Pause Games support

[Renn]

I wish the function of Decky Loader plugin SDH-PauseGame (https://github.com/popsUlfr/SDH-PauseGames) can be absorbed and made official into Steam.

This plugin monitors the focus change of Steam, once the game loses focus (or optionally Steam Overlay is open), it sends SIGSTOP to the game process to get the game paused. At that moment, the game stays in memory without consuming any CPU resource and does not progress without the users' intention. The game will be resumed when the plugin detects the game gets focus again and sends SIGCONT to the process.

This function would allow a console-like experience that the users can pause a game anywhere they want, and has been tested working well with most of the games available on Steam Deck.

Integrating this function into Steam officially would make it possible for the game developers to decide when the game should be paused and when not, which can make this solution much more versatile.

[Gwarsbane]

The game developer can already decide when a game should be paused or not, they can add that info in there. Most single player games will pause when the escape button/menu is brought up, others will pause when you alt tab out.

I doubt Valve would add anything like this as it would be messing with the game developers vision for their game as I know there was at least one game that didn't allow people to pause it or something like that and people were upset.

But if you want to be able to pause a game, go ask the game developer to put that into their game.

[Renn]

Originally posted by Gwarsbane:

The game developer can already decide when a game should be paused or not, they can add that info in there. Most single player games will pause when the escape button/menu is brought up, others will pause when you alt tab out.

I doubt Valve would add anything like this as it would be messing with the game developers vision for their game as I know there was at least one game that didn't allow people to pause it or something like that and people were upset.

But if you want to be able to pause a game, go ask the game developer to put that into their game.

This is a place to share "Suggestions / Ideas" I'm not sure why this one makes you so mad, but I'll try to explain myself. Having a game paused while unfocused is the de facto behavior for console gaming but not for Steam games, having it implemented as a Steam API would change that situation. And you can't simply ignore that there are so many old games that are no longer maintained can benefit from this change. There are many reasons that game developers can ignore a request for such a behavior if I as a player is asking, but if it's Steam, they cannot.

[HikariLight]

Originally posted by Renn:

Originally posted by Gwarsbane:

The game developer can already decide when a game should be paused or not, they can add that info in there. Most single player games will pause when the escape button/menu is brought up, others will pause when you alt tab out.

I doubt Valve would add anything like this as it would be messing with the game developers vision for their game as I know there was at least one game that didn't allow people to pause it or something like that and people were upset.

But if you want to be able to pause a game, go ask the game developer to put that into their game.

This is a place to share "Suggestions / Ideas" I'm not sure why this one makes you so mad, but I'll try to explain myself. Having a game paused while unfocused is the de facto behavior for console gaming but not for Steam games, having it implemented as a Steam API would change that situation. And you can't simply ignore that there are so many old games that are no longer maintained can benefit from this change. There are many reasons that game developers can ignore a request for such a behavior if I as a player is asking, but if it's Steam, they cannot.

As a suggestion forum, people are also free to tell you if your idea is bad or not.
In this case it's not doable as Steam CANNOT alter anything from games not developed by Valve.

[Komarimaru]

There's nothing Valve can do for this, would be solely up to the developer.

[William Shakesman]

Originally posted by HikariLight:

Originally posted by Renn:

This is a place to share "Suggestions / Ideas" I'm not sure why this one makes you so mad, but I'll try to explain myself. Having a game paused while unfocused is the de facto behavior for console gaming but not for Steam games, having it implemented as a Steam API would change that situation. And you can't simply ignore that there are so many old games that are no longer maintained can benefit from this change. There are many reasons that game developers can ignore a request for such a behavior if I as a player is asking, but if it's Steam, they cannot.

As a suggestion forum, people are also free to tell you if your idea is bad or not.
In this case it's not doable as Steam CANNOT alter anything from games not developed by Valve.

It would not be altering the game. It would just be making system calls that any application can do, not too different from Steam's own stop game button, which works even if the game devs have not designed their game for you to quit there. It is not as if there is no precedent for this.

That said, implementing it would likely require support. Do all games handle those sig commands gracefully? If not, it becomes Steam's problem when they implement this feature.

[Maria]

Originally posted by Renn:

This is a place to share "Suggestions / Ideas" I'm not sure why this one makes you so mad,

There is absolutely no trace of malice in what Gwarsbane posted, really people these days.

Just because they disagree with you, doesn't mean they hate you.

[HikariLight]

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

Originally posted by HikariLight:

As a suggestion forum, people are also free to tell you if your idea is bad or not.
In this case it's not doable as Steam CANNOT alter anything from games not developed by Valve.

It would not be altering the game. It would just be making system calls that any application can do, not too different from Steam's own stop game button, which works even if the game devs have not designed their game for you to quit there. It is not as if there is no precedent for this.

That said, implementing it would likely require support. Do all games handle those sig commands gracefully? If not, it becomes Steam's problem when they implement this feature.

Forcing a game to pause would require changing game files.
Which Valve/Steam CANNOT do for games not developed by Valve.
Steam is not gamings mom and it is not their job to mess with other developers games.

[William Shakesman]

Originally posted by HikariLight:

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

It would not be altering the game. It would just be making system calls that any application can do, not too different from Steam's own stop game button, which works even if the game devs have not designed their game for you to quit there. It is not as if there is no precedent for this.

That said, implementing it would likely require support. Do all games handle those sig commands gracefully? If not, it becomes Steam's problem when they implement this feature.

Forcing a game to pause would require changing game files.
Which Valve/Steam CANNOT do for games not developed by Valve.
Steam is not gamings mom and it is not their job to mess with other developers games.

OP LITERALLY JUST EXPLAINED THE MECHANISM FOR DOING THIS WITHOUT CHANGING THE FILES AND IT ALREADY WORKS (for most games). Why do people insist on commenting without reading the thread? I will NEVER understand this behavior.

Somehow you do manage to be correct about Steam not typically wanting to create standards for devs to follow. They almost never do that in any measure.

[Komarimaru]

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

Originally posted by HikariLight:

Forcing a game to pause would require changing game files.
Which Valve/Steam CANNOT do for games not developed by Valve.
Steam is not gamings mom and it is not their job to mess with other developers games.

OP LITERALLY JUST EXPLAINED THE MECHANISM FOR DOING THIS WITHOUT CHANGING THE FILES AND IT ALREADY WORKS (for most games). Why do people insist on commenting without reading the thread? I will NEVER understand this behavior.

Somehow you do manage to be correct about Steam not typically wanting to create standards for devs to follow. They almost never do that in any measure.

That's not what's happening. When you open overlay, it's simply telling the game that it's out of focus, nothing more.

Again, this has nothing to do with Valve.

Sigstop is an OS function as well, linux mainly. Windows use Sus[endthread etc.

[William Shakesman]

Originally posted by Komarimaru:

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

OP LITERALLY JUST EXPLAINED THE MECHANISM FOR DOING THIS WITHOUT CHANGING THE FILES AND IT ALREADY WORKS (for most games). Why do people insist on commenting without reading the thread? I will NEVER understand this behavior.

Somehow you do manage to be correct about Steam not typically wanting to create standards for devs to follow. They almost never do that in any measure.

That's not what's happening. When you open overlay, it's simply telling the game that it's out of focus, nothing more.

Again, this has nothing to do with Valve.

Sigstop is an OS function as well, linux mainly. Windows use Suspendthread etc.

Precisely

[Komarimaru]

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

Originally posted by Komarimaru:

That's not what's happening. When you open overlay, it's simply telling the game that it's out of focus, nothing more.

Again, this has nothing to do with Valve.

Sigstop is an OS function as well, linux mainly. Windows use Suspendthread etc.

Precisely

Then why did you comment as if Valve had to change things, without you knowing what Sigstop even was?

It's game dependent, and OS dependent.

[William Shakesman]

Originally posted by Komarimaru:

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

Precisely

Then why did you comment as if Valve had to change things, without you knowing what Sigstop even was?

It's game dependent, and OS dependent.

Because OP is requesting Valve include this functionality within their program, such that Steam would send the OS calls, same as the plugin he currently uses does.

[Komarimaru]

Originally posted by William Shakesman:

Originally posted by Komarimaru:

Then why did you comment as if Valve had to change things, without you knowing what Sigstop even was?

It's game dependent, and OS dependent.

Because OP is requesting Valve include this functionality within their program, such that Steam would send the OS calls, same as the plugin he currently uses does.

Or, since they brought up Sigstop, set it up themselves. Last thing we need is Valve digging deeper into an OS's functions.