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Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
9 years ago
Solved

[FIXED] Save Issues after Patch 1.30.103

The new save function is deleting my saves, renaming them, etc. My daughter and I both play. When I saved my game tonight it completely deleted my save file that I had been saving it under and saved ...
pc
  • JasonVega2's avatar
    JasonVega2
    8 years ago

    I tested it pretty thoroughly and could not break it.

    No saves suddenly turning into older save-names and over-writing existing save files.

    I saved as three times, deleted one and saved two more. Then I went back and checked. All the old existing saves were left alone.

    I think it's really fixed!

JasonVega2's avatar
JasonVega2
9 years ago

The "Save As" feature is over-writing random old save games without warning or recourse.

Today, as an example, I played Sims 4 for awhile his ESC and chose "Save As". The :New Save Game" block was highlighted and I was *extremely* careful to not choose any other blocks. I changed the save game name to "AW3 Climbing Wall" and clicked the "save" button. When I re-started the game some hours later, there was no save called "AW3 Climbing Wall", instead there was a new save called "02 First Day" with a picture of the family I currently play - a family that had not been created yet at the time this file was originally saved.

I make incremental backup game saves. Sims is an extremely complicated game and I get very emotionally attached to my Sims. I want to make sure that if the game ever gets corrupted, I can always go back to an earlier save. The "02 First Day" file was the *second* incremental save I ever made - in 2014.

This has happened 3 times.

I have noticed that if you scroll down in the list of saves and come back to the "New Save Game" spot - it randomly chooses an old file save and populates the name in that box with it. Not where you type a new name, but where you hover over that box.

The last time this happened it took me hours to find and restore the original save from backups - as it took me so long to determine which save file had been overwritten. I was excruciatingly careful after that to make sure I didn't hit any stray buttons or scroll through the old files or *anything* that might cause this to happen again.

The game is unplayable in this state (or more properly - unsaveable).

I will try one more thing - locking all the save files as read only in an effort to prevent the game from overwriting an old file. I suspect this will cause the save to file entirely and crash the game. We will see.

Has anyone else had such trouble with their saves?

  • JasonVega2's avatar
    JasonVega2
    9 years ago

    @NZsimm3rThat is unfortunate.

    I have something of a work-around in place:

    1) Make a backup copy of your -entire- Saves directory without the sub-directories before you play, and especially before you save!

    2) ESC and Save As in Sims 4. Save your file under a new name, but do not exit the save menu!

    3) Save As again and look to see if the correct filename saved. In my experience it usually takes two or three attempts before it actually *saves* under the name you give it - the other times it overwrites one of your old save files at random. Keep doing this until your Save As finally "takes".

    4) Exit Sims 4.

    5) Order the Sims 4 Saves directory by creation date and -move- (don't copy) all of the files that are time-stamped during the time you were saving the game. If you had to save three times to finally get the save file to save correctly, there should be 3 files.

    6) Copy the saves from the backup you made before gameplay. When the file system asks you about duplicates, skip all of those. We just deleted the overwritten files and the one correctly saved file. We want to restore the ones that got overwritten.

    7) Copy the saves from where you -moved- the recent 2 or 3 save files. Again, skip all duplicates. This should then copy the legitimate file you just made back into your Saves directory.

    It's a colossal pain, but if you're careful it should work. I will be doing this on a daily basis instead of *every* time I save. So, I might make 5 incremental saves in a 3-hour gameplay period. Maybe it took 9 tries total to get the files to "stick". I will then follow my little routine but just look at the files created *today*.

    Thanks for the link - I'll go take a look over there and see if there's anything I can learn or add.

    • crinrict's avatar
      crinrict
      Hero+
      9 years ago

      Hi @JasonVega2 and @NZsimm3r

      I've merged this thread with existing thread on the issue.

      I've not seen any issues in my save game atm other than then the save as gets a new name but there's been plenty of reports now.

      Tagging @IrishMadCat_EA to see if there's any more info needed

      • JasonVega2's avatar
        JasonVega2
        9 years ago

        Ah, sorry I didn't notice the original thread!

        There is absolutely NO DOUBT that "Save As" is overwriting old save files unrelated to the name you type in - at least in my game. Did some more testing to verify:


        Saved file as "AW3 Climbing Wall". Overwrote slot_00000002, originally "02 First Day".

        Re-saved file as "AW3 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly in slot_00000179.

        Saved file as "AW4 Climbing Wall". Overwrote slot_00000005, originally "93 Lkr Rm Atndnt".

        Re-saved file as "AW4 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly in slot_00000182.

        Saved file as "AW5 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly in slot_000001aa.

        Saved file as "AW6 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly in slot_000001ac.

        Saved file as "AW7 Climbing Wall". Overwrote slot_000001ad, originally "AH1 Six Skulls".

        Re-saved file as "AW7 Climbing Wall". Overwrote slot_000001af, originally "AD1 Great Party!".

        Re-saved file as "AW7 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly as slot_000001b2.

        Saved file as "AW8 Climbing Wall". Overwrote slot_000001b5, originally "AD2 Dance Party!".

        Re-saved file as "AW8 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly as slot_000001c0.

        Restored overwritten files and then locked all files in the Saves directory as read-only. This did not crash the game as I suspected it would - but it also did not work.

        Saved file as "AW9 Climbing Wall". Overwrote slot_000001c6, originally "AH8 Pioneer Tech".

        Re-saved file as "AW9 Climbing Wall". Saved correctly as slot_000001ca.

        It looks to me very much like Sims4 is using an internal DB or looking at an external file that tracks which slot names have been used previously. It appears that it is losing track of which slot names are *available* and therefor overwriting live files.

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