Story Progress Deleted?

[mathman111]

I was playing my second character because I didn't want to use the character I used for the demo, (nice job syncing that btw) and had been playing all the way to GUN-D4M, got a few cards, completed a few quests + side quests, when I finally decided to call it a night.

This morning, I log on to my computer, double click my desktop shortcut to the steam version of the game, and it says that I need to install the game first. I know that it's already installed, so I navigate to the game folder in my steam folder, and access it from there. It boots up normally, I choose my character fine, it has everything saved fine, and when it loads, I'm in my home, talking to Dad about the exam today... My character still has all his cards, and most of his items, namely, not the potion that he got in Grindea as story related.

I know you can't do anything about it now, but it's something I was very frustrated at, so have a look at preventing it in the future perhaps?

 

[Teddy]

Hey!

This is a rare bug that (if it's the same) seems to be caused by Steam Auto-Cloud saving (in rare cases it marks the second world file for eternal assassination).

I'll one day look into doing a manual cloud implementation to see if it might help.

In the meantime, the game actually keeps backups of the save files, so hopefully you'll be able to restore a somewhat recent version! Here's how to restore a game backup:

1) Start the game and have it running in the background (in the main menu), to ensure Steam Cloud doesn't bring back the old saves.


2) In the file explorer, go into %APPDATA%/Secrets of Grindea and find the Backups folder. In here you should see folders named after all your characters. Go into the appropriate folder. The auto 0-4 are rolling backups. Sort the folder by date to easily see which of them was made last! The “005h” and alike are permanent backups made every hour.


3) Choose a backup you think is appropriate, and copy it to the “Worlds” folder. Replace the save file of the slot you want to recover by deleting its save and renaming the copied backup to the correct slot. The 0 save file corresponds to your first save slot, 1 to the second, and so forth.


4) Load the character


If after copying a backup the game still puts you at the beginning, then it might be a bug in Steam Cloud that is deleting the saves!


To disable Steam Cloud for the game, go into your Steam Library, right click the game and choose Properties. Go to the Updates tab and make sure the Steam Cloud checkbox at the bottom is unchecked!


Hope this helps!

 

[mathman111]

Yeah, sorry, I just saw the old post as I finished this one, I tried it, but it is still putting me back at the beginning.

 

[mathman111]

I'm seeing two files, a .cha file and a .wld, I assume that those are character and world files respectively, so I'm taking the most recent .wld file and renaming it to 1.wld, and pasting it in the 2nd save slot, over the currently existing file, correct?

 

[KoBeWi]

This is a rare bug that (if it's the same) seems to be caused by Steam Auto-Cloud saving (in rare cases it marks the second world file for eternal assassination).

I'll one day look into doing a manual cloud implementation to see if it might help.

According to Steamworks documentation, Steam Cloud and Steam Auto-Cloud are separate things. Last time I commented on this bug, you claimed that Cloud does everything automatically, so dunno if anything changed since then or Cloud is somehow automatic too.

Steam provides two different methods of utilizing the Steam Cloud, read up on how the two methods differ, and determine which would be the best for your application.

First up is the Steam Cloud API.
The Cloud API provides a series of functions which allows you to directly integrate the Steam Cloud into your game. The Cloud API isolates individual Steam users files from each other and provides a greater level of control over the Steam Cloud.
[...]
It is generally recommended that you use the Cloud API if possible as it allows for deeper integration and customization, and it enables you to best provide the high quality experience that Steam users have come to expect from the Steam Cloud.

 

[mathman111]

You say:

in rare cases it marks the second world file for eternal assassination

Would it do anything if I put my character in the third save slot and my world in the third save slot?

 

[KoBeWi]

^
That would help, but probably temporarily. I'd just disable the cloud until it's fixed.

 

[mathman111]

I have disabled cloud and it still isn't working,

 

[KoBeWi]

You need to restore the backup too. If your character is 1.cha (second slot), then replace the 1.wld with the backup. Make a copy of whole directory first, in case you make a mistake

 

[mathman111]

I've done all of this, multiple times, besides making a backup, because unless this works, I'm going to have to restart anyway, so it doesn't make much of a difference.

 

[KoBeWi]

Did you try a different backup file? Or restoring character backup too?

 

[mathman111]

I'm about to try my third separate backup, and I did the character backup as well.

 

[Teddy]

According to Steamworks documentation, Steam Cloud and Steam Auto-Cloud are separate things. Last time I commented on this bug, you claimed that Cloud does everything automatically, so dunno if anything changed since then or Cloud is somehow automatic too.

Steam Cloud is the underlying cloud service, which can be accessed via Auto-Cloud or the API! Have I contradicted myself somehow? I don't see it!

Would it do anything if I put my character in the third save slot and my world in the third save slot?

It might work permanently if the cause is the cloud bug... since it's a specific file every time my guess is that it's some crazy hashing bug or something, which shouldn't affect any other save slots.

However, since you say restoring backups doesn't work even with Steam Cloud disabled, that's a bit weird! What happens if you try to restore a save file that's significantly older than your most recent? Also, do you get to watch the starting cutscene every time?

If you're not being forced to watch the cutscene, then I think you might be restoring world saves that have been backed up after the bug wiped your stuff, and you need to restore an older backup!

All this being said... since you had "only" finished Flying Fortress, and your character is intact (meaning all the cards etc is already there), then maybe copying your 1.cha file to a different slot and replaying there would be faster than messing about with these things.

On that topic, I think you should get asked if you want to skip quests you've already finished... did that happen when you got thrown back to the beginning? (basically a dialogue that says "you've already finished this quest once" etc)

 

[KoBeWi]

Steam Cloud is the underlying cloud service, which can be accessed via Auto-Cloud or the API! Have I contradicted myself somehow? I don't see it!

I was referring to this old quote:

As a developer you tell Steam what file extensions to back up, in what folders, and then Steam "does the job for you". There is no game code involved in this - it's done inside the Steamworks developer portal.

According to documentation, Cloud API is recommended over Auto-Cloud. The API is exposed via ISteamRemoteStorage interface, which provides methods for dealing with individual files. I'm not saying that you contradicted anything, I just discovered that there's a way to control what the cloud does and it's not some "old legacy system", but something that should be preferred when making a game.

 

[mathman111]

Sorry for the late response, I got it working but forgot to update, I restored a save from ~30 minutes previous and it is working fine for me, I tried putting my .cha file in slot three and my .wld file as well, but the problem I do believe was I was restoring from after the bug had already happened. If what you mean by the opening cutscene is the dialogue with Dad, then yes, I had to re-watch it every time, (or hold escape), but it still told me I had to do the "go to the city" quest each time.

 

[Teddy]

According to documentation, Cloud API is recommended over Auto-Cloud. The API is exposed via ISteamRemoteStorage interface, which provides methods for dealing with individual files. I'm not saying that you contradicted anything, I just discovered that there's a way to control what the cloud does and it's not some "old legacy system", but something that should be preferred when making a game.

Aha, I see! That's quite interesting... either I'm misremembering, or the only thing that's changed is Steam's documentation

Back when we got the game on Steam, Auto-Cloud was new, and as I remember it the wording was interestingly almost exactly opposite! The manual Cloud API was to be used in edge cases and Auto-Cloud was the recommended approach. In fact, I distinctly remember warnings about SteamRemoteStorage largely being considered "legacy"!

Maybe this means other people have had issues with Auto Cloud and now they're kind of backpedaling on it

Edit of edit: I removed the edit

 

[mathman111]

Now, when I moved my .cha file and .wld file over, it still asked me to make a new character, body, name etc., but when I got to playing it looked exactly like the file I copied over. That's a little strange no? And the name of the file was the name I entered the second time, but NPC's called me by the name on the copied file.