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evie Dec 27, 2023 @ 11:32pm

Auto-update for hidden games should automatically be disabled or be visible in downloads queue

I had a game start updating this morning that was hidden. I realised that my steam client was taking the entire network bandwidth and had no idea why, there was nothing in the downloads page. Forum posts indicated it had something to do with precache shaders, so I tried that with no results. While closing steam, I saw the "Cancelling download" message for the game I have hidden, and I went to cancel it properly.

Either auto-updates for hidden games should be absolutely disabled to avoid these things from happening, because if it's hidden why does it need to be updated in the first place, or games that are hidden should still show up in the downloads tab so we know what steam is doing.

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Showing 1-4 of 4 comments

Satoru Dec 28, 2023 @ 12:02am

The game is hidden but it's still installed so it will receive updates as normal

Hidden only means it doesn't show up on the default searches in your library. It doesn't preclude it from being updated, since its installed.

evie Dec 28, 2023 @ 12:17am

I am aware but the problem arises when the game begins to auto-update, in which there is no way to know. My network has a particularly low ceiling and having this game auto-update hindered my connection without me knowing what was causing it.

If auto-update cannot be disabled for hidden games i think it would be better if there was some way to tell that a hidden game is being updated in the download queue, where it is absent.

The reasoning for this suggestion is knowing what steam is doing with your network because when this happened I freaked out for 20 minutes trying to figure out why the hell steam is using all of my bandwidth without telling me and this change will stop that from happening again.