Flashback displays a hero banner and an icon for every game it detects. For Steam games this works out of the box — artwork is fetched directly from Steam’s content delivery network using the App ID found in the local library manifest. For non-Steam games, or as a higher-quality fallback for Steam titles, Flashback can query SteamGridDB, a community database of game artwork. SteamGridDB requires a free API key, which you only need to configure once.Documentation Index
Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://mintlify.com/CaramelHQ/Flashback/llms.txt
Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
Steam games — no setup required
When Flashback detects a Steam game it already knows the exact App ID from theappmanifest_*.acf file. It uses that ID to request artwork directly from Valve’s CDN:
| Image type | URL |
|---|---|
| Hero banner (primary) | https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/{appid}/header.jpg |
| Hero banner (fallback) | https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/{appid}/library_hero.jpg |
| Icon (fallback without API key) | https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/{appid}/library_600x900.jpg |
header.jpg first because it always includes the game’s logo and is instantly recognisable. If that request fails (some older titles have no header), it falls back to library_hero.jpg.
Steam CDN artwork requires no authentication. If you only play Steam games you can skip the SteamGridDB setup entirely.
library_600x900.jpg portrait cover, which is cropped to a square in the UI.
Non-Steam games — SteamGridDB setup
Games detected via the Discord list (not launched through Steam) have no App ID, so Flashback cannot use the Steam CDN. Instead it searches SteamGridDB by name. This requires a free API key.Visit https://www.steamgriddb.com and sign up for a free account. An existing Steam login can be used via Steam’s OpenID.
Go to your API preferences page and generate a new key. Copy the key — you will not be able to view it again after leaving the page, but you can always regenerate one.
Set the
STEAMGRIDDB_API_KEY environment variable to your key. Flashback reads it at startup on every launch.# PowerShell — persist for the current user
[System.Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable(
"STEAMGRIDDB_API_KEY",
"your_key_here",
"User"
)
Create the file
%APPDATA%\com.flashback.app\steamgriddb.key and paste your key as plain text (one key, no extra whitespace). Flashback reads this file each time it needs to fetch artwork.You can open the config folder quickly by pasting
%APPDATA%\com.flashback.app into the Windows Explorer address bar. Create the folder if it does not exist yet.How artwork is fetched and cached
Once an image is downloaded it is written to the local cache and never fetched again for that game. Subsequent launches serve the image from disk instantly.| Detail | Value |
|---|---|
| Cache location | %LOCALAPPDATA%\com.flashback.app\artwork\ |
| Cache key (Steam games) | steam-{appid} / icon-steam-{appid} |
| Cache key (non-Steam games) | Slug of the game name / icon-{slug} |
| Format returned to the UI | Base64 data URL (data:image/jpeg;base64,… or PNG/WebP) |
SteamGridDB API endpoints used
Flashback uses the following SteamGridDB v2 endpoints. All requests are authenticated with your key as a Bearer token.| Endpoint | Purpose |
|---|---|
GET /search/autocomplete/{name} | Find a game ID by name for non-Steam titles |
GET /games/steam/{appid} | Resolve a SteamGridDB game ID from a Steam App ID |
GET /heroes/game/{id} | Fetch hero banner images for a game |
GET /icons/game/{id} | Fetch icon images for a game |
Supported image formats
Flashback auto-detects the format from the downloaded bytes and constructs the correct MIME type for the data URL:| Magic bytes | Format |
|---|---|
FF D8 FF | JPEG |
89 50 4E 47 | PNG |
RIFF … WEBP | WebP |
Troubleshooting artwork
Hero image not showing for a non-Steam game
Hero image not showing for a non-Steam game
Confirm that your API key is readable by Flashback. Check both the environment variable (
STEAMGRIDDB_API_KEY) and the key file at %APPDATA%\com.flashback.app\steamgriddb.key. Make sure there are no trailing newlines, spaces, or BOM characters in the key file.Wrong artwork is displayed
Wrong artwork is displayed
SteamGridDB’s autocomplete search picks the best match by name, but an ambiguous title can return the wrong entry. Delete the cached file for that game from
%LOCALAPPDATA%\com.flashback.app\artwork\ and check whether SteamGridDB itself has the correct entry for the game name Flashback is detecting.Artwork is slow to appear
Artwork is slow to appear
The first fetch involves one or two network requests to SteamGridDB plus one download. Subsequent loads come from the local cache. If your connection is slow, expect a short delay the first time a game is detected.
Steam game shows SteamGridDB artwork instead of the CDN image
Steam game shows SteamGridDB artwork instead of the CDN image
This is intentional for icons when an API key is present — SteamGridDB provides better square icons than the Steam CDN portrait cover. For hero banners, Flashback always tries the Steam CDN first and only falls through to SteamGridDB if the CDN returns nothing.
Related pages
Game Detection
Learn how Flashback identifies the foreground game.
Clip Library
See how artwork appears in the clip library.
Configuration: Storage
Manage clip and cache directories.
Troubleshooting
Fix common setup and runtime problems.