How to get an older version of a game on Steam

Steam updates games without asking, and the build your mods were written for is gone by the time you notice. There are three ways back and they are not equally good.

The one that works: a beta branch

Right click the game, Properties, Betas. If the developer publishes older branches, and many modded games do precisely because their community asked, you pick one and Steam downloads it.

This is the clean answer. It is supported, it is what the feature is for, and the build you get is the real one rather than something reassembled.

The catch is that it is entirely up to the developer. Some keep a year of branches, some keep the previous version, and plenty keep none at all.

The one that half works: stopping the update

Properties, Updates, set it to only update when you launch it. Then start the game from its own executable instead of through Steam.

This holds your current build rather than getting an old one back, so it only helps if you act before the update lands. It also stops working the moment you forget and press play in the library.

Worth doing the day a big patch is announced, if you are mid playthrough and want to finish it.

The one to think twice about

There are tools that fetch specific old builds through Steam's content system using your own credentials. They work. They are also outside what Steam's subscriber agreement allows, and people have had accounts actioned.

If your library matters to you, this is a bad trade for one modded playthrough. Mentioned here because pretending it does not exist helps nobody, not because it is recommended.

Before you roll back anything

Copy your save. Saves are written by whatever version last touched them, and a file the new build upgraded will often refuse to open on the old one. There is no undo for this and no support forum can help you afterwards.

Save locations differ per game, but the folder is almost always outside the game directory, which means verifying files or reinstalling will not restore it either.

The version data on this site

Every game page here tracks the builds we have seen, with the date each one went live. That history starts from when we began watching rather than from the game's launch, because Steam only exposes the build that is current: there is no archive to read, so the record accumulates going forward and saying otherwise would be inventing dates.

What it does give you is the build number that was live on the day a mod was published, which is usually the version that mod was actually tested against.