I recently got steam to stay in touch with some friends and I really like the fact that I can add non-steam games. I want to add Oblivion as a steam game so I can use Steam chat while playing, but I'm currently using mods that require OBSE. I tried adding the shortcut to OBSE.exe as Oblivion, but when I try to launch it from the Steam console, I get an error message saying that it couldn't read the arguments. Is there any way to make it possible to launch OBSE from the Steam console?

All you do is load OBSE_loader.exe. It takes care of the rest.

Is that not working?

I am loading OBSE_loader.exe, that's what I have the Steam shortcut targeted to launch, but it doesn't work. I can launch the game from my desktop, but for some reason launching it in Steam doesn't work.

What does the properties for the shortcut in Steam show? It worked for me with just the pointer to the loader, and set to start in the Oblivion directory.

Just as an experiment, you don't have the steam dll file for OBSE in your Oblivion directory do you? I know I didn't bother copying that across and I'm curious as to whether steam might try to load it even for non-Steam versions of the game.

I didn't know there was a steam dll file for OBSE. I know I read somewhere that there are problems using OBSE with the Steam version of Oblivion, but I'm trying to use a non-steam Oblivion with a non-steam OBSE. I will do some research on OBSE for Oblivion to see if that gets me anywhere.

Just check your Oblivion folder for a DLL file with Steam in the name. Try removing it. It's not needed for non-Steam versions to work.

I don't know if it will fix it, but it's something to try.

Starting Oblivion from steam works for me and I DO have the steam dll file in there. When I last updated OBSE, I just copied everything in there....I figured it wouldn't hurt.

And as I said, it didn't because it still launches using OBSE from steam just fine.


http://i49.tinypic.com/25jletx.jpg
Yup, just made the target the OBSE loader (and then changed the icon)

misunderstood the question...

^ This.

obse_steam_loader.dll is only used when you have a Steam version of Oblivion. Otherwise, just point Steam at obse_loader.exe and make sure it's set to start in the Oblivion folder.

That's what I thought should be the case, but I was trying to find a reason why it doesn't seem to be working for the OP.

Of course, the fact that it's complaining about "arguments" is probably a strong indication that he has the link messed up somehow. Possibly missing quotes around a path that has a space in it.

Easiest solution may be to cut and paste the information from an existing Windows shortcut to obse_loader.exe. The formatting seems to be identical for Windows shortcuts and the Steam shortcuts in the Library menu.