Phylactery on Steam: the rehearsal

App 2278770 · session “Phylactery 18” · 15 Oct 2026

The whole release, walked as if it were real, so a real one is mechanical later. Nothing has been sent to Valve.

8/14store page items green

10/15build items green

11decisions waiting

Your clicks

The permission classifier blocks these for me as production deploys.

Publish the Steamworks settings
App Admin → Publish tab → Prepare for Publishing → Publish to Steam → type STEAMWORKS. Pushes the name, install folder, Phylactery.exe, depot name and icons. On an unreleased app this releases nothing.
Set build 25967681 live on default
App Admin → SteamPipe → Builds → row 25967681 → branch default → Preview Change → confirm. Only your accounts can see it; Phylactery then appears in your library.
Close the Placement Tool popup
My click opened it on your desktop (outside my tab group).

Your decisions

Genre and tags my proposal
Primary genre Action. Tags: Action, Indie, Dark Fantasy, Atmospheric, Psychological, Pixel Graphics, Short (Steam needs 5+).
Descriptions
You write the short one (~300 chars) and About This Game, or I put a literal "placeholder" in for the rehearsal.
Release date
A fake date for the rehearsal, or "To be announced". Store data only, not sent to Valve.
Support contact
https://a327ex.com, [email protected], or both. I did not enter your contact without asking.
Content survey
A private draft exists, empty. Its first question asks about "frequent violence or gore" (snakes die in blood and meat chunks), and it holds the AI disclosure. Your answers, your attestation.
Screenshot 3 not for all ages? confirm
It shows blood on the floor, so I marked it "no"; the other four "yes".
Xxxxxxxxx . xxxxxxxxx
Xxxxx .Xxxxxxxxxxxx. .xxxxxx xx xxxx xxxxxxx xxxx.. Xxxx xx xxxxxx.
The Steam copy's ending
What happens at the egg with no posts to unlock. Also: no menu or quit yet (close the window; F11 or Alt+Enter for fullscreen).
System requirements fine for now?
My estimates: Windows 10 64-bit, dual-core 2 GHz, 4 GB, OpenGL 3.3 card, 200 MB. A real release needs a test on weak hardware.
steamcmd login in git history security
The private steam-release repo has carried steamcmd's cached login since the Sep 7 snapshot. I untracked steamcmd/ and sdk/ from now on. History: leave it, purge it (force-push), or re-login steamcmd so the old token is replaced.
Two stray images
My first upload attempt went through the wrong uploader and left two copies of the library capsule as extra description images. Harmless. Delete them?

What's done

The build

A store build is now a player's copy: no testing keys, no sound tool, no sound names (the package says store=steam; dev runs and the site are unchanged). Packaged as a 50 MB Phylactery.exe + steam_api64.dll, booted headless (840 frames, fine), uploaded as BuildID 25967681 (private, not live).

Steamworks settings

App renamed Phylactery; install folder Phylactery; launch option Phylactery.exe; depot Phylactery Content; app icon + shortcut icon. All saved, waiting on your Publish.

Packages

All three renamed: Phylactery (store), Phylactery for Beta Testing, Phylactery Developer Comp. Immediate, no publish needed.

Store page

Name, Windows, English, Single-player, system requirements, controller questionnaire ("No Controller Support"). Every store asset, 5 screenshots, every library asset and the logo placement uploaded (placeholders, below).

The runbook

steam-release/RUNBOOK.md: the whole procedure with every real URL, the traps I hit, the art specs and how uploads actually work, and Valve's clocks. New tools: package.py and boot_test.py (game-agnostic), tools/steam_art.py (Phylactery's placeholder art).

Release checklists

Store presence 8 / 14

✓System requirements
✓Controller support
✓5+ screenshots
✓Capsule images
✓Library assets
✓Developer and publisher
✓App icon
✓Shortcut icon
○Basic info (genre)
○Descriptions
○Content survey
○Release date
○Support info
○Tags

Game build 10 / 15

✓Platform support matches
✓App configuration
✓At least one depot
✓At least one build
✓Launch options
✓Install directory
✓Depot languages
✓Store and devcomp packages match
✓Package includes Windows depot
✓All depots attached
○Default branch includes the exe
○Common redistributables
○Pricing
○Published pricing
○Trailer

Never touched, by your rule: store review, pricing Save (it sends the price to Valve), build review, Coming Soon, Release. No trailer (your call), so that checklist item stays open.

The placeholder art

Made from real game frames plus the title in the game's own font (FACETED FINE). Real key art is still to come. None of them shows the ending.

Store

Library and icon

Library hero 3840x1240 (no text allowed)

Library logo, transparent

Screenshots

What the rehearsal taught

The permission classifier treats Publish to Steam as a production deploy: that and setting a build live on default are your clicks.
Graphical assets have no plain file input. The working route: hand the files to the page, then call its own LoadImageFilesForUpload, then Upload, then tick the rules confirmations.
Steam now asks per image: "legible logo filling 1/3", "no other text", "transparent background", "screenshot suitable for all ages".
920x430 (header vs library header) and 3840x1240 (hero vs screenshot) are ambiguous sizes: pick the type by hand.
Long name fields: Ctrl+A, not triple-click. Depot renames need the page's own Save too. Store checkboxes toggle: read the state first.
The logo placement tool is a popup; open its URL in the same tab instead.