Effective Guide Writing: A How-To

Guides can be a great tool for general information, walkthroughs, achievement hunting, game tips or just helping the community tackle problems within Steam itself. If you're looking to start making a guide of any kind, but don't know where to start, or a are looking for assistance creating something within your guide, let this be a tool to help you solve your problem(s) and help you create an effective Steam guide.

Step №1 - Creating a Guide

This part is kind of obvious, though something I find to be the most difficult. The beginning of a guide can often times be the most difficult: What do you want to focus on? How should you structure it: text, pictures, gifs, video links or some combination of them all.

Do you want to make it for a specific game, or maybe you don't want to write one for any one specific game at all? The single most important thing to take into consideration is how to organize it all. I can only speak for myself, but a highly disorganized guide will keep me from utilizing it at all.

If you want to create a guide for a particular game hub, simply go to the "Community" hub from the game's store page or your own library, then select "Guides" and then "Create Your Own".


Should you desire to make a guide not associated with any one particular game, you can use the link below to create one. Keep in mind that guides without an associated game will only show up on your profile's guide list or whatever showcases you add them to.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/editguide/?appid=753

Step №2 - Basic Guide Information

While called "basic" guide information, having a cohesive title and description go a long way in making a useful guide. I always recommend a short, to-the-point title (think of it like a book title) for the guide you're writing. Tell the reader what the main focal point of your guide is going to be.

The description of the guide underneath should be an extension of what the title says with an elaboration on the contents without going overboard. Typically, a couple of sentences will suffice.

Optional - An optional bit of flare you can add in your guide description could be what I like to call a "Guide Photo Header".


While note necessary, you can use it as either an extension of your guide description, or as a personal image for all your guides. I use a combination of the two; a general image for information guides and one with added information for all of my achievement guides.

If you'd like to add one and you have no previous background in digital art or image creation, a great starting point would be free programs, such as Gimp and Adobe Express if you're trying to make something with a budget of zero. To center the image, you want something with 915 pixels in length.

While Steam will automatically adjust oversized images in guides themselves, they will not for images within the guide's description, which will cause it to cut off. The length mentioned above will center the image.

If you decide to add one (image) in the description, you cannot upload it in the guide and paste it like a normal picture. For something like this, you'll have to host it externally. I'd recommend using Imgur and will be using it for this example.

Simply upload whatever image you want to use onto Imgur and follow the instructional gif below:

Once you have the link, go to your guide description under "Basic Guide Information" and paste it:

Lastly, your branding image, or guide "thumbnail" is the image that shows up when people look at guides for a specific game. It also shows as the image for guides you have in your showcases on your profile.

Branding images can either be static pictures, or .gif animated pictures under 2Mb. The key to a good image is something related to the guide, game, or general feel about the guide.

Keep the image to a perfect square with a minimum of 185x185 pixels to about a maximum of 500x500 pixels.

This will ensure the image isn't stretched and Steam doesn't add those pesky black bars to fill in the gaps.

Always remember that the thumbnail and description that shows on the guide is its first impression and can drive traffic to or away from it. Make yours stand out!

Step №3 - Contributors

Contributors, or other authors of a guide can only be added and removed by the guide creator and can be found on the front page of the guide. These can be added and removed as see fit by the owner of the guide.

Before adding a contributor, you need to know be aware that contributors can alter and remove content from the guide.

Guides that have one or more contributors attached will share any rewards points evenly if rewards are given to said guide. It is always best to only add people you trust to as a contributor.

All contributors have to accept your invitation to be tied to a guide and can remove themselves at any time they deem appropriate to do so.

Step №4 - Programs

There's a multitude of programs out there that can help you create just about anything you want, I want to focus on just the free websites and programs. Not everyone has money to burn on programs and software. Creativity shouldn't be hindered by your wallet. With that said, here's some helpful, free programs and websites that can assist in your guide creation:

• GIMP - Probably the most obvious answer out there. GIMP is the best software to use to rival things like the ridiculously overpriced Adobe. It has a bit of a learning curve, but it has a plethora of helpful tools to get the job done.
  
  
• Adobe Express - While regular Adobe is expensive, they do have a free version with some basic tools and abilities that can help with image editing and gif creation for things like guide thumbnails and such.
  
  
• Paint 3D - This program is no longer updated, but if you have Windows 10 or higher you can still download it online. A quick way to do basic resizing of images quickly without having to boot up heavy programs. I use it for map making and quick transparent images
  
  
• Screen to Gif - I use this to make all my gifs. It's very lightweight and extremely easy to use.
  
  

  Websites

  
  
• EzGif - A free website to edit, resize, combine and optimize gifs to reduce their file size to get them to upload as gifs on Steam utilizing the 2Mb or less criteria: https://ezgif.com/
  
  
• RemoveBG - A simple website to remove the background from images in one click: https://www.remove.bg/
  
  
• Photopea - An online only photo editor. No program downloads of any kind: https://www.photopea.com/
  

╔ Achievement Guides

Achievement guides are one of the main staples of Steam guides and some of my favorite guides to make. I break these up into two categories:

• Individually Listed Achievement Guides - These are when you break down each achievement individually based on similar criteria to unlocking them, such as all online achievements, co-op achievements or anything else that might help organize said guide. These typically aren't in walkthrough form and are more so a search tool than a comprehensive walkthrough of the entire game.
  
  These types of guides are more appropriate for games with little to no missable content. An example might be something like this:
  https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3083752831
  
  
• Walkthrough Achievement Guides - These are when you detail, from start to finish, how to not only complete the game, but complete each achievement in chronological order. These are ideal for games with a plethora of missable content and missable achievements.
  
  You don't want to make a guide that causes a player to miss something or have to do additional playthroughs due to the way you structure your guide. An example might be something like this:
  https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2863854416

Whether you use one or another is up to you, but some games lend themselves better to one than the other. If you have a linear or semi-linear game, I'd recommend a walkthrough style achievement guide.

If you have a free roaming game with few or no missable achievements, it might be better to do an individually listed achievement guide that states what to do and how to do it. If the player can simply return to anything that they missed, a walkthrough style guide might not be necessary.

Neither of these are hard rules, so use your best judgement based on what you're working on.

╟ Achievement Guides

Structuring achievements would be the next step and that part is up to you. Design is up to you, but I recommend making clear and concise breaks so it is easily legible. I break up achievements with something colorful that matches the theme of the game. For example:

Be creative and do whatever you feel looks the best. Some other alternatives I see people do is box off the achievement description with code boxes:

Achievement text, pictures or both will go here if you're using code boxes. 

It creates some nice spacing and helps separate one achievement from another.

When adding the Steam achievement thumbnail that developer adds on Steam, not all of them size them properly. The original size of achievement thumbnails is 64x64 pixels, but developers can make them as large as 256x256 for some reason, so adjust them accordingly to your liking.



There's no right or wrong way to set up your achievements, so get creative in designing it and see what you can make!

╚ Achievement Guides

Writing - The single most important portion of any guide is clear, concise and well structured writing. Nothing paints a poor picture like subpar instructions that are hard to understand.
 
Screenshots - Screenshots are incredibly helpful and I highly recommend using them. Not everyone wants to follow walls of text and screenshots not only help to break that up but help those that are more visual readers.

If you're looking for something to capture screenshots with, you can use a variety of methods such as Steam's built-in screenshot option ([F12] by default), print screen if you're on windows, or video capture programs and then dissect the photo you're looking for.

.Gifs - Gifs aren't necessary, but can add some nice flare to a guide or show something short that maybe text/screenshots can't get the point across with. They are a nice middle option without having to go to a full video file.

There are many, many programs that you can use for free to make gifs. Programs I use include "ScreenToGif" and Microsoft windows built-in screen recording. You can then use programs like the aforementioned "ScreenToGif" to slice up the video to make said gif for uploading.

Videos - Videos, in excess, can actually hamper your guide's usefulness and traffic. Over the years of being on here, traffic to video-only guides receive less attention than those of text and photos.

While a video here and there can be beneficial in limited cases, but I highly advise from using links to outside videos, especially those not made by you. Making a guide and linking someone else's work is just lazy.

╔ Steam Errors

While working on guides, you'll undoubtedly come across error messages that prohibit you from doing what you want to do. Sadly, Valve doesn't provide sufficient explanations for what those errors actually mean. Here is what I've learned so far on why certain errors come up and what they mean:

• Error Code 15 - You'll see this one if you're trying to make changes to your guide and go to his the save button. Every time you save a guide, it goes through the automated screener that Steam has built in to scan for malicious links.
  
  When it is going through that, you cannot make any changes to your guide and will encounter this error. So watch out for the notice at the top of your guide when that happens:

• Error Code: Steam Quota - This is undoubtedly the worst error to get. The "quota" is the limit you can upload to the cloud through Steam. Every screenshot, picture or artwork piece you upload uses cloud storage.
  
  If you hit the limit, there are a few solutions. As someone with extremely image-heavy guides, I have designated "Upload" accounts (see above in the "Contributor" portion of the guide) that I set as contributors and upload my images. My main accounts hosts all of them so they are in one place.
  
  A temporary solution is to remove screenshots you don't need/want to free up space if you don't plan on making too many guides. For those looking to make dozens, you'll need those upload accounts.

• File Upload Failed: 29 - This is a harmless error that stems from uploading a picture that you already uploaded into your guide. The upload will automatically fail to try and prevent duplicate pictures.

╚ Steam Errors

One of the most annoying errors you can get doesn't give you a message at all: broken pictures. For those that make guides, you're all very familiar with this issue. After several conversations with Valve Support, they have yet to isolate the problem and have told me on numerous occasions that there is no fix at this time.

So what are broken images? They are the images you upload to a guide that the server hosts. Sometimes they fail to either be carried over during server maintenance or just, break somehow. Truthfully it isn't known what causes this, but it is highly, highly recommended that you save backups for everything you write and everything you upload. The worst feeling is when you have an image in game you took and you lose it with no way to go back and take another screenshot.

While images can cause issues, I've never had a guide's text disappear, but it is always good to keep backups.

So, what does functioning image look like compared to a broken one? A healthy image, when hovered over in "Guide Contents", will display the photo and the size of said photo. A broken one will display no image, the file size will say 0.0Kb and it will show a picture of what appears to be a torn piece of paper.

It can also be completely blank. Now, don't mistake images that are actively loading as broken images. Guides with dozens, hundreds or even thousands of photos take time to load. Here's what to look for:


From what can be observed over the years, guides linked to Steam games suffer from broken images, while community guides that aren't linked to games tend to not be plagued with this issue.

While this isn't factually guaranteed, it is what I've observed over the years of making Steam guides.

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For more of my guides, check out the link below:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1304735272
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