Tomorrow's PTE Release - save/load feedback here please

People may be mehing at game saves but the whole point of them is to provide the framework for being able to replay a battle from any point... right? Also, Kingdom Under Fire is one of those games that didn't get a save feature until a patch was released and boy did it suffer from not having one, seeing as campaign maps could go on to the hour mark easily, with one screwup causing your heroes to die horribly and forcing a reset of the entire map. Yes PA's games don't typically go that long but....

Go with me here. Once rewind and play features are in, one could potentially create a gamesave with a 30 minute no army build ready to go from the moment the game is resumed. What would PA play like if everyone had a base and some resources already set up?

A good idea I always supported since day one. Some interesting good things about that, starting with every team having a generic base, just for a change of pace or interesting gameplay.

The vanilla game should always be a blank start, but some maps being saved as save/loads where you load with each team starting with a prebuilt template base, makes it like a versus campaign scenario deathmatch lol.

When watching a replay it's no longer possible to switch army vision (the little eyes next to the player names from spectator vision or with a replay). Looks like that was broken with this PTE.

"Are there filesize improvements coming? My one hour game had a compressed save of 250mb, unzipped 340mb!! And I only had a small game with 4 AI's, not that many units. How many storage do you guys not need for all those replays? "


Right now save files are full replays files with full history. This is necessary if you want to resume from middle.

It might be possible to reduce the history data set down to only what's needed to load the game at a single point in time. That's giving up a pretty major feature in exchange for a smaller file size. A reasonable trade off. But it's also lower priority than more than a few things. There are a lot of other save/load features that must be done first. After they're complete we'll re-evaluate overall priorities and see what makes most sense to work on next.

I just tested this again it it looks like it does work... i swear i'm not crazy. (Vision worked and was the correct vision)

Maybe it had to do with watching the lobby ID replay versus staying in the game after it finished and using chrono cam?

but yeah if I see this happen again then i'll take a screenshot

EDIT: The economy, alliance, and army tab for armies doesn't work for any teams when viewing a lobby ID replay.

Unfortunately I am not able to test the save load because the UI crashes after 15-30 minutes in, and I cannot reconnect to the game either locally or via PlayFab. Definitely an increase in UI crash frequency.
Edit after patch: Newer PTE seemed to kill UI crashes in the few games I played. Got a few server connection lost instances, though.


Edit: Pelters don't work anymore. The first one I built was after a save, but now that I think about it the last game I played without saving I built a pelter, and I don't recall it being helpful.

Edit edit: Anchors unable to target aircraft (edit^3: Sometimes?). This wasn't a secret balance change, was it?

Edit*4combo: How long does it take a saved game (playfab) to appear in the Replay list? Saved a game at the start, played for about 30 minutes, wasn't there when the game ended.

My pelters worked okay on Meso.

That is a lot of data for a single game!! I understand that you need all game data for the chronocam loading feature to work, but I didn't expect it to be this big I was thinking among the lines of 20 saved games on one pc, that would add up to 5gb of saves data! Not that it is that much though, I remember that The Witcher 1 had a 30gb save folder when I finished the game. It always created a new save file instead of overwriting.

It might be nice to have the game automatically overwrite save data for the same saved game, since the chronocam feature would allow you to return to the previous save points anyway. This saves some diskspace for the unknowing user. Although you should always still allow the user to change it if they really want.

But disk space might not be that a big problem since we can also use playfab for saving, which is always nice

Finally, making two seperate save versions might confuse the user if one of their saves allow the chronocam function, but others not. Single point saving might be great for modding in campains, since it would shave a lot of the mod size.

Anyways, thanks for responding

Ok. Some bugs with load and save.

When you reload the game, and destroy other commander the game wont end. Also the surrender and delete button dont work but that has been confirmed.

This worked in my game though, I saved and loaded like 7 times and when I killed the last enemy commander the game ended normally. So it might be related to the surrender/delete button not functioning.

I haven't played PA in a while, how do I save my game?

You can find the Save Game option in the menu after pressing Escape.

I don't have a save option, and I'm still showing as build V78071 in the corner so I'm guessing that's why.

How do I get the latest build?

Cheers for the help

Save/Load and the changes they are talking about are currently only in the PTE (public test environment) server.

disagreed

tough

we have them already

mmmmmmmmhhhhhmmmmm ... baaaaaacoooooon .....*DROOLS*

so either we are already skynet or sorian will cause it ...

Hey all, if you have a repro for factories losing build queues, please post that here. It seems to be a bug, but a 100% repro has not been found.

Second best would be a replay file where it happens (earlier in the game the better).

Some feedback on the loading and playing of saved games:

I saved a randomly generated system at the very start, after commander touchdown. Then loaded the game from the replay menu later.

1. Pelters seemed to have issues targeting units. I was able to force fire on the ground, (auto)target enemy buildings, attack wrecked buildings... But when an enemy unit showed up, they ignored it. I don't *think* they were ever able to auto target units.
2. Similarly, I found my anchors did not want to target aircraft. Occasionally they would fire on their own, but most of the time the aircraft fly right underneath. If I issue an area attack command, they figure it out.
3. Now that I think about out, I'm wondering if my catapults and Holkins were actually targeting units, or just buildings...
4. No problems with AA turrets or laser towers, I think torpedo launchers are fine, but they might be slow to fire at the edge of their range.
5. Killed all enemy commanders... game didn't end. Killed my own commander.... game didn't end. Obliterated every last planet and unit in the system.... Game didn't end. Surrender doesn't work as you guys mentioned. Did I miss a notice about "no way to exit a game except for alt-F4" (or quit to desktop)?

I had this. I thought it was normal. How do I send the save file?

Noticed same bugs.