Games & "My Games"

YouTellMe · 08 Apr 2011

Hi!

I have around 40 games on my computer, many of them like to make folders to store stuff like saves. About 10 of them actually use the My Games folder, but another 9 make their own folders in My Documents, which is annoying because I would rather they are all in the same place to keep things neat.

I was wondering if there was anyway I could move the folders into the My Games folder, and use some sort of link to point the games to the proper place when they look for those files. And of course the links would need to be hidden to keep things neat!

I have heard of stuff like symbolic links before, but I have no idea how to use them, or what their limitations are(like if they even work for this).

Any help would be appreciated! Thanks!

Miranova23 · 08 Apr 2011

Well here's the tutorial on symbolic links: User Folder - Create Your Own Special Folders

But what if you did this to the setup... Create shortcuts to each of your other game folders. Then, move those shortcuts to "My Games." Go back to the other games and on the main folders, Hide them. When you click "Apply," choose to only hide this folder, NOT subfolders. Close and reopen explorer. The other games folders should be nowhere to be *seen,* only the shortcuts which will then reveal their contents. (Just tested this with dummy folders.)

I don't believe you could do this with "symbolic links" or "special folders," however, because then once the folders are hidden, the symbolic links I'd imagine are hidden too... Could be wrong there, but seems to be the way it was when I moved my entire user profile to a different drive.

Hellriser · 08 Apr 2011

If you just want them in one place so you can backup your saves easily, I can recommend this free app: GameSave Manager. It will backup your game saves for later restore (say your reinstall your OS). If you just want to keep things tidy, the "hidden" suggestion above is pretty good.