STEAM wont be supported by Windows 7 after 6 months. Do we lose our games?

[AnthoniusII]

Srteam announced that it wont be available in W7 adter 167 days . Does this mean that we wont be able to play the games we payed for?

[alhoon]

I don't think so. Not supported means that the updates steam gets won't be on par with windows 7. Which may cause glitches with steam down the line (and not immediately) but not with the games themselves unless things get so bad that steam auto-crashes to desktop. In that case, you could simply roll-back the updates, I think.

If you want to be 100% sure, I believe you can keep steam in offline and don't receive those updates, your games will certainly continue to work exactly as they did.

[Dismounted Feudal Knight]

I don't think so. Not supported means that the updates steam gets won't be on par with windows 7. Which may cause glitches with steam down the line (and not immediately) but not with the games themselves unless things get so bad that steam auto-crashes to desktop. In that case, you could simply roll-back the updates, I think.

This is not the case, according to Valve. There will be underlying client updates that simply will not run with 7 or 8.

----

If I hear of a legit way to patch up 7 in a way that works around these updates, I'll try to remember to forward it here but I have no news on that right now. There is a determined classic windows community I'm following that will at least try.

Otherwise, it sucks but all kings fall eventually and 7's reign has been over in the mainstream for years. If you are opposed to the march of Microsoft, it may be time to start playing with Linux distributions which are collectively still rough but when they work/are configured correctly they runs old and new games alike well and many distributions have a strong technical future. The use of 7 is ill advised for anything with an online dependency, and the use of Steam has always been just that with nebulous or nonexistent answers to 'what happens when Steam goes away'. I don't like the rugpull but that's where we're at from a mainstream perspective.

[AnthoniusII]

STEAM replied to my client support ticket. They are not sure if the games will be still playable aftet the transmision from W7 to newer ones and they recomend to upgreade my Windows.

[Dismounted Feudal Knight]

About what I expect, 'just upgrade' is the vast majority of the response you will get and for the most part it is the path of least resistance in the long run if you can adapt to the change.

[AnthoniusII]

STEAM reply:

We understand that updating your operating system might be a hassle, but it is crucial to ensure the continued security and stability of your computer and Steam account. As mentioned in our announcement, Microsoft has already stopped providing security updates and technical support for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1, which makes these operating systems more vulnerable to new malware and other exploits that could compromise your PC's performance and security and by extension pose a risk to other users of the Steam platform you interact with. I appreciate that Windows 7 Ultimate works great for your specific setup but it has not received security updates from Microsoft in a long time and exposes your account and by extension other players you interact with to a risk that increases over time. Insofar we need to balance the interests of the less than 0.1% of Steam users who are currently on Windows 7 against the legitimate interests of all others.

In order to continue enjoying Steam and the games you have purchased, we recommend updating to an operating system that actively receives security updates. We have zero incentive to lock you out of your games or to drive Windows 10/11 sales as you imply.

If you are opposed to Windows 10/11, we suggest that you create a partition or a virtual machine on your hard disk that runs Linux. The vast majority of Windows 7 games run on Linux through the Proton compatibility layer and in contrast to Windows 7, Linux continues to receive security updates. Valve makes significant investments to make Windows games run on Linux, which is only possible for us because of its free and open source license.

Steam Support
Ella

[alhoon]

Well, Ella is right, Antonie.
May I ask, why don't you want to make the jump from Win 7 to win 10/11? They are much safer.

[AnthoniusII]

Well, Ella is right, Antonie.
May I ask, why don't you want to make the jump from Win 7 to win 10/11? They are much safer.

Because my modding material and tools taht work fine in W7 are moree than 300GB .... And there is no way to restore all that material and install it again to a 17 years old PC with DDR2 . The amount of time of move the Photoshop ONLY to an other disk and re-intsall it to the disk after the format and with W10 is huge.

[alhoon]

17 years old computer?! Weeell... win 10 won't work on it probably. I am amazed your computer still works after all that time. If I may say so, it won't work forever. You better start making backups.

[AnthoniusII]

17 years old computer?! Weeell... win 10 won't work on it probably. I am amazed your computer still works after all that time. If I may say so, it won't work forever. You better start making backups.

This PC wont stop untill weill go no further. You may not aware of it but 16 years ago iin the old Kafeneio i posted that i was modding via PC from an Internet Cafe and many Greeks (including Garb) made a secret fundraiser and with the small amount of money i had they sent me money to buy this PC and i gave them a promise to finish TGC. I intent to keep my promise. This PC is sacred.
EDIT The PC is 16 years old because the fundraiser was made a year or more after registered in TWC (i was .org member before).

[alhoon]

All good Antonie, but at some point, this PC will suffer some permanent hardware failure. Computers were not built to last for as long. It says a lot about your dedication to this PC that it still works after so many years.

[William the Silent]

I already noticed that my MTW1 doesn't function proper anymore.
In field battles you cannot direct your units to a certain spot anymore.
Still loved to play MTW once and a while.
I guess keep your old computers and games.

[Basileos Leandros I]

Just for information, MTW works reasonably well with Windows 10. No major issues but it's not ideal.

[AnthoniusII]

STEAM does not respond to W7 anymore. How do I playmy games ofline without "opening" STEAM?