STEAM - Is it possible to play games without an internet connection?

Well, yesterday I was at my girlfriends house and her family doesnt have an internet connection. She went to run some errands for about an hour, so I decided to continue my game of Half Life 2 that I was working on the day before. I turned on my laptop, loaded up Steam, and tried to play the game. But it said that an internet connection is required to play that game.

To me this sounds retarded because HL2 is a single player game. I could understand if I tried to play Counter Strike or Team Fortress 2. But Half Life??

Now, basically my question to you guys is. Is there a way to play single player games using Steam without an internet connection? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks guys!

 

Steam has a feature called Offline mode, which seems it didn't kick in for you. It's best to go in offline mode before you exit Steam with an internet connection otherwise it can be unreliable.

 

A lot of people have troubles playing in offline mode, I don't know why.

For me, just login (online), go to settings and uncheck the "don't save account credentials on this computer". Now I can disable my wireless and login in offline mode.

Just tested Portal 2 here in offline mode.

 

Ah ok, I'll have to give this a shot when I get back home and can use my laptop with an internet connection again. I'll let you guys know how it worked out for me. Thanks a lot fellas!

 

^ This is the advice to follow. Somehow Steam has problems if you were online, turned off the PC, and then tried to use it without an internet connection. Always go offline before exiting Steam.

 

^^^ thanks lozanogo I was wondering if it was just me.
iMaCuLaTe , just wanted to add be sure your client for steam is up to date also.

 

Thanks for all the help guys. I found this on Steam's website.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=3160-AGCB-2555

Basically says what you guys just said.

 

Yup. Offline mode requires you to go offline while your online

 

Thanks for the info guys. I tried it and it helped. I had to go in offline mode, then see if the game worked. Then I restarted my comp without the internet and it worked fine that time. But you need to be online first to then use offline mode. Kinda retarded but whatever. I'll just make sure to go into offline mode each time I log out of Steam. Thanks again!

 

This is one of the reasons I like GOG more than Steam, and I'm hoping GOG takes off big-time now that they've dropped the "we only carry 3+ year old games" policy. Want to play a game from GOG in offline mode? Start the game just like you would regardless. And it works. Period.

 

Yes, but GOG doesn't have any multiplayer servers which puts it into a different category than Steam, which is pretty much just a massive online gaming community.

 

True, but about 90% of my gaming time is spent on single-player games

 

Is Steam aware of this issue? And do they even care that it's a pain in the a$$ to go offline every time your going to use it? I wish they would just make it work without having to switch "modes"

 

Which is totally asinine ! The only time I would want to be in "Offline Mode", would be if I "Didn't" have an internet connection, wait..............let me run down to the local McDonald's, log into steam , go into offline mode, then go back home, wait, internet is back up..............crap !

 

Yea that logic is crazy in my opinion. They should definitely make it possible for people to play without having to go through that hassle.

 

You need to set up offline mode just once, after doing the install and initial setup. I recommend doing this once for each game.

However, offline mode doesn't help if the game itself requires a connection even for single player, like assassin's creed to uplay etc.

 

So it's not really just once then....I have over 30 games. This is also not true, it's my opinon that steams offline mode blows due to the need to be online to go offline(common knowledge).

 

I've never had a problem with the offline mode in steam. If I try to start steam without a connection, it simply says it couldn't connect and then gives me the option of restarting in offline mode.

 

It gave me the same option. The problem was when I tried to play Half Life 2 it wouldnt let me do it :/

 

In most of the cases if you get out online, and the next time (for any reason) you don't have internet access then Steam jumps directly to offline mode.

Note the bolded section, it had happened to me a few times that it doesn't work. The caution should be taken if you know beforehand you'll not have internet soon.

 

some games on steam doesn't evn require to login into steam! try to run games from steam folder, worked for me with GTAIV and some sonic games!

 

Not entirely true, actually it opens Steam and put it on the background. But yes, you can launch them directly without having to go throughout the Steam interface.

 

sign out an try to lunch from steam folder! any "forced steam" game will immedietly start steam and ask you to login! I've tried many games, one of them was GTA EFLC and dreamcast collection! although not many of them will work!