Run as Administrator

I have a Windows 7 PC that is used by myself, my girlfriend, and occasionally her son.

It has steam installed, for the games.

Some of these games need admin rights to run.

This is fine for me, I know the admin password to run them. However the other users do not, and I'd rather not run as admin by default or make my girlfriend or her son admins. I have tried setting the permission to "run as administrator" to some of the game executables for all users. but this then still asks for the admin password.

Is there someway around this in windows 7 or am I clutching at straws (yes I know the dangers, however up to this point I do trust the users, I just really hate the idea of everyone having to run as admin all the time)

It depends why they need admin rights. If the game is asking for admin rights then there is little that can be done. If the game simply needs access to parts of the filesystem or registry then you can create an ACE in the DACL to allow the user accounts the required permissions to those objects.

Or to put it another way you can add the user accounts to the permissions list on the steam folder and its subfolders and give them full control.

I'm a bit too cream crackered tonight to write instructions but will tomorrow.

It's possible that the permissions problem is with the Registry rather than the file system. Even if it is the file system it is not necessarily in the Steam folder. A file/Registry monitor would be the best way to find out exactly where the problem lies.

It's a side issue but I'd want to know why something like a game needs such rights. It smacks of sloppy coding and I'd not be happy running such software.

The game runs via a launcher/updater

This needs rights to (I assume) update the actual game files.

I haven't had time to look at this properly since my post but thanks to everyone who has given advice, I'll update you when I get a chance to look at it again properly.

some suggestions.

install the game to a custom location not under program files and put the user as the owner of the entire directory.
as someone else already said adjust registry permissions for the game
and try to launch the game directly without the launcher if its just the launcher asking for admin rights.

there is a 3rd party app which improves UAC but I cannot remember off hand what its called sorry. That app I believe can whitelist apps/games.

Have a look at ITknowledge24.com and their UAC Trust Shortcut