Steam Forum

Hi there!

I was an advocate a couple of years back, but eventually got rid of my Mac and spent some time with Windows 7. I've once again left Windows behind and have embraced Ubuntu Linux. =) Thus, I have returned to my good old pals, Codeweavers! =D

I'm trying to learn the ropes again as CXG has developed a lot these past two years.

My particular (and simple) question is this:

Is it ok/safe/recommended to install multiple Steam games in the same Steam bottle? Or should I create a new Steam bottle for every different game from Steam I want to play?

I ask because it used to be recommended (and I think it still is) to have a separate bottle for every game, so that we can tweak and customize the environment to best help that particular game run.

Any insight you can provide on this matter will be most welcome.

Thanks!

Hi,

It's safe enough to have a bunch of steam games in a single bottle. But I would recommend that you back up your games in some way, just in case.

Say, you install a game and don't realize it needs .Net 4.0 (known not to work). The partial installation and subsequent removal of .Net 4.0 might or might not affect the other games of the bottle.

Personally, I install small steam games in the same bottle, and 1GB+ games on their own. That way, if I accidentally ruin a bottle I won't have that much data to recover/redownload.

awesome, thanks for the speedy reply!

can i ask one more question? steam seems to want to authenticate my computer every time i start it up. is this common? is there a fix for this?

thanks!

I don't know what the recommended best practice is, but I usually install all my games in one bottle and haven't had any trouble with that. :)

bladebot wrote:

I don't know what the recommended best practice is, but I usually
install all my games in one bottle and haven't had any trouble with
that. :)

hehe, also good to know. =) thanks! =)

nicodemus144 wrote:

...

steam seems to want to authenticate my computer every time i start
it up. is this common? is there a fix for this?

thanks!

Every bottle is technically a different XP machine (or w98, or whatever). So, yes, that would be a knock against having multiple steam bottles; they all need to be authenticated via the email Steam sends.

Also, the "remember me" box in the Steam login window only works while you keep opening Steam from that bottle. If you open another bottle's Steam, you'll have to log in again.

Hmmm... Now that I'm typing it, it reads kind of onerous, doesn't it? I don't play that many games at once, so it's not a big deal for me.

nicodemus144 wrote:

awesome, thanks for the speedy reply!

can i ask one more question? steam seems to want to authenticate my
computer every time i start it up. is this common? is there a fix
for this?

thanks!

Hi,

.... painful thing it is ; becomes particularly painful when you've got 3 or 4
different computers that you run Steam on ... you can turn the thing off though.
Start Steam, and use the Steam -> Settings menu item. In the GUI that pops-up,
on the Account tab, you can see a button there 'Manage Steam Guard Account
Security..' ; click on that, and then the settings GUI will appear and you can
turn the function off...

...as for how many Steam bottles to run, that can be pretty much app/game dependent
more than anything else. You have those win32 titles that absolutely need emulated
virtual desktop ON, those that need the same setting OFF, and if you segregate these
titles into 2 bottles, it saves having to constantly use the Wine Configuration GUI
to flick this setting ON/OFF to suit whichever game you want to play (if you have any
like this). Some games, like...errm.. X2/X3 ... have a particularly complex dependency
chain, and the nature of it is such that it might break other Steam titles in the same
bottle, so I would put X2/X3 into their own Steam bottle, because the convoluted bottle
setup works fine with all of this series....(but perhaps not with other steamapps =)...

Cheers!

ps: if you put more than 65 ~ 70 steamapps in the 1 bottle, it can take a very long time
to scan the bottle when you start the bottle manager and such...

awesome don! thanks a lot!

i think i'll save myself the trouble and just stick with one steam game at a time for now. =)