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5

I own a lot of games on Steam, and I'm overall a big fan of the service.

However, one thing about it really bothers me, and I'm wondering if anything can be done about it.

Let's say I have two different online, multiplayer games, both of which I legally own. If I bought these games normally, I could be playing one of them online, while my fiance could play the other one online on another computer.

However, with Steam, I can only be signed in on one computer at a time. So, despite the fact that I have bought about 40 games, if I'm playing one of them, someone else in my house is not able to play any of the others.

Is there a way to get around this? I don't think this is illegal or immoral as I own both of the games in question, and only one person is playing the game at a given time (same IP address and the same household, so it should be easy for Steam to verify that I am not sharing my games unfairly).

If I had bought simple boxed copies, this wouldn't be an issue, but since I became such a fan of Steam, I can't play any of those games at the same time as my fiance.

Is there anything that can be done?

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7 Answers

up vote 24 down vote accepted

As far as I know, you can't do that. If one of you wanted to play single player, then you could possibly set one computer to Offline Mode before starting the game, and then the other person should be able to log in on the other account and play multiplayer, but both of you being online at the same time should not be possible.

Keep in mind, this is technically not allowed. Steam's agreement says you're not allowed to share your account or your games, that includes your fiancee. I don't think they actually do anything about it as long as you're not talking about it on steam chat or their forums. However, you still risk losing your account and all your games when bypassing their rules.

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The offline 'exploit' is undetectable. I've used it a couple times at LAN-parties. – user56 Jul 21 '10 at 10:00
@Arda Xi it's hardly "undetectable". All they'd need to do is just keep a log of whenever you launch a game (on your client). Then the next time a client connects they could check for any overlap between clients. I'm not saying that they actually do this, but this would be pretty easy for them to do if they wanted to. The only way to be really undetectable would be to permanently keep a client offline. – TM. Jul 21 '10 at 22:56
Or you could remove the log. But, since no such code is not implemented, it is undetectable. – user56 Jul 21 '10 at 23:48
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@Arda Xi: "no such code is not implemented"? double negation doesn't confuse me. not. :p – Zommuter Jul 22 '10 at 8:26
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@Arda Xi, just because they don't seem to enforce it at the moment, it doesn't mean it's not implemented. Lot's of games leave things behind that could be looked at for sure... save game files, gameplay stats, steam cloud data that hasn't been synced, error logs etc. Undetectable is giving a false sense of security. It's definitely detectable, the question is just whether or not Valve chooses to do it. – TM. Jul 22 '10 at 20:42
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up vote 12 down vote

This is technically against the Steam terms of service. You have not purchased the game, you have purchased a license to play the game. It's buried in that legalize and the difference is subtle but important. You have permission to play the games on your account but your fiance does not. You have permission to take your games anywhere but you can only play them on one machine at a time. Steam works on an individual basis not a "friends and family" basis, so only one person can play that game at a time, and technically it should be you. If your fiance wants to play a game she needs to purchase a license to play the game on her own account.

The steam TOS is located here, http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/

Valve hereby grants, and you accept, a limited, terminable, non-exclusive license and right to use the Steam Software for your personal use in accordance with this Agreement and the Subscription Terms. The Steam Software is licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership in the Steam Software.

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I was going to post this. +1 instead. – StrixVaria Oct 11 '10 at 22:27
up vote 3 down vote

No, there's not way that I know of to accomplish this.

See this related question in which I have the same problem, I found no way around this limitation.

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up vote 3 down vote

I believe you can. If you log into an account, then go into 'off-line mode' you can log in somewhere else. You may have to disconnect the first machine from the network/internet before logging in again.

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Thanks for the suggestion, but I'm specifically trying to play two games online. – TM. Jul 21 '10 at 3:32
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Oh yeah. Well you are out of luck then. :( Tho I have two online games played together on a LAN using a similar method, but that was the same game. – Tyronomo Jul 21 '10 at 23:33
up vote 3 down vote

The only way to do this would be to have the 2 games on different accounts.

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2  
So you'd actually be best of by creating one account per game :-/ – Zommuter Jul 22 '10 at 8:24
up vote 3 down vote

It depends on the game. In my experience, some Steam games do not make use of Steam's DRM and can be launched outside of Steam and are not subject to Steam's locking. Figuring out which games use Steam DRM and which do not is tricky, however, and some that may not be using Steam's DRM may be using some other DRM product.

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up vote 1 down vote

Brandon's answer pretty much covers it, except it misses out on one small detail.

There are games that you actually can play on-line multi even when Steam itself is in Offline Mode. Example would be Relic games (Company of Heroes, Dawn of War) don't care about Steam being On-Line, as they use Relic.com account for on-line multi. I suspect there are more games from other distributors, which act in similar fashion.

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