A grieving father has reached out to the Steam community on Reddit, asking for a way to pass on the games of his deceased son. Unfortunately, Valve’s rules in such cases are quite clear.
This is the father’s story: On December 31, 2024, a grieving father reached out to the community in the Steam subreddit. As he explained, his son had an enormous collection of games on Steam. Tragically, his son passed away in October.
Now the father wants to know if there is a way to pass on his son’s games. Perhaps someone else could benefit from them, and at least something good could come out of the situation.
The grieving father emphasizes that it will take some time before he feels ready to deal with it. However, he does not want to simply close his son’s account – that would feel like erasing his existence.
Besides expressing condolences, the community quickly offers advice – but also warns the father.
Community warns: Steam should not find out about this
This is how Steam sees it: The platform’s rules are quite clear. Basically, it is not possible to gift a game that is already in the library. Therefore, the father cannot simply pass on his son’s games.
Furthermore, the community warns: The father should not let Steam know that the original owner of the account has passed away. Because then the user account could simply be closed – the games and the memory of the son would be lost.
According to Steam’s terms of service, users are not allowed to share their account credentials or transfer the account to another person. Inheritance is thus also excluded. Valve confirmed this just this May in response to a user inquiry.
Our colleagues at GameStar wanted to know how this looks legally and asked a lawyer whether one could inherit their game library. You can find the answer on GameStar PLUS.
How the father could preserve his son’s memory
Is there a solution? The community advises the father to set up a Steam Family. In this way, his son’s account would remain intact, including all playtime, achievements, and leaderboard entries. At the same time, his friends could access his games as family members.
While this is not how Valve intends the use of this feature, as with transferring the account, it’s likely “What Steam doesn’t know…”.
The father explains that he does not yet feel ready to access his son’s PC. For now, he wants to keep the account and maybe one day play some games on it – even though he thinks that his son would certainly not be too pleased if he “ruined” all his statistics (via Reddit).
The rules of Steam are so strict in such cases because, strictly speaking, users do not own the games they purchase. The platform itself reminds you at the purchase that you are only obtaining a license. With death, the right to use it expires. However, some users also report that Steam sometimes makes exceptions in such tragic cases and allows further use of the account.
