Bypassing steam on games I already own
 

I am trying to make backups of my favorite games, drm free backups because I don't trust steam or the cloud. The last game on my list is fallout 4, how do I modify the game to bypass steam drm. And is there a universal tool I can use to bypass steam on all/most games?

I tried some older methods and scripts but it must have been patched a while ago.

That's a wise decision. :)

I don't think so. You could try a Steam emulator - there are quite a few available - but I'm not sure how well they remove the copy protection, if they try at all. A cleaner solution is to get the cracks (can't call them no-CD/DVD patches ad there's no physical media) for those games. The cleanest solution is to buy their DRM-free version from GOG.com but that doubles your spendings.

If they are only using basic Steam DRM, I'd recommend this: https://github.com/atom0s/Steamless

Many popular games will have their own "DRM" on top of what Steam provides so it doesn't always work.

And also https://gitlab.com/Mr_Goldberg/goldberg_emulator may be useful.

every game i have if especially if it has Denuvo or even something other than steam i still have to use steam to re register and verify the game before i can even do anything with it..
so i just unpack the game start downloading it with steam and pause it and close steam..
then copy the unpacked game backup into the the game directory in steam.. reopen steam and begin downloading again..
relaunch steam and it will use those files to complete the install instead of downloading..(wich is far faster than downloading) unless the game has an update then it will download too.. sometimes games with large files that have been modified by an update will be redownloaded and replace the existing..
so if there are no updates to a game it will verify and install quickly with that method without having to download the entire game..

goldberg is your best your best choice as far as i know and getting the full crack is your only real option for some games because you can rarely find bare cracks these days without taking a deep dive into the scene

The only way to be sure. (I remember that being said about nuking things from orbit, but removing DRM fits that criteria given topic of discussion.

You try two things. Firstly, you apply a properly configured Steam Emulator (like Goldberg's, mentioned below), secondly, if that doesn't work entirely, you try Steamless on all of the game's executables.

By properly configured, I mean having the steam_appid.txt and DLC.txt prepared based on Fallout 4's Steam data (see SteamDB.info for easy access to these).

And is there a universal tool I can use to bypass steam on all/most games?[/QUOTE]

Actually:

1. YES. A Steam Emulator is an almost universal tool to bypass Steam DRM. If exe is protected, Steamless works 99% of the time.

2. Steamless removes the additional layer of the protection if it's needed. A Steam Emulator itself does nothing to remove it, but rather completely circumvent it, making a game run without Steam even installed, let alone running.

3. Cracks aren't a "cleaner" solution for Steam games since they are in 99% cases just preconfigured Steam Emulators. If exe is included, that's because SteamStub was present and it needed to be patched out. So, they're basically a preconfigured variant of what you'd prepare yourself as described in point 2.

4. GOG.com aren't always textbook DRM-FREE, but more like DRM-CIRCUMVENTED. The number of times I saw a steam_api/steam_api64.dll in the GOG game files proves just that. So, if that's present, you can pretty much safely assume that DRM was merely circumvented, not entirely removed. However, whatever they do in any case, it's usually foolproof so in case of trouble, it's always best to go for GOG files.

Older methods don't always work for more recent games. That is because the steam API evolves and therefore emulator authors need to be constantly following it. If you use an outdated emulator, it may work erratically or not at all.

Linked above are two items which are the basics of cracking Steam games nowadays. Bookmark 'em. Always keep 'em updated. And learn how to use them.

Also, there are certain steam underground communities which focus on dealing with digital DRMs such as Steam API, Orbit/UPlay, Origin and UWP. This forum is, to my knowledge, still focused on the physical media based backups.

Naturally, as you can see on GCW main site, cracks for digital distros are present aplenty. However, I don't think you'll find a lot of experts here to deal with cracking those. Hell, the forum rules disallow this, so like I said, seek out steam underground communities if you need help with that.

You can PM me if needed.