Valve's Steam Account *All Sorted Now*

Ian D J

Ian D J

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Ian D J
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Bit of a long shot but thought I'd give it a go in here. After having bought a brand new PC game from the local Gamestation, I found myself being unable to log onto my Steam account due to an "incorrect password". I have used the same one for years but now suddenly it's locked out on me. I tried installing an old PC game (brought by me from new) that needed a Steam account to activate it - and sure enough I was unable to play it because of this Steam password issue.
Using the option to send a "retrieve password" to my email client is not working because the email does not show up at my end (I check ALL folders including Spam).
I have a feeling my account has been hijacked, if that is the case, then suddenly my PC games collection has become a collection of expensive tea coasters.
There is no point in me creating a new account and reinstall my existing PC games through that because then Steam would just think of me as someone else trying to re-use keycodes on used games. With that in mind, I am not keen on the idea of buying the 30-plus PC games I already own all over again so that I can play them once more.
I know Steam was designed to prevent piracy and re-selling but not everyone has pots of money to spend on brand new PC games so it's a bit unfair on those who rely on buying second hand games.
Now that I've got this issue, I've gone right off buying any more PC games, it's no wonder why the PC games industry is struggling as I think it's effectively pricing itself out of the market (and I've never like consoles because I prefer to use a keyboard for playing FPS type games).

Steam - now I know why it's called that 'cos it's being a pile of steaming sh . . . you know the rest. I have sent an email to their support client but how do I rate my chances?
 
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One of our steam accounts got hacked last year, emailed steam support and it all got sort out quite quickly.
I am not fan of steam (for all sorts of reasons) and whenever possible crack my single player steam games to avoid the hassle of being connected, but give them their due, they do seem quite good at helping out with account problems.

Tara
 
I'm sure this is the page you've seen:

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4988-DHXV-7272

If you go the route of forgetting your account name then the recovery email will only be sent if the address you give them matches the one on their record, which should obviously land it in your inbox unless it's filtered somehow. If someone has hijacked your account and changed the email address the account is linked to then I imagine you'd receive an error notification when entering your email.

Hopefully Steam Support will do its thing and sort you out :thumbs:
 
:) Cheers Tara and Jamie. Indeed, that was the page I used to send them a message - hopefully they'll get back to me with a solution. Thankfully I have never purchased games through Steam using my credit card, just used it to verify CD keys on games I've bought from High Street shops. But that's just it, when I do request a verification code to end up on my email client, nothing shows up even in my Spam folder, and indeed I do get an error message saying the email does not match (although I still get the "thank you, we have recieved your message, etc" ones) so the option to reclaim my account by changing passwords and settings seems to have locked out on me.
The only information I have to go by is my username (as well as the various CD keys with my games) . . . so fingers crossed.

Otherwise it's a case of a load of PC games being on it's way to the local landfill site (as they cannot be sold on the second hand market in any case). :D
 
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neil_g said:
i despise steam for the fact i cannot resell any games. i completed MW3 ages ago and now its just collecting dust on the shelf.
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The fact that you can't loan games to friends or family members unless they have your steam account details encourages piracy

It's like having a room full of legaly bought books that nobody else can read if I've got one open :bang:
 
neil_g said:
i despise steam for the fact i cannot resell any games. i completed MW3 ages ago and now its just collecting dust on the shelf.
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Exactly Neil and Brian. Although I'm not sure on the laws on selling used goods when I "look at the small print", but it is true that games developers absolutely hate the second hand trade as they don't make money out of it - hence the advent of Steam.
But even so, indeed once the game is done and dusted, that's it, it has no resale value so it'll either (as already mentioned) sit about the house collecting dust or thrown away - which isn't very eco-friendly at the best of times.
So is Steam harming the PC gaming world by adopting the "one game per person" thing knowing that you're stuck with the game after having paid full price for it?
It does explain why there are far more support for the consoles but very little for the PC. Hence why 99% of PC games that are about are all console port overs - even though the games are developed on PCs in the first place! A shame given that even £99 type graphics card now packs more processing power than both the PS3 and Xbox these days (living proof was when I played "Prey", the X Box one suffered with terrible slowdowns when things got a little hectic on the screen but the same game I got for the PC for £4.99 played smoothly and fluidly the whole time even on high resolution settings).
Like I said, I've always been a PC player due to the versatility and power over the consoles. I had an Xbox 360 a couple of years ao and apart from that first time play because it was a new and exciting thing, it remained stuck under the telly gathering dust because I found myself often turning to the PC for my gaming needs anyway, so I sold it three months later.


Or is it me talking balls? Again.
 
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If you make a new account, and scan all your Keycode Booklets, they can transfer games onto a new account.

I was lucky, we had our house robbed, and my whole stack of DVD's and Games went, all of them were registered on Steam, and all the DVD's were Ripped, so they carried out 200+Disk's for nothing. I didn't loose a thing lol.

Didn't stop the insurance claim with the rest of the house and getting more DVDs and stuff :P
 
For the most part, Steam is the best thing to happen in the PC gaming industry in the last 10 years :). You'd have a hard time finding a lot of gamers who'd argue against that.

Yes it can have problems, but surely your account being compromised isn't Valves fault but your own as it's most likely that your PC's security that is at fault?

As for Steam "pricing itself out of the market", there's always something discounted every single day and the holiday sales are amazing.

Unfortunately pre-owned games are slowly becoming a thing of the past on all platforms.

I hope you get your account back soon though, contact Steam support as mentioned above.
 
Kazz said:
Unfortunately pre-owned games are slowly becoming a thing of the past on all platforms.
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because the industry are forcing us down the tie in route.

i dont think its unreasonable to buy a game legitimately for £40, complete it (which lets face it only really takes a few days in most cases), then be able to sell it on..
 
I just miss the old days when I buy a game knowing I don't have to faff about with Steam and downloadings.
Mind you, even when Steam was working, I often had to wait hours while updates and bug fixes are downloaded before I can actually play the game! That happened to the recent Duke Nukem game - one I now cannot play because of my current issue.
I have opened a new account which will work with any new games I'll buy from here on (IF I buy some more) but then it'll only think I'm someone trying to use old CD key numbers on past games tied up to an old account anyway, even though they all rightfully belong to me. But have to try that "scanning" thing.
 
Ian D J said:
I just miss the old days when I buy a game knowing I don't have to faff about with Steam and downloadings.
Mind you, even when Steam was working, I often had to wait hours while updates and bug fixes are downloaded before I can actually play the game! That happened to the recent Duke Nukem game - one I now cannot play because of my current issue.
I have opened a new account which will work with any new games I'll buy from here on (IF I buy some more) but then it'll only think I'm someone trying to use old CD key numbers on past games tied up to an old account anyway, even though they all rightfully belong to me. But have to try that "scanning" thing.
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ha, yes thats another one..

got bored on my week off and reinstalled a game from the disk.. fired it up only for steam to announce it was updating the game and it would be playable in an hour.

:gag:
 
neil_g said:
because the industry are forcing us down the tie in route.

i dont think its unreasonable to buy a game legitimately for £40, complete it (which lets face it only really takes a few days in most cases), then be able to sell it on..
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I agree, it kinda sucks. You buy a DVD and want to sell it on or lend it to a mate or family member? fine, no probs.

Similar argument with DRM, imagine if next week movie publishers announced that once you placed a Blu-Ray into your player, it was then locked so it could only ever be used with that particular machine? They'd be an outcry, the government would crumble under pressure and tell them to remove the restrictions.

Fine to do that with games though apparently. That's why I haven't bought a Ubisoft game since one of the early Splinter Cell releases, they just blatantly take the mickey out of PC gamers with their level of DRM and complete failure to communicate with their potential customers.
 
if you guys do gaming more often, you will come to realise Steam is a godsend.

i have Steam open most of the time as IM client. never had any problem of not being to play a game because it's updating. Steam also fixed "wanting to play a year old multiplayer game now, but need to update it first" problem.


regarding second hand sales, it is true this has disappeared, it does seem terrible from a camera owner point of view, where we are used to getting second hand bargains. but if you buy games on the wonderful Steam sales, you will actually get much better value without worrying about scratched disks.

of course, don't buy Call of Duty games, they suck and are never on sale. what to look out for during Steam sales are indie games (like Braid, Limbo, World of Goo), old classics (Unreal pack, GTA pack) and new releases that has been discounted heavily (Skyrim, Portal 2).


unfortunately it does sound like your account has been hijacked. get a few of your CD boxes ready and contact Steam support. as long as you can proof you have bought the games on your steam account, they will reinstate you as the rightful owner.
 
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Kazz said:
I agree, it kinda sucks. You buy a DVD and want to sell it on or lend it to a mate or family member? fine, no probs.

Similar argument with DRM, imagine if next week movie publishers announced that once you placed a Blu-Ray into your player, it was then locked so it could only ever be used with that particular machine? They'd be an outcry, the government would crumble under pressure and tell them to remove the restrictions.

Fine to do that with games though apparently. That's why I haven't bought a Ubisoft game since one of the early Splinter Cell releases, they just blatantly take the mickey out of PC gamers with their level of DRM and complete failure to communicate with their potential customers.
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personally i hate the whole "you need an internet connection to play this game" thing too. diablo 3 for example, great game, pain in the arse if your internet goes down or you want to play away from home.
 
Ignore this, I'm mis reading posts again
 
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Update . . .


. . . Still no change.

No reply from Valve as I continue to be locked out from my account, and thus unable to play half of my PC games collection. Just that I fitted in a new graphics card on the PC recently and wanted to revive my FPS days. The only games I can play are pre-Steam ones and they are a bit dated (Serious Sam, etc).

I'll give it 'til the end of the week before I have a clear out. Could use the shelf space.
 
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And still nothing.

I get the automated email confirming they have got my message but nothing from them about my issue, nor am I getting any verification emails so that I can restore the account password.

For a company that now has a firm hold on the PC gaming market, I'm not really that impressed. I'd like to try and give them a ring or write a traditional letter to them but can't seem to find any other address or number.
 
It can take a few days, think how many ridiculous emails they get off people who don't like a game they've brought and want refunds.

I think it took 3-4 days when I had an account issue.
 
faddius said:
It can take a few days, think how many ridiculous emails they get off people who don't like a game they've brought and want refunds.

I think it took 3-4 days when I had an account issue.
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:thumbs: That's true. :)
 
Aha! Just had an email by Valve asking me to write down the ticket number on the most recent game that was successfully activated under my original steam account and send a JPG file of that back to them.

Fingers crossed.
 
Yay. Finally got the email which gave me the ability to log back on into my account using a unique password, along with changing it to one I can remember.
I now have my account - and more to the point - PC games back. :thumbs: :clap:

This is a bit early in the morning for it but am a happy man once again. Sorry to have been a bore over this one but it was actually driving me nuts as I was facing the prospect of having to throw away £100's worth of PC games all because of a small bit of missing data.
Anyhow, at the same time I hope this thread may come in useful for those who might be experiencing the same thing. :naughty:
 
glad you got it back, i can't imagine the 3 days of agonising waiting.

to be honest i thought it took them quite long. these days a Steam account is a virtual shelf of most of your's games, taking 3 days to get it back is way too long. what does a gamer supposed to do during that time?

(play Ubisoft games? :bonk:)

hope this doesn't happen to anyone in the future, and hope Steam can speed up their processing, like by marking this kind of ticket as work-stop priority.
 
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