i've just been told by Steam it is a problem on OOO end.
problem with steam authentication after steam client update
I do hope they clear this up soon. I've been bored as heck for the past 2 or 3 days. .-.
Well this sucks.
I just found out that all of my friends ARE able to play Spiral Knights with their Steam accounts, but I still can't. What the heck, man?
Well...... as crappy and messed up as this seems, I just have to remain being patient.
Just discovered the same problem not long than a day ago. What update are we talking about here that after you haven't had the successful connection to SK? The update of 27th of September? I tried to connect before that and it did not let me establish it so it may not be because of that update. After that I remember I recieved another update notice, but this was not mentioned in the Client Update history. I may remember wrong though.
Specifics
- Clicked an application to open up the Steam client on iMac with Lion 10.7.1.
- Actions to open the Steam client failed multiple times with the notice of unsuccessful connection attempt with the option to go offline.
- First two or three attempts to reconnect the client crashed the it.
- Fourth attempt I decided to try the offline mode which was successful.
- Tried to go online after that which caused the client to crash again.
- Examined the internet connection to see if the fault was there, but could not identify the problem from a working connection.
- Closed the internet connection just in case and started it up again at this point.
- Attempt to open up the Steam client was successful, but sadly I don't remember any longer the amount of attempts.
(At this point I had no idea of any updates for the Steam client.)
- Started Spiral Knights from the Steam client with the Steam client update released in 22th of September.
- Got an error at login screen which stated the "We have experienced a problem authenticating with Steam. Please ensure that the Steam client is running and that you are not logged in elsewhere." error message.
- Tried to close and open the game several times.
- Tried to close and open Steam client several times.
- Checked for updates and started to update the client with the update released in 27th of September.
- First attempt to download the update failed somehow for it did not start at all.
- Second attempt started out just fine until the "second" part of the update which seemed to stop at 11.8 Mb / 28 Mb or something like that while the first part was around 30-38 megs if I remember correctly.
- Third attempt with the "second" part of the 27th update was a success. Don't know if these two were the same update or two updates in one package.
- Restarted Steam client after the update.
- Checked for more updates with having the answer of nothing new available at the moment which means the update was successful.
- Tried to start Spiral Knights with no avail multiple times.
(At this point I had no idea that you could login with your Steam account into spiralknights.com.)
- Logged into the spiralknights.com with my SK account which had been synchronized with my Facebook account.
- Found out that I now need a knight to be able to continue to post in here.
- Found out that I am able to login with Steam account now.
- Logged out from my SK account and into with my Steam account.
- Chose my knight to represent myself and now I am here writing this at the very moment.
So what I think happened is that both Steam and OOO have had their share of going haywire with SK unintentionally. Sorry for us players/customers, but like many of us have said, the game is free and the CEs won't vanish from there until we get to login into the game again. In the meantime I take the advantage to enjoy trailers and videos of D3.
Firstly I am grateful and thankful for Valve to have made the Steam service available in the first place. Secondly I am thankful for Sega and OOO that have created Spiral Knights for us. It ain't in it's best yet, but it will be. Valve, Sega, OOO, Blizzard, AE, Ubisoft and friends which I don't mention here at this moment, are great companies. They do their best to match our needs and they have accomplished this over and over again. They still do.
I will wait until all is solved. I have faith and that alone with the right attitude is enough. My loyalty is with them and my strength in patience is divine to wait them. There is time for everything so personally I don't need to be the focus of interest as a custome, because every moment focused on to find solutions at the moment is far greater than our "vague cries" of unsatisfied negative experience due the problem at hand. Thus we should use the time efficiently to our advantage. Steam and OOO does so, so why not we? Knowledge is power. Let us share every bit of detail from our encounters that we possibly can for them and we will triumph this mear challenge together. After that we just have to wait and leave them to do their magics.
"Knowledge of one will be shared into strength of thousands."
Best of Day/Night Everyone!
EDIT: Just got a notice about the Steam client's 27th of September update being successfully downloaded and the client to be ready to be restarted - again... I just did update it so what is this? Did it not update itself the first time or did the update fail without my notice?
EDIT: Tried to open SK after the update with no avail. My skin for Steam client however got dumped.
Day 2 and nothing. But hey, Battlefield 3 Open Beta just started. Everyone get on that now! :D
WTB Fix :( Tried almost everything, uninstalled SK, uninstalled ste
am, forced updates on steam :(
Progress reports probably won't get posted unless they find something significant, and they know its gonna take awhile to correct. The situational nature of the problem also makes it difficult to reproduce, which in turn makes debugging that much harder.
Another problem though is that trying to placate the userbase never works, and trying typically leads to users harping constantly while others start making idle threats. If something important happens, or needs to happen, they'll let us know what to expect... but other then that, its best to give them time to focus on the problem and give input if needed.
@Starlinvf It's one thing if users are complaining about a gun not shooting enough bullets, or a sword not being swishy enough. That isn't the case here. It's now been 3 days since some of us have even been able to log in, possibly 4. That isn't a small thing. It isn't a "bug" like a bad graphic or a bad connection. We can't play, and I don't know about anyone else, but if this goes on for much longer I for one will probably lose interest in the game entirely. And for anyone reading this that is playing and has no problem, just realize this kind of bug, unfixed, is going to eventually keep nabbing people's account info one at a time until you get bugged out of playing too.
Get this fixed SK. Steam has told us that it's up to you guys and is out of their hands. If you want to keep the tiny player base you have left, get us back in the game!
@Amarothia: I still wanna know what information Steam support is basing this on. Its not uncommon for support teams to shift blame elsewhere if they have no idea where a problem exists.... and you also have to remember that most support team while technically savvy, are not a development team, or even know what the development teams are up to unless unless project management sends out a notification. OOO is already talking to, or had to talked to someone higher up the support chain at Steam to figure out where to start looking. From there on out its going to be checking and tweaking things one at a time, communicating results, and continually repeating until they figure out exactly whats wrong.
And despite what people are inclined to believe, silence doesn't mean they aren't working on it. Yet at the same time, posting constant updates that don't have any new information isn't really productive either.
I don't get why Steam or OOO can't release some sort of statement saying that they are trying their best to fix this. At least acknowledge it as a whole and not individually hoping that the message gets passed along to others.
All we're asking for is some acknowledgment, a time frame, and a little understanding! We're not looking for them to put the blame on something or someone, we're just asking for some sort of light at the end of the tunnel.
@Starlinvf: As I stated in a previous response, I have found that it is not the update that borked the game. My account worked fine until Steam updated, I ten tried it on another computer, which was using the old version of the steam client. Neither work. I have also had a friend sign into steam on my computer, using my steam client, and they could play spiral knights just fine.
Now finding out what kind of problem this may be is another situation, there is a plethora of ways that it could be. One way a friend suggested is that maybe its based on when you created your account through steam. Personally, I made mine somewhere near the end of July, early August.
edit: @ Slygurl: how can you put a timeline on something you have no idea what the problem is? Also, if you put in for a support ticket you know that they are doing what they can and trying to compile information to find out what is wrong. So I don't think that they have to put out a timeline, I mean Like I said, its like trying to predict who's going to win the world cup, or the Superbowl.
dang thought it was fixed there for a second. Started up the game and it stayed on "logging on" longer that it has since this problem.
@Zaderta: I made my account somewhere between the June 30th and July 11th during steam's summer camp sell.
Reply received last night (Still don't know when it will get fixed :S) :
Greetings,
We are currently investigating this issue, sorry for the inconvenience. We
will update you when we know more.
Best wishes,
- Coriolis
Everyone just please remain patient. Surely there are other things you could, or should be doing, other than complaining about SK for steam players, not being available. Surely I'm upset about it not working too, but I'm not threatening to leave SK forever, or saying OOO or Steam sucks, and that they aren't working on the issue, simply because they have not released any details about anything yet. Just be patient. Or do what I did, and start using a Non-Steam character to play the game, while we wait for our Steam/main characters to regain access. I don't have my Tier 2 access, nor my 3* and 4* equips, but that doesn't matter. I still had fun using a crappy Slime Slasher, and a Stun Gun. (I was actually able to complete a Snarbolax expedition with those things..... ALONE, need I add.) So anyone itching to just play the game still can. Complaining isn't gonna make them work any faster, so all you can do is wait.
Assuming I don't get on anymore even after paying 50cdn and...kinda activated 25 more on my steam for one game, I'll show you the one thing from spiral knights that I will always remember. A screenshot me playing spiral knights for the last 3 days.
http://imageshack.us/f/59/3daysu.jpg/
if the link isnt allowed, or doesn't work. its a screenshot of the bloody message mocking me for 3 days now.
I just made an account on the forums after this problem occurred.
I really hope they can get it fixed sometime today. I just got on Fall Break (I have the rest of today as well as the next 4 days off from college classes) and was hoping to make some great progress this weekend with some friends of mine.
Also, the day before it went down, I had just purchased a catalyzer, and was preparing to upgrade it to a toxic catalyzer the next morning (I wanted to wait until my mist energy was back at full so I didn't use as much CE), but unfortunately, I couldn't do that, cause this problem started.
I will be disappointed if this isn't fixed by next Wednesday, but I understand that OOO is probably working as hard as possible to fix this.
Usually problems with authenticating can be fixed by closing Spiral Knights and Steam, restarting steam, then launching Spiral Knights again.
Currently we're seeing a few people with this issue who aren't able to correct it by restarting Steam. Our developers are currently working to try to determine what's causing it and find a solution.
Thank you for your patience while we try to get to the bottom of this. We'll try to keep you updated as we know more information.
@Cronus
That's the problem: most people already restarted Steam and SK and they still have the error. A friend of mine that has that issue even tried reinstalling the game and re-updating Steam. Needless to say that it also didn't work :x
Thanks for posting something though, at least this way people can't say that the Admins/GMs/Whatev aren't working on it <.<
i'm enjoy this issue by 28.09.11. And drunk very much beer for collapse my mental state. and i want to login in SK ASAP
As this might be of important interest, I'll post what i posted on steam forums, here....
Just thought i'd go ahead and add that i don't think its a problem with steam, but a problem with our accounts in general. A friend of mine, who can log into his account from his computer, we tried to log in from there with the same issue, couldn't log in. The thing is, he can log into his account from steam just fine on that very same computer. It's only when we tried to specifically log into my account, which is having the issue, that we were unable to do so. If this was simply a problem with steam, that wouldn't be the case, no? We should have been able to access my account just fine from there since his steam is proven to work. Only we couldn't.
Were you online when the game updated? Because I was. I was in the munitions factory, just as the game stopped working, just to update. I tried to log back on after the crash, but couldn't. And since then, the authentication error has reared it's ugly head. But all of my friends, who were not online at the time, are still able to log on, and play SK with their Steam accounts. So generally I've guessed that it has only affected the Steam users who were online at that time. Which I would guess were a lot of people.
I wasn't online when it happened.
I just couldn't get on one day.
Wednesday to be precise.
Cold-Snap, it is not just the people who were playing when this happened who are stuck. I was NOT online when this occurred and I have not been able to log in since this problem started either.
I also was not online when the update started. Also, it automatically updated when I started it up. Since this problem started, I've seen two prompts for steam to update, both taking a few seconds (so not as complicated of an update as the one on the 27th).
I have a desktop and a laptop and I was planning to play on my desktop but it has that error after the update but then later I tried my laptop and it worked till steam updated itself and then went the way of my desktop lol so its steams fault for their update!
@Finalfan I had the problem with my laptop even before it updated, I have thesae as you with a desktop and a laptop, but once it stopped working on m desktop i couldnt login on my laptop, then a couple days later, steam updated on my laptop, incurring that even before the update i couldnt play with this problem.
Well then color me clueless. ALL of my friends are able to play right now. I'm secretly jealous, but I'm too cool(unintentional pun) headed to blow up about it. I'll just continue to wait patiently until this issue is resolved.
Well...its just seems not enough people have this problem, and no reason to resolve this fast.
So there are a bunch of us that can't login into SK. Got that. Now what do we have in common?
+ There are those who had Steam client without the latest update released in 27th of September. Me included, we were unable to login into SK.
+ Then there are also those who did update the Steam client who also became unable to login into SK.
+ Also there are those who were online during the update who were kicked out somehow just to become unable to login again into SK.
+ Finally there are also those who were not online during the update and they also became unable to login into SK.
Conclusion: It may not be the update or the update alone which causes this challenge. If it is a part of the problem, then what does it need to partner with to cause the problem?
+ There are those who have not uninstalled anything, me included. No change happened.
+ There are also those who have uninstalled the Steam client and/or SK. No change happened.
Conclusion: It is not file specific Steam problem or a file specific Steam problem alone. It is also not a file specific OOO problem or one alone. Definition for file specific means our installed client files and game files, on PC and/or Mac.
+ There are those who have tried to restart the Steam client and the SK multiple times.
+ There are those who have also tried to update and then run Steam client and the SK multiple times.
Conclusion: It is just not fixed since the ability to restart these applications usually update themselves and save your progress am I right? Steam synchronizes the game files on the cloud with your current state in-game after you logout right?
+ There are those who have used the original skin of Steam client during each step.
+ Then there are those who have used an added client skin during each step. Me included. I just lost the skin due to this latest update.
Conclusion: Client skin on Mac was overwritten and the skin was unable to be used any longer. Still could not login into SK.
+ One of the Steam staff members informed that the problem is on the other end which means the OOO has something wrong with SK.
+ Also the Puzzle Pirate has the same problem. Coincidence? Personally I don't believe in that.
Conclusion: Something is making certain particular customers unable to login into SK and Puzzle Pirates. Can the Puzzle Pirates be logged with Steam too? If yes, then it may have something to do with Steam also afteral.
Someone said that they are still "online" due to the ticking time rising. What if the problem is that due to some certain way those who did try to login from those certain computers with those certain accounts thru Steam to be malfunctioning? Has anyone thought if the Steam Guard has anything to do with this? Remember the code that you need to put when you try to access your account thru another computer other than the first you got online into Steam in the first place? What if your friend can play with your account from his or her laptop or a computer because you have submitted a code into that before or after the problem took place so that the problem is not recognized because of it or the absence of the permission? Well that does not solve it because you need the code to play on another computer. Steam also updates the saved game files into the cloud every time you close a game you play thru Steam so it could be because of those saves? If the trace is somehow written so that you are "online" and yet you are not, but the files say you are, then that is a partially a problem with Steam too. This was mentioned before, but I wanted to make a note that this makes it a Steam's problem too or does it really? O.o
Oh well, too much for my brains maybe. I am a wizard not a developer. xD LOL
Sure Sega and OOO and Steam says their gonna fix it, but when? It's been 4 day's already. I'm losing my patience with OOO and Steam, I met people who play it on steam, but i can't :(. I'm getting bored.
1) Steam's first response is always to blame it on the other party----that's an auto reply, if you got that email a human being has probably not even looked at your request. For a company as large as Valve, it takes quite a few complaints and good amount of time before anyone gets off their butt to really look at a problem.
2) OOO is aware of the issue, and they are communicating with Steam (or are attempting to).
3) Nothing on the OOO servers has changed since the Steam update, something in that update changed the way SOME accounts are interacting with the server.
4) Some Steam accounts are affected, but not all.
5) The bug is not reproducible. Thus far, no one with a working account has found a way to trigger the bug. This suggests it is something in the data associated with the account that cannot be changed in normal play.
6) The bug is not related to the actual Steam client installed on the user's computer---using a different account on the same computer is fine.
Hang in there folks, remember to submit a support ticket with Steam and OOO. OOO knows there is an issue and is working on it, but the people at Steam...take more prodding. Submit a ticket with them, and eventually they'll look into it and stop auto-replying with their usual "it's the other guy's fault."
Just to slightly demystify things, heres a tidbit about the login process that I think some folks are getting confused on.
SK steam accounts are distinct accounts in the SK servers, just like normal accounts, including all character data, CE, etc. The key difference is the steam account names are steam:(UID) and uses a hidden password or more likely a token. In order to get the login information, the SK client either detects or is told about the launch conditions and calls on a function (written in java) that will talk to an external system and pull the authentication info. With Steam, it talks to the Steam client, which in turn talks to the steam servers. For Facebook Connect, it'll launch a browser window and uses javascript to return the information. If you launched the game through site, it'll be able to pull your web session, and communicates a session ID with the login system of the site, then uses that to authenticate the user account.
But a key to the problem rests with 1 minor detail that I can't test any more. When the forum was upgraded to include steam login, there was a loop hole that let you login to an SK steam account without steam running by using the web session ID method from the site. Several features were broken without the overlay, but normal gameplay functioned fine. The loophole was quickly plugged, and now redirects you to a steam:// URL that launches the Steam client, but proved the accounts are autonomous.
Another issue that I just realized is the Heartbeat with Steam that initially kicked players out. I have no idea how that is supposed to work....
Anyway, this leaves 2 possible places the problem is happening. Either Steam is handing the wrong info to the SK client, or something happened to one of the accounts. Since most people can still login to the forums using Steam, it means the account information on both sides should be intact. And since a few people confirmed the inventory system through Steam still shows equipment intact, theres a good chance the SK accounts are not corrupted and both sides are associating the same account ID. The caveat is weither or not this info is cached on the Steam servers, and how frequently they sync..... but I'd assume any mismatches or problems would had been spotted by now.
Since every other cross communication method shows both sides working correctly, we're back to square one with trying to figure out whats triggering the error. The most annoying part about all of this is the error is generic, and nothing about the authentication is logged....
Same problem...."We experienced a problem authenticating with Steam. Please ensure that the Steam client is running and that you are not logged in elsewhere."
SEGA settling the problem soon? They have replied me asking me to restart my steam then also ask for my CPU processor. All along I have been playing from the same computer. Can SEGA do something? I still have Crystal energy and Items in my account. Please look into it SEGA.
Anyone happen to know what are OOO's feelings are on multiple accounts? I realize it's probably frowned upon since the game is designed for everyone to have only 100 mist per 22 hours, and having a second account would ultimately double gameplay ~ and potentially create an economic edge (or whatever excuse you want to make). But at this point, I'm seriously tempted to set one up in the interrum time that my account is trapped in this problem.
You are permitted to have up to three accounts on a computer, but they will share mist energy unless you buy CE.
This limitation was set so that households with multiple players but only one computer could have more options, but it would be harder for exploiters to get free mist energy.
More info: http://wiki.spiralknights.com/Energy_faq
Be advised that using the second account to "feed" your main account is frowned upon, but in this case a secondary account may be the only way for you to play until both Steam and OOO get their collective acts together.
As long as you don't go around exploiting other things, I think this should be ok, as it is within existing structural constraints.
i was wondering if the problem has anything to do with the spiral knights
> accounts or if it's the "steam version" of the game that's causing this,
> because i was wondering if i could log in with my steam login and password by
> typing it in the normal game login. if i knew the password that is used when i
> log in through steam i would test this. i do not, but i was thinking you could
> test this out and at least this could be a way to calm people down while you
> fix the real issue.
reply:
Greetings,
It looks like our developers believe that the issue is something with Steam
itself. They are currently working with Steam to try to determine what's
causing it and find a solution.
Unfortunately there's no way to log into a standard client with your Steam
account because Steam accounts don't actually have account names and
passwords. However if you just wanted to play around a little on a different
or new knight, it should be possible for you to use a standard client with a
standard account.
Thank you for your patience while we try to get to the bottom of this. We'll
try to keep you updated as we know more information.
Best wishes,
- Cronus
Wew. 4 days of SK absence. Not a single reply from OOO for me though.
Ok, so I tried to login into SK today to check on something I had put on sale at the AH, and I got this error. Not sure why, I logged on a few hours ago and it worked fine. I guess it's not really the Steam update, since I've been able to play ever since it started (and like I said, only got the error now)
Heh just reinstalled SK and still getting this error. Oh well guess I have to go outside :'(
Or just play other games? I doubt that SK is the only game you have xD
So I been play normally with no problems since the update that caused a lot of steam users to go in the dark. I had just finished a JK this morning right before server reboot. Got on the lift to heat back to haven and then BAM. Steam authentication error..... WTF ! -rages around a bit- I tried the obvious things. reinstalling everything, restarting everything. and nothing. Yeah. Good job steam for leaving another in the dark. I do no blame OOO for this at all. I think the move to steam was a bad one just for this reason.
seems like everyone has been having this problem for a while but for me just happened and hr ago and i wasn't kicked off the game either it was on my routine game restart after a few games of lockdown (otherwise the game would crash while playing) and i got the msg restarted to no avail. dont know much about programming so dont know how much trouble this will be for OOO or steam to fix but goodluck with it. XD and goodnight lol
Same situation as Magicninja. Did not have this problem before. Played until server reboot this morning. Then, Steam Authentication Error. Restart computer, steam, SK, problem persists.
@Magicninja hahaha I like how you are already saying "rages around a bit". come back when you and just a handful of people haven't been able to play for 4+ days.
Hello
So I do not know who is really slow here who was in the
shoes will stick, now comes the oh-so-dear SK further into the
4 days before it breaks the play could not have without the
OOO could make any real opinion
so you love now comes even before the rest of the dog after
your current server are now also start with the rest of the I
know the expected lighter
How far should still go - we have money put into the game
crystal energy or pay for anything?
slowly coming to me all the head-hunting from here
OOO I like advertising for a game from steam member of course
washing the steam access unusable
shame on you for these people and support for your disability
more than 4 to 5 days leave so in the uncertain
Making money is the one playing with one, if not here
running properly, one should ever make such thoughtless
to tell people that the money paid back
so now nice weekend
I just tried logging in again and succeeded o.O Maybe other people that had the error can login now too?
I'll bring a bat with me, it'll definitely speed up the process ;)