Backups of the game files is kind of pointless anyway because Steam doesn't seem to care about download-traffic at all -- they don't do anything to even try and reduce it. There are people with limited internet so maybe they can find some use for backing up game files, but they can zip them up themselves if they want to.

Steam still isn't all that great when it comes to the important stuff -- save files. If your HDD blows up and you loose hundreds of GB of games, that's not an issue, just a matter of download time to restore them. A few bytes of savefiles, however... they might be lost forever if the publisher hasn't enabled Steam Cloud for the game.

Likewise, if the cloud desyncs and the user chooses the wrong option he'll just have trashed his savefiles, because Steam doesn't do versioning at all. Of if the game happens to bug out and trash a save.

Both of these -- cover games that aren't officially supporting Steam Cloud, and having access to at least some past versions of cloud content -- would feel a lot more useful than a backup function that only backups stuff that you can download anyway.

[j3envolio]

I guess from my perspective, backups are useful if you're planning to reformat your machine. But like you said, users can just take a manual backup of the game files themselves. I guess bandwidth limitations don't affect most of the folks on Steam, so why should Valve bother pandering to a minority?

As for save files, yeah your right. They've generally not very and could be handled in a way better way. Even using an implementation like Git wouldn't be too much of an issue. Just needs folks at Valve to give it a go.

[nullable]

Originally posted by J3envolio:

As for save files, yeah your right. They've generally not very and could be handled in a way better way. Even using an implementation like Git wouldn't be too much of an issue. Just needs folks at Valve to give it a go.

Well at some point it's up to you to manage your data., configurations, etc.

I use game save manager and a weekly task that backups save games to my dropbox. And whenever my dropbox gets full I delete the 2 or 3 oldest collection of backups.

[agga.agostini]

Yeah i think ill manually save backups from now on
Today steam has been a right ♥♥♥♥. And i have mucked about with skyrim se un installing re installing the game file veifying and re downloading common redistrutables and a mysterious 31.9 mb multi times then 5 hours into trying to get the game to load again re downloading c++ direct x audio.dll files update checks on windows to find that steam hasnt dowloaded and installed the game at all theres no skyrim at all installed but the pref.ini files in documents are there so im not dreaming. Then steam tries to download aniversary edition update for a game that apparently has disapeared completly ive checked for error viruses nothing, so i think oh well i install from my backup haha roflol yep bloody legendary. So now its compltley installed it again a d capped out my data 100 gig this month for skyrim. And steam works again. Sorry for the whine but im manually backing up and looking for a torrent as this happened, with skyrim and i d/l a torrent version and played the game through no issues so im hopping itll be the same with se/ aniversary edition as im over all the steam issues. Bring back the DVD!!!!!..
Had issues with gta 5 as well luck i had it on disc played with minimal issues
The internet is unreliable for relying on for game downloads from steam to windows to the telco providing data. Ever wondered why theres no insurance for this. Such is life

[Lithurge]

Originally posted by agga.agostini:

The internet is unreliable for relying on for game downloads from steam to windows to the telco providing data. Ever wondered why theres no insurance for this. Such is life

Something of a necro...

But your problems sound more like an unreliable internet connection than a Steam problem, I've never had any issues downloading through Steam. Maybe try another ISP and if you're using a mobile carrier that'll be your problem.

[Durhelwyr]

I thought restoring from backups on an m.2 would have been really fast rather than downloading for half an hour. That's my reason for trying backup but it just downloaded. Ah well. No rush.

[moyi]

Yes, I also tried installing from game backups and the games completely redownloaded instead. I checked the official Steam FAQ about game backups and saw this:

Backing up all of your games

It is recommended that you use the method outlined in Moving a Steam Installation as this will save time and simplify the backup and restore process.

Using the Steam Backup Feature
https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/4593-5CB7-DC3C-64F0

[Poketchu]

Originally posted by Ogami:

In the future, DONT use the backup function. Its really not very good.
Just copy over the game files from your steamapps/common folder to a external drive or similar, and also copy over the correct "appmanifest" file for the games you backup.
Those are in the steamapps folder.

If you want to play those games again just move the game files folder back to steamapps/common and the appmanifest for that game to steamapps.
Then restart Steam and voila, the game will appear as installed in your library and ready to play.

I have a 8TB "Archive" HDD just filled with "backups" like that and never had a problem this way when i wanted to play something.
At most the game had so download a recent patch.

i kno
i know it's been 8 years but what games have you tested this with>? by chance did you try street fighter 6 street fighter 5 or final fantasy 7 remake ? which are loaded heavily with drm checks?

[Emma]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.