Saving games

[Hormalakh]

I don't want to sing the praises of save-scumming or force anyone to play the game in a different way or anything like that. I just want to make an observation. Take it how you will and respond with your own observations.

 

In older games, we had less save-scumming. Know why? Because saving a game took a really really really long time. Players had to balance their impatience with their laziness. If they wanted to save the game or reload they would have to consider waiting quite a bit of time before they could play again.

 

This was removed with quicksaves and quickloads. You got your saving "fix" every 2 seconds and going back to redo a decision could happen in a relative "flash."

 

Saving a game has has its negative reinforcement removed and the best way older games reduced save-scumming was due to a technoogical limitation.

 

Imagine having to wait 2 minutes every time you loaded or saved a game. Or 5 minutes. Enough time to get a sandwich and a drink. You can bet loads and saves would decrease. And ironman mode would just become a more hardcore form of this.

 

Of course, bugs always become the bane of this.

 

Just an observation. Developers and players can do what they will with this observation. As always, a relevant XKCD comic can be found.

 

Text:

After years of trying various methods, I broke this habit by pitting my

impatience against my laziness. I decoupled the action and the neurological

reward by setting up a simple 30-second delay I had to wait through, in which

I couldn't do anything else, before any new page or chat client would load (and

only allowed one to run at once). The urge to check all those sites magically

vanished--and my 'productive' computer use was unaffected.

 

http://xkcd.com/862/

[Dream]

No. Let people play how they want; it's a single player game.

[Hormalakh]

OK. Just cuz you said so. It was only an observation.

[Pshaw]

I know what you're getting at but honestly there's got to be better ways to reinforce this besides making saves take forever. The simplest would be to simply not allow saving of any kind in combat. At the very least it would ensure that you need to play a battle out completely every time you reloaded. I'd also limit auto-saves to when you change major zones not entering and exiting buildings or different sections of dungeons.

 

Beyond that, as a frequent saver myself, I say just let it be. I think the best way you can make constant saving not be the solution to getting a perfect game is to have your characters choices ripple out into later parts of the game. Even if you're a constant saver if killing a bandit chief early in the game means you'll be targeted by cartel assassins later which kill off a random companion wouldn't be salvageable if it happened 10+ hours of gameplay later. You'd have to live with that choice. Now this is a bit harder to implement and obviously it can't be done for everything but I think it's the best way to prevent constant saving and reloading for perfect results while not impeding your ability to save and stop playing at anytime.

[Brannart]

Well in the IE games you could not save in the middle of combat. I certainly hope they do not allow that.

[LadyCrimson]

I don't remember saving ever taking very long even years ago and even without "quicksave" hotkeys. Maybe 10-12 seconds at most. It certainly wasn't enough to keep me from rather obsessively saving. But then I'm one of those people that sometimes saves like a madperson, but then ends up never actually reloading/using any of those saves. It's more a psychological thing re: "what if the power goes out" or "what if the game crashes."

 

At any rate, I'm still of the opinion that how frequently one saves should be left up to the player...at least with more complex/lots of choice games like this. Leave the save points/minimal saving routes for simpler games or online type stuff.

[Kaz]

There will always be legit scenarios where the reload feature comes in handy.

- Technical problems (bugs)

- User error (miss-clicked or misunderstood the game mechanics)

So any penalties applied to reloading would also harm people caught in the cases listed above. This should be avoided and I think it's more fruitful to talk about how to take away the incentives for reloading instead of making it harder. Listing the common reasons for "save scumming" and addressing them individually is a good start I think. I divided them into three categories.

 

Skill checks

Thief skills, writing spells to spell book, or other instances where the player stands to gain from a dice roll, has been covered in this thread.

 

Combat gone awry

This is a hard one. I think the major factor prompting reloading was the severe penalty of character death. I think PE is taking steps in the right direction by introducing stamina in addition to health. Poor choices in battle will still result in characters getting knocked out, but because it's not a death there is still plenty of incentive to play through and salvage the situation. Death was a chore not only for the trek back to town for the revive, but for having to find a place to store all the dead character's belongings. Not fun because leaving them on the ground = risk of loosing them permanently, and free inventory space was premium real estate. Unless you have hours upon hours to kill on games any sensible person would reload to avoid this ordeal.. If I didn't have to manage the items of the dead character, I'd be much more inclined to deal with the death and carry on until I could revive them.

 

Dialog (multi-choice riddles etc.)

I can't think of a way to avoid the dialog meta game without introducing some weird mechanic that hinders the writers. And frankly, the only time I can recall reloading for dialog is after I miss-clicked, or aggravated a person because I didn't thoroughly read the choice I picked. People who want to exploit this will always do, and I don't see much reason to work around it.

[Dream]

There will always be legit scenarios where the reload feature comes in handy.

- Technical problems (bugs)

- User error (miss-clicked or misunderstood the game mechanics)

So any penalties applied to reloading would also harm people caught in the cases listed above. This should be avoided and I think it's more fruitful to talk about how to take away the incentives for reloading instead of making it harder. Listing the common reasons for "save scumming" and addressing them individually is a good start I think. I divided them into three categories.

 

Skill checks

Thief skills, writing spells to spell book, or other instances where the player stands to gain from a dice roll, has been covered in this thread.

 

Combat gone awry

This is a hard one. I think the major factor prompting reloading was the severe penalty of character death. I think PE is taking steps in the right direction by introducing stamina in addition to health. Poor choices in battle will still result in characters getting knocked out, but because it's not a death there is still plenty of incentive to play through and salvage the situation. Death was a chore not only for the trek back to town for the revive, but for having to find a place to store all the dead character's belongings. Not fun because leaving them on the ground = risk of loosing them permanently, and free inventory space was premium real estate. Unless you have hours upon hours to kill on games any sensible person would reload to avoid this ordeal.. If I didn't have to manage the items of the dead character, I'd be much more inclined to deal with the death and carry on until I could revive them.

 

Dialog (multi-choice riddles etc.)

I can't think of a way to avoid the dialog meta game without introducing some weird mechanic that hinders the writers. And frankly, the only time I can recall reloading for dialog is after I miss-clicked, or aggravated a person because I didn't thoroughly read the choice I picked. People who want to exploit this will always do, and I don't see much reason to work around it.

 

Or let people play how they want; there's always that.

[Exile2k4]

I think it's a really difficult issue - personally I'm hoping that the devs design some of the features of the game so that Ironman is very difficult but still enjoyable, and then I'll enjoy the challenge of that setting. A lot of things which promote constantly saving might be 'realistic' in some way (ie traps that spring out of nowhere and instantly kill you) but they don't really add much to the gameplay experience for me personally. I love the feeling of weight and importance that playing without constantly saving/reloading gives combat, conversations and decisions, but I don't want to restart the game a dozen times for things that I didn't feel were in my control.

Edited November 27, 2012 by Exile2k4

[Kalderas]

I don't want to be able to save durning combat. I would sadly abuse it against my will

[Sedrefilos]

I loved the quick-save option. I quick-save after every combat or when I enter a new region. I NEVER load after a decisions but I load (of course) if I lose a battle 'cause it's game over then

 

And I wouldn't like to reload a save 10 battles before the one I lost because some people care if other people are save-"scumming". I already won them; what's the purpose?! I only need to fight again the last one.

 

In short... MAKING SAVES LAST LONG IS THE WORST IDEA I'VE EVER HEARD!!!

 

Save whenever you want except during combat is just fine. Why mess with the save game procedure??

[Osvir]

In Might & Magic 1 you have to go to an Inn to save. I really like this concept. If camping is limited (in essence, an updated Rest mechanic) this could be cool as well. There are some problems with this though, and that is if you camp outside the dungeon, you go through the entire thing, get to the boss and then die. Now you have to play through everything. Of course you could break the immersion yourself and finish everything in the dungeon except the boss, leave for a town and save, then return to the cave. But then the question is... has anything respawned?

 

And if it has respawned, wouldn't this be an excellent method to use for "grinding" and "abusing"? Regardless, I think that you should be able to save anywhere and however you want, Hardcore mode fulfills the hardcore saving does it not? The real question I am wondering about is, will I be able to play Hardcore save mode on all difficulties?

 

"Save scumming" (the definition of it is externally messing with the actual .file definition in your folder e.g., "making a backup" no?) has never really been an issue to me, I press Q like mad when I play Baldur's Gate. Before enemy, after enemy, before rest, after rest. I see it as a sense of accomplishment and I'm a fast player (heavy micro-management, I draw conclusions quick and beat enemies to a pulp within 3 draws, I can be a mean chess player too ). The Rest mechanic is more of an issue, which will be... fixed in P:E? I don't think it will be entirely "fixed" but with new solutions comes new problems, I'm such an optimist realistically speaking, there's probably going to be things in P:E that people are going to whine about regardless, you can't please everyone, and everyone certainly doesn't know how to please themselves (mindset).

 

Also, if I get woken up by enemies I take them down, no reloading here just because I had a bad night. The real problem is that I can take down the enemies fairly easy due to party strength and player skill, then I just rest right after that battle, if there is another battle waking my party up I take those enemies down until I get a satisfactory rest and re-memorized all my spells and such. It was way too easy to rest and take down enemies, there was no real threat. The highest difficulty I've played on Baldur's Gate is "Core Rules" though so I have no idea how difficult the enemies get on the highest highest settings *shrug*

[PrimeJunta]

I wouldn't mind an optional timeout on save. Terrible save-scummer here, and it hurts my enjoyment.

 

Even better, I'd like a game that doesn't reward save-scumming, with no constant dying, and delayed consequences.

[JFSOCC]

@OP. Popcorn brain, it's called. We humans get a small dopamine boost every time we click a link. it's a bit of a "ooh, what does this button do" or "what's behind this door"

Clicking random article on wikipedia, getting stuck on tv-tropes, googling yet another thing, it all gives us that little spike. a small fix.

 

and that reward is hard to turn off, because of the way our brains are wired.

Getting rid of all that is a huge boon.

 

I'll let you know when I've succeeded

[PrimeJunta]

I've tried ADOM and Angband, but the only ones I've really gotten into are rogue (the original) and Nethack. I've ascended with most of the classes on that one. (Not that the class even makes much difference by the time you're past the castle.)

 

Also Dwarf Fortress, if that counts.

 

I do enjoy that type of gameplay; however I'm not sure I'd like it in a game where the content isn't procedurally generated. I'll certainly give P:E's Iron Man mode a try; in fact I might start with a combination of Iron Man/Easy, assuming a usual frequency of dying at Normal difficulty.

 

My problem with most games is that when I get tense I start save-scumming, which jolts me out of it. With many of them the level of difficulty assumes that you have a relatively recent save to come back to anyway. Few things are as annoying as racing through stuff you've just played through just to be able to continue. I'd rather take that "punishment" as a five-minute timeout. Wouldn't want to force it on anyone though.

[rjshae]

One thing that could be done is to store checkpoint data in memory at key moments of the game; each time you save, you're saving the checkpoint data rather than the current state. This will require you to replay the game from the last checkpoint. It's somewhat similar to how saves work in DS2, except you don't have to retrace your steps as much.

[jivex5k]

Saving only outside of combat is fine with me.

I wouldn't expect to come back mid-battle and remember what's been going on anyways.

 

As far as the OP:

Your talking about something that wasn't included by design, but rather a limitation due to hardware.

There's no reason to punish players for saving the game, period.

 

If you think saving every 2 seconds takes away from the game, don't do it!

 

NO CHECKPOINTS! I'm not 14 any more, I have responsibilities and would like to play this single player, incredibly long game at my own damn pace. If that means I can only play 15 -30 minutes a day I don't want to be punished.

 

And don't you dare think about respawning monsters on loading saves, this isn't a hack and slash rpg.

Edited November 27, 2012 by jivex5k

[Sacred_Path]

The fact that there's an Ironman mode solved all of that for me. I'll play on Ironman, and people who want to use save-scumming are free to do that.

[Dream]

One thing that could be done is to store checkpoint data in memory at key moments of the game; each time you save, you're saving the checkpoint data rather than the current state. This will require you to replay the game from the last checkpoint. It's somewhat similar to how saves work in DS2, except you don't have to retrace your steps as much.

 

That sound so fun man! Why don't you just do that yourself and let those that want to save whenever do what they want?

[kenup]

I don't remember saving(never over a minute) or loading taking 5 minutes. The only exception I remember was NWN2 loading in the first PC I played it on. And even if they do take time, quick saves have nothing to do with it, it's the engine's problem. I don't see a reason to go backwards on this and make saving/loading slower. It's not a gameplay mechanic, let alone a better one.

 

 

Quick saves are a convenience, and a very good one at that. They do come handy in many cases, like needing to leave the desk really fast.

Edited November 27, 2012 by kenup

[Frisk]

Well, I have a job and a family If I'm lucky, I'll have 30 minutes per day to play the game. I want to be able to save whenever something more urgent needs my attention.

 

I am, however, fine with not being able to save in the middle of combat.

[Agelastos]

What about a cool down period which prohibits you from performing certain tasks (lockpicking or pickpocketing, for instance) directly after you load a save?

New Vegas used a system like that to prevent people from using save-scumming to "cheat" in the casinos.

Whenever you had used a slot machine and lost, you couldn't just reload and try again. You had to wait 1 minute, or something like that.

[Dream]

What about a cool down period which prohibits you from performing certain tasks (lockpicking or pickpocketing, for instance) directly after you load a save?

New Vegas used a system like that to prevent people from using save-scumming to "cheat" in the casinos.

Whenever you had used a slot machine and lost, you couldn't just reload and try again. You had to wait 1 minute, or something like that.

 

There's a reason New Vegas only had that on slot machines and not on **** like lockpicking and pickpocketing.

[Pshaw]

What about a cool down period which prohibits you from performing certain tasks (lockpicking or pickpocketing, for instance) directly after you load a save?

New Vegas used a system like that to prevent people from using save-scumming to "cheat" in the casinos.

Whenever you had used a slot machine and lost, you couldn't just reload and try again. You had to wait 1 minute, or something like that.

 

I find this to a bit silly. In a game like New Vegas where you can just enable the console and add all the gold you want I'm not sure I see the point in trying to stop people from cheating at gambling. Heck I don't see the point in save-scumming your gambling at all when a console command will save you a lot of time if you want to get gold outside of the spirit of the game.

Edited November 27, 2012 by Pshaw

[JFSOCC]

Answer the question "why do people save games" and you can start answering "How do I discourage someone from save scumming"