How can I delete local content from a game not in my list in Steam?

Question

I played the free weekend for Call of Duty Black Ops and I decided not to buy it.

However, now I have a folder taking up 8 GB of my SSD space in C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\call of duty black ops.

The game is not listed on my game list in steam (where I could right-click and select "delete local content")

Is it safe to delete that folder directly? Is there another folder I could delete to recover more space? Is there a way to do it from Steam (this would be preferred)?

Answer 1

You can use the Steam browser protocol to uninstall it:

steam://uninstall/<id>
Deletes the specified apps' cache files.

Generally you can find the ID you need by looking at the URL of its Steam store page — for example, http://store.steampowered.com/app/42700/.

Call of Duty: Black Ops' ID is 42700, so the link would be steam://uninstall/42700. Enter that into your browser's address bar or the Windows Run dialog (Win+R).

You can also pass it directly to the Steam executable as an argument:

Steam.exe "steam://uninstall/<id>"

In this case, it left behind a few files (~10 MB for me). Those can safely be deleted.

• folder: steamapps\common\call of duty black ops
• file: steamapps\call of duty black ops mp binaries.ncf

The multiplayer component actually has a separate ID (42710); uninstalling that ID did nothing for me, but you may want to try anyway, just to be sure.