So, I had the Skyrim game for a while now. A physical copy. I loved the crap out of it, and when I could find a €25 priced LE version, I of course bought that one. Both for PC.

However, my problem begins here. A good friend of mine loves skyrim. He likes it so much he often visits me just to play the game (and because I am a generous god, I allow this). So when I got the LE version, I figured "I might as well give it to him". What would be the point in owning 2 copies of the game, right? Well apparantly there is this obnoxious little third-party-program which I normally like, but now it's being an ass. I am, of course, referring to steam. A third-party program that has the audacity to block my friend from installing the vanilla version of skyrim, despite me now having the legendary edition. Steam doesnt like the fact that I gave someone else my offline, single-player game, and it seems he can't circumvent it (Now I'm sure there are ways to do so, but much like pirating/torrenting, I prefer to stick to legit ways).

However, the problem does remain: I have, officially, 2 versions of skyrim: the normal version, and the LE version. Steam apparantly signed both of those games to my steam account, which prevents me from handing out my original version. You would -think- that logically, the LE version would simply override the vanilla version, and so "frees it up", but no.

I want to give my friend -my- old game, which I paid for, which I owned, and which by all intents and purposes, was my property. But steam, a program that was never mentioned on the original CD case (nor the LE case, I just checked), blocks this.

I want to know IF there is a way my friend can still install and play the game that I got him, and if so, how he is supposed to do this.

If there is NO way to do this, then Bethesda: what in blazes am I supposed to do with a useless copy? I paid 50 bucks for that game which was rendered useless, and I can't help but feel somewhat scammed by this steam BS. 50 bucks is a lot of cash for an anorexic frisbee.

nope, technically they are not "officially" the same game, so steam counts them as such. There is no way to give a steam game you have used to someone else.

Not their fault you bought 2 copies knowing full well it used steam, this is ENTIRELY your doing, not theirs. Also, it is not Bethesda's doing, it is steams and is their for a good reason.