79 - Save Games

[matt]

In this diary I discuss the importance of choosing an appropriate save game scheme for the game you are trying to make.


Do you guys have favorite save game schemes? I like very frequent auto saves myself, although I am also partial to very frequent auto saves. I think I bound quick save/load to mouse buttons for Half-Life to help me get through first person platforming... I'm glad people have mostly figured out that first person platforming is a bad idea, but every so often there is a little in a game that drives me nuts. (I fell off the world in the earthquake sections of Call of Duty Ghosts a few times since I wasn't constantly looking at my feet)

[gagaplex]

I prefer the option of quicksaving at any point, really. Especially for difficult games. Shooters can start sucking quickly if you have to retread the same steps until you get to the next checkpoint after a boss or whatever. I guess this can be mitigated by a lot of autosaves, including during bosses' various phases or something. But really, I prefer saving whenever I want over even frequent autosaves.

[miumiaou]

I think it's different for all genres of games, I think for RPG it's better to have savepoints (even RPG maker horror games), for shooters or a certain type of horror games, but otherwise I find it fun to see how the game creators have include savepoints in their horror games (like the stuffed cat in The Calling...), I also find it handy to have the possibility to save via the menu

[Grabthehoopka]

I don't know. I do like the convenience of autosaves, but I do like having directly control over when I save. However, I don't like replaying parts that I've just played through because of autosaves, and I also don't like frequent autosaves because I didn't notice an autosave once and turned the console off and corrupted the data and it's made me paranoid ever since, but I've also screwed myself by manual-saving my way into a corner before, so I don't know.

[RightClickSaveAs]

I don't know. I do like the convenience of autosaves, but I do like having directly control over when I save. However, I don't like replaying parts that I've just played through because of autosaves, and I also don't like frequent autosaves because I didn't notice an autosave once and turned the console off and corrupted the data and it's made me paranoid ever since, but I've also screwed myself by manual-saving my way into a corner before, so I don't know.

I'm the same way, I've gotten used to autosaves so most of the time I forget to manually save anyway, but I like the option of having control as well.

I also like the idea of going for total immersion though. I just think that there should be some way, even if it takes a little poking around on your computer, for you to roll back the saves, just in case. I've had stuff happen where a game gets corrupt or you just need to go back and check something out without playing through the whole thing again. I love the Telltale Walking Dead game, as my avatar shows, and they used a very seamless save system as well, but they really screwed it up on Steam, and lots of people had problems with the save files not syncing up right, and losing whole chapters of progress. It was terrible and they never fixed it, you had to mess around with copying different files over each other and hope that it worked.

[gagaplex]

A thing with autosaves is that you inevitably get a save when you are low on hitpoints, out of ammo and about to get hit in the face by a monster; or some similar moment in time where you're screwed/you screwed yourself over.
Obviously that's more of an issue in games where something will actually kill you like that, where ammo and hitpoints are an issue as such.
Still, I suppose as long as the game creates new autosaves, it's not a big deal. I remember a lot of games that would simply overwrite your existing one, though... and suddenly you don't have a good savegame to go back to anymore.

[matt]

You guys will have to trust me on the fact that we won't autosave in a bad place.

We are planning on only having one autosave slot. That is pretty common in games these days. I'm not planning on Neverending Nightmares being very difficult, and we don't have ammo or health to worry about.

Since the rooms are all fairly small, the autosaves will be frequent. At most, you'll lose 30 seconds if you quit and then reload your autosave.

The reason for this is because I don't want people to think about "saving" because that's a game concept. I want to immerse you in the world of the game, and thinking about saving takes you out of that world.

Just give my scheme a chance! If it fails, then we'll go from there.

[gagaplex]

But how will the proposed branching paths factor into this? Won't a single save slot mean we have to start the game completely over if we want to go a different route at some juncture? Or will there be checkpoints, too, that we can select from a menu once unlocked, like the "chapters" some games have, where you don't have to start over completely but from the start of a given section?

[ranger_lennier]

I'm also concerned about replays with a one-slot autosave system. Will there be a point in the game where you have to accomplish something (say not getting killed by a monster), in order to take a certain story path? If I died there on my first playthrough, then accidentally die again the second time through, would I have to start all over again? Personally, I don't worry too much about full immersion. As long as we're looking at a game on a screen and walking by pushing a button, that will remind me as much that I'm playing a game as much as a save system will.

I actually think some games have a save system that takes away any real challenge. In the original Bioshock, you basically can't lose the game. Any time you die, you just respawn nearby with any enemies you managed to kill or damage the last life still killed or damaged. I never got enough practice against the Big Daddies to actually get good at fighting them. The atmosphere and story of the game were good, but the actual fighting didn't do much for me, yet there were enough enemies that I had to spend a lot of time killing them.

[RightClickSaveAs]

Just give my scheme a chance! If it fails, then we'll go from there.

Sounds fair to me! I didn't mean to sound like I was doubting your ability to make a save system that won't break, just wanted to bring up a potential problem. But I'm sure it's been thought through, and it would actually be fixed if issues come up, unlike the Telltale save bug. This is really just misplaced distrust on my part due to the Walking Dead save problems, I still can't believe they never fixed that huge issue. Hopefully their upcoming second season won't do that.

Also is NN going to use Steam cloud, or is it too early to start thinking about that yet? I've always been curious, what decides which games use the system, is it completely up to the developer or are there other factors?