On-map save points


cekivi

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Just a suggestion to have some objects in the game (way-points, sign posts, whatever) to save your game as you're progressing. I've experienced the problem where you want to stop playing but you're far form a safe location to sleep so you're left choosing to play longer than you have time for, sleeping in an exposed area, or quitting and losing whatever progress you've made since the last save. I may have even deliberately tried to sprain an ankle once so I could save and quit. :P

Hopefully by having the save points be certain areas it will prevent any save corruptions or accidentally saving in an area that you're then trapped in.

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Would it not make sense to introduce the ability to save at any given time? We could still have the auto-save as it is now, to preserve permadeath. But an additional save feature would allow players to do just that - leave the game when they have to and resume at a later point in time. Of course the last autosave would be replaced by saving manually.

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It's a question/request that has certainly come up before, but as always I am curious if any of you think that a less-limited save system would have any effect on the essential nature of the current game experience. I can think of a few ways it would change, but I am more interested in what you think about this topic. Put another way -- would the questions the game currently pose to you be any different?

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1 minute ago, Patrick Carlson said:

It's a question/request that has certainly come up before, but as always I am curious if any of you think that a less-limited save system would have any effect on the essential nature of the current game experience. I can think of a few ways it would change, but I am more interested in what you think about this topic. Put another way -- would the questions the game currently post to you be any different?

Saving at any point would certainly change the dynamic. You'll no longer have to find a shelter to stop and rest in so the game would lose some of its realism. It may also lead to players ignoring the permanent features of the game by essentially "quick saving" before any risky action. That's why I proposed tying the saves to interactable items (or @AZHockeyNut's suggestion of tying saves to locations). You could think of it as your character taking 5 before they continue with whatever they were doing.

Again, it's really only a problem on the really large maps. If there are not many shelters and the weather is too poor to sleep you can be left in a situation where you're ready to do something else but there's no good exit route from the game.

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To be honest, I've never seen a problem with the current system. The only times I've lost progress were due to getting stuck between rocks so that I couldn't get out and had to reload in order to continue (or wait until I died!).

If I've got a limited amount of time to play the game, I'd always make sure I saved using the existing system of indoor locations and sleeping in plenty of time before I have to stop. And I wouldn't go somewhere where I can't save my progress if I know I haven't got time to complete that bit of my journey.

Perhaps more frequent or time-based autosaving could be a solution? I don't really like the idea of adding a quicksave feature.

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Well it's a difficult question isn't it? There's reason on both side of the argument, especially about difficulty and responsibility on one side and on the other side the simple fact that sometimes real life ask to leave the game and it's frustrating to not being able to save. So... Why don't have both? (Yes, i'm a greedy b****** ^.^)

First, you change absolutely nothing in the saving mechanics. You hard save entering a safe house or sleeping if you need to roll back you progress for any reason.

Secondly, you add a tiny little feature for that, went you leave the game (because you really need to go), you save your current game state independently and the next time you launch the game you have to choose : either directly go back to your game that you left in a hurry to save properly and everything, or else do something else but loosing that temp save. Note that either way, you lose that save after that. It's just a save to go back to your progress when leaving, nothing more.

What do you think of that? Hope my french brain was able to English explained it correctly ^^

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Umm, it looks like such a feature is already in the game: Radial Menu / Campcraft / Pass Time.

You don't actually have to find a safe location or certain (to be added) places to save. You don't even have to take a bedroll with you. But of course, in order to save using that feature, you would have to spend at least 1 hour at it, because it won't save if you cancel the action. So it won't help you, if you get hit by a blizard and unexpectedly have to stop the game.

But it should be all you need if you use that feature in regular intervals?

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I really though that you needed to rest one hour for that. But none the less, if for whatever reason you can't (wolf, blizzard, or anything) you're screw. And that lead back to the same problem. Having to improvise an indirect way isn't the same as having a game mechanics though for that matter. The latter is always better in my opinion.

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So you would like to be able to save next to a wolf, or even in the middle of a blizzard? :)

But I get it, you and the others are essentially asking for a quick-save option.

case 1: (You can choose to load the auto-save or the quick-save). You walk around. You do a quick save. You walk around some more. You get a sprained ankle and the game does an auto-save. You quit the game and load the quick-save. -- That is as if you never got a sprained ankle. So the game should auto-delete any quick-save when it does an auto-save.

case 2: (You can choose to load the auto-save or the quick-save). You walk around and the game does at some point do an auto-save. You walk around some more. You do a quick save and leave the game. You continue the game using the quick-save and, just after that, you manage to get into trouble (wolf, blizzard, whatever). So you quit the game and resume it using the auto-save. -- Same as before: This allows you to circumvent any trouble. So the game should also auto-delete a previous auto-save if the player does a quick-save.

So with both cases you add the possibility for abuse if you allow to choose between two different save points when resuming a game.

But I wouldn't mind a quick-save option as long as there is only one save point.

- EDIT-

Wouldn't it make sense if the game did an auto-save once you quit it?

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I'm absolutely with you on that point @tentacles. What I was trying to explain before is not really a quick save as you can't do some ting in the game and decide to go back to it. You will still be bound to go to your real save. What I'm proposing is a temporary save juste meant to quite the game and when going back to the game directly going back to that point. This save is like closing the screen on a laptop to go away and then opening it after a while when you have time. It's not really a save per say because you can't really choose to go back to that point after a while. It's eit her you go back there at the start or you don't. And whatever your choice, that's definitive.

And choosing between the two save is the same as when playing, choosing to quick and restart. That's already a possibility from the start on that point,so it's not really the matter here.

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7 hours ago, tentacles said:

But I get it, you and the others are essentially asking for a quick-save option.

No, not a quick save feature. Just more frequent saves. Neither of your scenarios are preferable as they remove the permanence of your decisions. If you can choose between saves than you always have the option to "undo" your worst mistakes. I just want one save file that I can update (be it entering an on-map location or interacting with something) without having to sleep/pass time. The main reason is I do not have the time for long play sessions so recently I've only been able to play the Long Dark on holidays due to the time commitment. I haven't even had time to play on the weekends anymore :(

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8 hours ago, tentacles said:

Wouldn't it make sense if the game did an auto-save once you quit it?

Yeah, this.

If the saving system were to remain the same as it is now, but with the added function that game auto-saves whenever you quit, no matter where you are, wouldn't that work?

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8 minutes ago, Pillock said:

Yeah, this.

If the saving system were to remain the same as it is now, but with the added function that game auto-saves whenever you quit, no matter where you are, wouldn't that work?

The downside of that approach is that if you become trapped in a terrain feature (e.g. you clip through some rocks and cannot escape) you now have to delete your save and start over. For the full release a save on exit approach would likely be fine but there's still too high a chance for bugs with the game still being in Alpha.

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I really like the idea of in-game save points at major intersections, etc that are far away from shelter. They would function purely as convenience points to not force players to keep hauling gear way back to a building just for the sake of saving before they quit the game. +1

An anytime autosave feature would fundamentally change the weight of your in-game decisions, and reduce all of the gravity from your character's situation. This game needs a risk/reward system to work as well as it does. If I think I can make it past some wolves without being spotted, or make it home before an incoming blizzard obscures my visibility, I pay the price if I'm wrong. Adding the ability to press one button to autosave before trying these things, then reloading if I'm wrong so I can try something different, it removes all risk from the game, and all importance from my decisions as a survivor. Autosave on exit would be similar as it only takes 15 seconds to exit/reload a game. -1

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I am not too sure at the moment, but doesn't the game auto-save after each wolf/bear attack? Assumed that it does: If a quick-save key merely triggers an auto-save event, then an attack would overwrite that save game. So there shouldn't be any way to undo a wolf/bear attack.

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45 minutes ago, tentacles said:

I am not too sure at the moment, but doesn't the game auto-save after each wolf/bear attack? Assumed that it does: If a quick-save key merely triggers an auto-save event, then an attack would overwrite that save game. So there shouldn't be any way to undo a wolf/bear attack.

Yes, the game does auto-save every time you gain an affliction (e.g. a sprained ankle). That's why I was (half) joking in my first post about deliberately spraining an ankle so I could save and log out of the game. ;)

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6 minutes ago, cekivi said:

Yes, the game does auto-save every time you gain an affliction (e.g. a sprained ankle).

But that doesn't necessarily include attacks which don't cause any afflictions.

Also thanks for mentioning that an auto-save on exit wouldn't be wise at the current state of development. That was one of those situations when you have an idea, but don't have the time to think about it in detail. :)

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17 minutes ago, tentacles said:

But that doesn't necessarily include attacks which don't cause any afflictions.

Also thanks for mentioning that an auto-save on exit wouldn't be wise at the current state of development. That was one of those situations when you have an idea, but don't have the time to think about it in detail. :)

No problem :)

Also, I don't think it's possible to be attacked and not suffer an affliction. At the very least I always suffer bruises.

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6 minutes ago, Bidule said:

Well, I had the opportunity to not have any affliction sometimes. Unusual as it sounds, I just had torn clothing and less condition but nothing else.

That is exactly what I had in mind. And I just can't remember if the game saved after such an attack.

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