If you get this error:

Steam must be running to play this game (Steam initialisation failed)

 trying to play your favorite game on steam, you'll have to make an adjustment to the binary file (in this case it will be abc.exe) to get it to work.  I tried to run the game by making the regular user an administrator or with administrative previlidges and it worked just fine.  However the point ofthis workaround is to have the game run as a non previlidged user instead of granting elevated access permissions for the money you spent on the game.  Below is how we do just that.  Keep in mind that we don't guarantee your results here.  Editing a compiled executable will void any warranty and we don't recommend reading any further if you have any reservations about doing so.  Some games should come with a warning if you spend money and the game doesn't work off of steam since 2015.  

The following change has to be made using a Hex editor such as HxD:

<requestedExecutionLevel level="requireAdministrator" uiAccess="false"></requestedExecutionLevel>

to

<requestedExecutionLevel level="asInvoker"            uiAccess="false"></requestedExecutionLevel>

Notice, only the level tag has to change.  One important thing to keep in mind when you do the abovechange, is to pad the above xml with spaces before saving to retain the same file size.  If you don't, you'll get the next error below in Windows event viewer:

Activation context generation failed for "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\ABC\abc.exe".Error in manifest or policy file "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\ABC\abc.exe" on line 1. Invalid Xml syntax.

and the more commonly seen error:

The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorret. Please see the application event log or use the command-line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail.

So ensure you add the spaces after the double quote.  Spaces after the double quote work well with XML and won't break the file.  Took me a few days to get this resolved so hoping it will help you guy's as well.

Cheers,
TK