Daddy Bob

DADDY BOB'S COMPUTER Q & A

 

October 18, 2009

Q. I have somehow deleted a game from my games folder in Vista. The game can still be found if searched for and played, but just isn't shown in the games folder. How can I get it back?

A. For some reason not fully explained by Microsoft, it is possible to hide a game in Vista and Windows 7. There also seems to be very little documentation of this from other sources. In this case, I suspect that the game that is not displayed has simply been inadvertently hidden by the user or someone playing a trick on him.

First, there is a setting that must be configured before this hiding can easily be done or undone. Right click a blank spot on the taskbar, choose Properties, then the Start Menu tab, then click on the Customize button. Scroll down to the Games item.

In the Games section, be sure that the "Display as a link" is selected. This will assure that the "Games" item is displayed in the start menu and when it is clicked, will open the Games folder.

Now, when the Games folder has been opened, to hide any of these games icons, right click on it and choose "Hide this game" from the menu. This is apparently what has happened in this case.

So, to unhide any hidden game, you will have to unhide all of them. This is done by clicking on "Options" in the top menu, displaying this dialog.

 Click on the "Unhide games" button, and click OK. All of the hidden games will be displayed again. As you can see, there are other configurations available here for your games folder that you can experiment with if desired.

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