Bind installed team fortress 2 game to steam

Question

I've downloaded and installed tf2 from the internet, but it couldn't connect to online servers. So I've also installed steam after that.

Now when I want to play tf2 from inside the steam, it doesn't see the existing installation and wants to download tf2 anew. Can I anyway make steam use the already installed game?

...Why didn't you download it through Steam in the first place? — Frank, Apr 30 '13 at 14:02
@fbueckert: I wanted to avoid 12gb download, because offline installer is much smaller — Grigor Gevorgyan, Apr 30 '13 at 14:03
I don't see how an offline installer would be any smaller; it would still have to download and install everything. Unless it was meant to just be played offline, in which case, defeats the entire purpose of TF2. — Frank, Apr 30 '13 at 14:12
Installed from offline installer, the game folder is 11 gb, and the installer itself is much smaller. — Grigor Gevorgyan, Apr 30 '13 at 14:13
Steam's downloads are compressed, it just does not show it to you. — , Apr 30 '13 at 14:40

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 30 '13 at 15:35

You could try copying the game files to the appropriate folder in steamapps. I would think that Steam would recognize most of the files as the ones it is expecting.

The copy you would do is something along the lines of C:\Program Files\Valve\Team Fortress 2\ ---> C:\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\~grigorgevorgyan\team fortress 2\

Of course, some of these files are bound to be wrong (like the .exe - the standalone won't have the Steam hooks). So, go to steam and tell it to "Verify Local Game Files..." and wait for it to redownload the different items.

Well, I thought a would look cool, but apparently not. – Riking Apr 30 '13 at 15:36 — Riking, Apr 30 '13 at 15:36

Bind installed team fortress 2 game to steam

1 Answers1