Counting those hours... with non Steam games.

[Digital]

Why hasn't this been implemented yet? Now I know this has obviously been discussed before, but it's been a long while, and I believe this feature should've been implemented from near the start, Now I have a few non-Steam games, and mods for games, and the porblem is that Steam doesn't track the hours played for those, I assume it's a simple algorithm to just start counting how long the game is active, It doesn't keep track of how long I've played The Hidden, It's on Steam itself, even though it's only a mod, it still doesn't track how long I've played.

I've also got Guild Wars 2 in my list of non-Steam Games list, now I know I've stacked up plenty of hours playing that, but Steam won't tell me, it will only tell me the last time I played it... aaaannnddd It also keeps removing itself from my games list so i have to keep adding it every few days (but that's for a different discussion)


So, is this in the works, or has it been talked about by developers? If so, what's the official statement on this feature?

Also, I would like know your pros & cons for this feature.

[Marble]

Because shortcuts don't relate back to anything on Steam's servers, it would only be possible to record the time as long as the shortcut exists., If you swapped PC's, removed the shortcut, re-installed Steam etc., then the count would be lost anyway making such a feature essentially useless.

[ KARR™]

It also allows 'hilarious' jokes to be started. People would have dozens of hours in 'Half Life 3' or 3 days playing 'with your mother'.

If it's an external game, Steam can't actually know if it IS a game or if it's notepad that has been renamed.

[Digital]

Originally posted by KARR:

It also allows 'hilarious' jokes to be started. People would have dozens of hours in 'Half Life 3' or 3 days playing 'with your mother'.

If it's an external game, Steam can't actually know if it IS a game or if it's notepad that has been renamed.

So where is the harm with spending 50 hours playing "with your mother"? Steam already tells your friends and any profile lurkers that you are in a non steam game, I'm sure they could sort out some profanity filters and such.

Originally posted by Canti:

Because shortcuts don't relate back to anything on Steam's servers, it would only be possible to record the time as long as the shortcut exists., If you swapped PC's, removed the shortcut, re-installed Steam etc., then the count would be lost anyway making such a feature essentially useless.

Well when I switched PC's to my current, much better equip't PC, I copied my Steam files over to my new PC and everything was fine, so why doesn't it store a file/s that can track those hours in non-Steam games? yeah means people may be able to change some digits in those files and have a couple billion hours "tracked" but who's that harming?

[Marble]

If you do a fresh install on a different PC, the shortcut won't be there. If you add the shortcut, it won't carry your times over because Steam has no idea what the shortcut is for. It would require a total overhaul of the way it works for a feature that is essentially useless and prone to abuse. If you want time tracked for non-Steam games, use something like Raptr.

[Digital]

Originally posted by Canti:

If you do a fresh install on a different PC, the shortcut won't be there. If you add the shortcut, it won't carry your times over because Steam has no idea what the shortcut is for. It would require a total overhaul of the way it works for a feature that is essentially useless and prone to abuse. If you want time tracked for non-Steam games, use something like Raptr.

Well that's what i have been using, but It hasn't kept track of a few games I play, there's like a 10 hour difference, between actual steam game tracking and Raptr tracking.

[Marble]

If you sync your Steam account with the Raptr one it should pull all the time data from Steam by itself. This might not work if you were timing it with Raptr before connecting the Steam account, though. It might add the Steam time to the original playtime Raptr recorded itslf, not sure. I'd ask about it on their support pages because it sounds like something is wrong with yours.

[Digital]

37 hours of Killing Floor tracking by Raptr, 48 hours tracking by Steam, I did join Raptr quite late in the game, but it did update all the hours, but now it seems out of sync.

This is why i was saying about the Steam files tracking non steam games, and you mentioning that it wouldn't work because the shortcut wouldn't be there after transfering machines. But i know that shortcuts work if directed properly, so after transfering the file could keep the shortcut, and notify you if it's broken or missing, and all you'd have to do is re-add the non-Steam game and the shortcut would be fixed...

[Marble]

Again, times are kept on Steam's servers and are tied to the specific game. If the game isn't on the Steam database, what is it supposed to record times against? And if the times are stored locally, they wouldn't be visible to anyone else but you and would not transfer over to other devices and would be lost if you deleted them. The only way it would work would be for it to create a new database entry for every shortcut for every user and that is just plain madness.

[Tito Shivan]

You may have not noticed how all that stat tracking and time logging is nothing more than a 'incentive' to purchase your games on Steam.
You want all the candy? Come buy it from us.

[Spawn of Totoro]

Why does it matter?

[KillerKoala78]

Originally posted by TheBDK:

Use xfire. Problem = solved.

What he said.

[Τhe Rolling Cheese Wheel]

Originally posted by TheBDK:

Use xfire. Problem = solved.

For once I actually agree with this guy.
I don't want official steam statistics bloated due to pirates.

[Digital]

Isn't Xfire kinda... dated now? I had it years ago during the Dawn of War: Dark Crusade years, but I've never had it since...

[Τhe Rolling Cheese Wheel]

Originally posted by TheBDK:

Originally posted by The Rolling Cheese:

For once I actually agree with this guy.
I don't want official steam statistics bloated due to pirates.

I'm glad you agree. Actually, I couldn't care less.

Cared enough to reply, so that's something :)

[Digital]

well like I said the last time I used xfire was way back... when it was just an ordinary chat tool for you and your friends, and why can't it add a "temp ID" to a non steam game so It can track the hours played? a "Temp ID" that would not change that is unique to your account.

Originally posted by TheBDK:

Originally posted by RubberNinja125:

Isn't Xfire kinda... dated now? I had it years ago during the Dawn of War: Dark Crusade years, but I've never had it since...

And steam isn't dated? lol
Anyway when Titan bought Xfire they rolled out plenty new updates. If you bothered to look, you would have seen that already.