Skyrim dead on launch after Steam client update

[syscrusher]

I've sent this as a support request to Valve -- a process which was an epic quest in itself -- but am posting here also, figuring I can't be the only one with this problem.

Skyrim was working perfectly yesterday. Today I allowed Steam to install its client update, figuring that wouldn't interact much with the game itself. WRONG.

Now I can run the Skyrim launcher, but clicking Play causes Windows 7 UAC to pop up a dialog asking me if I want to allow Skyrim Launcher to "modify my computer". Whether I say yes or no is immaterial -- it just returns to the Skyrim launcher menu. No error messages whatsoever.

The problem can be replicated across multiple user accounts on the computer, and it persists across rebooting the system. Running Skyrim Launcher as administrator didn't help, either.

I only run Windows for gaming, not as my normal operating system, so I'm not sure what to do next. As I said, I submitted a support request to Valve, but I'm not optimistic about hearing from them in the near term.

[edit] I have only about five mods installed, all just minor tweaks, and no LAA patch. Basically, nothing that tweaks the executables from Bethesda, just ESP files.

Anyone else run across this, and find a solution?

Syscrusher

Edited December 26, 2011 by syscrusher

[Khettienna]

Sounds like the update botched your Steam install. Try uninstalling/reinstalling only the Steam client. If that doesn't fix it, "verify integrity of game files" on Skyrim from within Steam.

[syscrusher]

Thanks, Khettienna

I think it was something like what you propose, but instead of me telling it to test the files, it appears to have detected the problem on its own.

I had shut the system down waiting to hear from Valve or on this thread, and powered up to try your suggestion. This time, on starting Steam it immediately re-downloaded ... well, something. It wasn't really clear on WHAT. "Downloading one file" was the message. In any case, when that finished, the game was working again, so who knows what was going on.

{sigh}

Thanks. I'm back in Skyrim now.

[DaMage]

"Verify Integrity of Game Cache" - Right click on Skyrim -> Properties -> Local Files

If that doesnt work, it might be that the steam updated was faultly (it has happened to me before) and you can either wait for the next update....or reinstall steam.

Reinstalling steam:

1. Make a backup of all your games. File -> Backup and Restore Games. When you uninstall steam it remvoes all the games, so if you want ot save your bandwidth, you can back thme up to a folder on your computer.....the steam backup puts all the game into a single steam installer ready to install again later. TIP: When it asked for file size, select custom and tell it any huge size so that it all goes into a single installer.

2. Uninstall Steam. If the steam folder still exsists after uninstalling, delete that too.

3. Download and install Steam again.

4. Run your backup installler to put all your games back in.

There are properly instructionsl ike this onthe steam forums somewhere aswell which may have more details.

[syscrusher]

"Verify Integrity of Game Cache" - Right click on Skyrim -> Properties -> Local Files

If that doesn't work, it might be that the steam updated was faultly (it has happened to me before) and you can either wait for the next update....or reinstall steam.

Reinstalling steam:

[...]

There are properly instructions like this on the steam forums somewhere aswell which may have more details.

Thanks. I didn't know Steam had a way to nondestructively reinstall; that's good to know. I was afraid I would have to back up my game saves and INI files and reinstall from scratch.

One of my complaints about both Steam and Skyrim is the lack of *official* online documentation of things like this. Community-driven forums are no substitute for a real user manual that is topically organized rather than (mainly) chronologically organized, and with chapter titles that are more specific than "Need help with game" or other vague phrases that are typical of forum thread titles. Of course, Valve is far from the only company short-changing the documentation in recent years, and Bethesda's own web site for Skyrim isn't very helpful, either.

My game is back online now, thanks to a combination of help here and blind luck; the Steam support team has still not responded to my request, but I posted into the ticket that they can close it since the problem went away. Thanks for the replies here.

[Ginnyfizz]

Just another tip, it is also possible to move your Steam installation from C:\ProgramFilesX86, which is what I did, I put mine in C\Games\Steam\. Avoids UAC silliness. Check out this article;-

Moving a Steam installation and games

[Si-Shen]

I had the same problem with Steam on Friday and I have it installed outside of the programfiles directory.

I have found this problem about 3 or 4 times with different games (Skyrim, New Vegas, Deus Ex and I think, but can't recall Civ 5). For some reason rebooting the machine, going back into Steam starts up an update DL as if Steam just forgot that it had not done all the DLing. It's an evil system to begin with but thats just a major headache.

[syscrusher]

Just another tip, it is also possible to move your Steam installation from C:\ProgramFilesX86, which is what I did, I put mine in C\Games\Steam\. Avoids UAC silliness. Check out this article;-

Moving a Steam installation and games

Interesting tip, thanks. I had considered doing something like this on initial installation, because I *really* wanted to have my own Steam account separate from my wife's account. But I was afraid that would break things.

I've got another system running VMware, which I use for modding but not actual gaming (due to performance limitations of the virtual environment). When I buy my second copy of Skyrim to set that up, I will probably try relocating it as you suggest and see what happens.

Syscrusher

[WillieSea]

I installed 'steam' on my D: "Games" drive and have never had an issue with UAC. The only stuff I install on my C: drive is the OS and utilities that I don't care if I loose them. Makes it easy to do a 'reinstall' if I need to.

[syscrusher]

I installed 'steam' on my D: "Games" drive and have never had an issue with UAC. The only stuff I install on my C: drive is the OS and utilities that I don't care if I loose them. Makes it easy to do a 'reinstall' if I need to.

According to a colleague of mine who is a systems programmer on the Windows platform, there is a way to turn off UAC entirely, but he indicates that this can have lots of complications for other things, so he advises not to undertake disabling UAC lightly.

[Si-Shen]

I have one drive so I installed it in the "Games" directory which I created when I got this rig. Except when Steam acts up and does not install/update things properly I never have issues.

[WillieSea]

According to a colleague of mine who is a systems programmer on the Windows platform, there is a way to turn off UAC entirely, but he indicates that this can have lots of complications for other things, so he advises not to undertake disabling UAC lightly.

I am a client server and mainframe programmer (both worlds) and I would not recommend disabling the UAC either. The UAC prevents your computer from joining the vast XP 'Bot Army' since the XP has no system protections. Not so much an issue as most have moved to Vista or W7 OS by now.

[syscrusher]

I am a client server and mainframe programmer (both worlds) and I would not recommend disabling the UAC either. The UAC prevents your computer from joining the vast XP 'Bot Army' since the XP has no system protections. Not so much an issue as most have moved to Vista or W7 OS by now.

This system isn't used to surf the Internet, so that probably wouldn't be an issue. The only web sites it is allowed to visit are TESA and the Nexus. My *real* computer runs Linux; Windows is just used for gaming. That being said, as much as UAC is a pain in the backside, I don't plan to disable it because of security and operational problems caused by doing so. I just mentioned that in passing.

Cool that you do mainframe programming. I work for a small consulting company that does a lot of mainframe work as well. Hit me with a PM if you'd like to socially chat about real-life work. (But no offense taken if not.)

Edited December 28, 2011 by syscrusher

[vometia]

I am a client server and mainframe programmer (both worlds) and I would not recommend disabling the UAC either. The UAC prevents your computer from joining the vast XP 'Bot Army' since the XP has no system protections. Not so much an issue as most have moved to Vista or W7 OS by now.

As a C programmer and Unix sysadmin I'd also not recommend disabling UAC, even on computers that aren't one's main port of call, for much the same reason.

I didn't think you were beardy enough to be a mainframe programmer! I used to work with a bunch of them many years ago and they all had beards, even the women (that bit might not be strictly true.) I quipped to one of them that JCL looked like it was written in Martian and he just spluttered with incredulity that someone who wrote Unix shell scripts for a living could have the front to criticise JCL's aesthetics!

I quite miss poking around the mysterious world of MVS (well, there is the Hercules emulator, but it's not the same without a bunch of other people also doing things to it!)

[WillieSea]

Unfortunately, I am not 'allowed' to talk about where I work or what I do there. (ooohhh, mysterious!) You know how 'finacial' institutions are...

Beards are too scratchy, that is why I don't have one. I have coded Unix as well, and have often wondered if the developers of it were smoking merry-weed... There is not much I have not done as one time in my coding past. Some of it is 'scarce' for people who know it.

I do recommend a seperate hard drive for all your game installations. Life is so much easier.

[vometia]

I think I was fortunate enough to work for those that weren't too bothered about people knowing! Or maybe the climate was just different in the 1990s...

I strongly suspect that dubious substances may have been involved in the development of Unix, or so it's rumoured. Then again, it's also rumoured that its original intent was to store the high scores of some Star Trek game back in the 1960s; which wouldn't entirely surprise me, but it's hard to know what to believe, really! I must admit I absolutely despised it when I first used it: we had a herd of Vax mainframes* back at college and the VMS ones were much friendlier. Though someone pointed out later that Unix isn't unfriendly, it's just very picky about who its friends are.

I also use a separate array for my games; that's another thing that was drummed into me in the early days of sysadminning, to keep user and system data on separate devices for performance reasons (as well as backing up, etc). It's gradually filling up, though: I'll have to either delete some old games, or perhaps the better solution is to buy more storage!

* there's often debate about whether or not Vax systems (or at least the larger ones) were mainframes or not; as far as I can tell, it pretty much came down to what marketing called them. I think the 8000 series (we had a couple of 8650s at college, alongside some older Vax 11s) were described as such, at least if I recall, though they weren't IBM compatible (though there were 3rd party channel adapters for them I think.)

[syscrusher]

@WillieSea and @Vometia: Relax, I'm not going to turn off UAC, just discussing a theoretical possibility in a moment of frustration. To me, the "right" way to do sysadmin is that you have an admin account and regular accounts, and they are separate logins (with the option of "su" or something like it). What bugs me about UAC is that when a regular user tries to modify a system file, instead of denying access or prompting for an admin login, it has a tendency to do a shadowed user-local version of the file in a hard-to-find place in the user's home directory. Ugh. But, perhaps my bias against this is just that it's not the way other systems do things.

@WillieSea: "Unfortunately, I am not 'allowed' to talk about where I work or what I do there." ... Understood. Some of our customers are financial services companies.

@Vometia: I knew you were a techie, but I never knew you and I had that much in common. I have been in UNIX (and then Linux) since the early 1990s, and did Novell Netware and some DEC and IBM stuff before that. I actually did more PDP-11 than VAX, though. But I administered ULTRIX systems on MIPS RISC systems. Ah, those were the days. My bookshelf still has the Brown reference book on IBM 370 JCL, and I spent more college hours at an 029 keypunch machine than I can even remember.

[syscrusher]

Sidenote.... We're kind of drifting off-topic here, and should probably take further discussions of legacy systems to private messages.

[Sealwarrior]

I know that you found a solution to your problem syscrusher, but I wanted to post this in case others had the same issue.

This has actually happened to me as well, 5 days after I installed Skyrim (give or take a few days.) After an update to the Steam client, starting Skyrim would cause the launch menu to pop up as usual. When I selected the option to play the game, however, I would be greeted by the same launch menu no matter how many times I futilely clicked that option. I was able to fix it thanks to a quick search on Google, which prompted the discovery of this link:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20111121145847AAOfSi9

If you would just disregard the "Best Answer- Chosen by Voters" box and look at the post directly below that by Noah, it descibes a way to force an update to the Steam client. In this way, you do not have reinstall Steam. Using this method, I was able to once again play the game without being stuck on the launch menu prompt, and so far I have yet to run into it again.

I think it is a nice alternative to reinstalling the client, but seeing after you did that without incident I am sure it is not too much of a hassle.

[HeyYou]

There was a thread on the beth forums about creating 'symbolic links' of directories so that one directory someplace else, would 'appear' to the O/S to actually be where Steam thought it was. Creating a symbolic link from your Steam/common/etc..... to your games directory was a trivial matter. One line of text on a command line, and two directories would behave as though they were the same, even though one was on a different partition/drive..... Seems to me a great way to simplify mod installs, and avoid UAC issues altogether.

It's also possible to disable UAC for specific folders......