Tales of Androgyny

A game about birds, bees, flowers and trees. · By Majalis

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Save File Corruption and Overwritten/Modified in v0.3.10.4

A topic by Moltar123 created Jul 25, 2021 Views: 1,315 Replies: 8

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Moltar1233 years ago (2 edits)

So for some reason, when downloading the game to play the newest update, it seems to have nuked my save files that were in the adventure mode (did not touch the story mode saves). All of my save files were immediately modified, likely due to whatever code that is responsible for skimming header information (i.e. used to display information about the save files) and maybe failed during reading it and wrote back a lot of default and NULL values. You can see the save date in the JSON file too: `"timestamp": "Jul 24, 2021 8:50:36 PM"` Meaning it _just_ saved it.

Thankfully my achievements and 'progress' is still saved, but RIP my playthrough. I should note that I had save edited _before_, giving myself some additional values (levels and the like) so maybe some new update didn't like those changes and errored out like this. I would have liked to have provided a 'before' save game so it can be used in debugging this problem, but unfortunately this is no longer available to me.

Corrupted Save File: https://controlc.com/7e71055c

Video Demonstration of loading Corrupted Save File: https://i.imgur.com/DmS0mqb.mp4

Screenshot Below: The save image that is still there... I will miss you, my Hiro...

Moltar1233 years ago

For the interested: The QR Code reads "Your tummy is gonna be gurgling with my sploodge, sissy bitch!"

MajalisDeveloper3 years ago

Hey, thanks for this. Before you load one of the save files, can you send it to me? The save file you attached here is what happens to the save file after it fails to load. That scene is an error-handling script that runs when a save file is corrupted, usually. It'll also happen if there's an obsolete element from the save file, which is one way I can break backwards compatibility of saves, but I don't think I've removed any in the last few updates (and whenever I do, I keep them in the code as deprecated fields so that it won't break old save files!)

If I could get a copy of a save file that *would* break if you loaded it, but hasn't been loaded yet (which should be any of the ones you haven't loaded yet), I can try to reproduce this and fix it, so that would be much obliged.

Moltar1233 years ago

Unfortunately, the ones that would break were all broken, even before I loaded them (i.e. I saw the "Enchanter Level 1" save summary even before I loaded it). The most recent save that I still have that isn't broken (was quite a while back, but the save file was modded if that means anything): https://controlc.com/6de78e38 <- This one does not corrupt itself when loading it (I made a backup before trying it just in case though)

Is there a log file or anything that gets created? Then again... maybe it was... the enchanted codpiece? I remember that particular item being made 'impossible to get' after I mentioned it here: https://itch.io/post/3873965 I still have a Codpiece +1 so maybe that was it? I cannot access the old builds of the game so I can't really tell.

MajalisDeveloper3 years ago

Hrm... the codpiece was changed, but I don't think it was changed in such a way that would break saves. It's still a piece of armor, it's just no longer upgradeable.

Moltar1233 years ago (3 edits)

I found the bug! It happens if you use a save created in a Patreon-exclusive version of the game in the free tier of the game; I just had it happen to me again; everything was immediately wiped back to Enchanter Level 1. I am assuming that this is to prevent people from cracking your game and punishing them, but if this is the case, it is also punishing legitimate users.

Edit: For clarity, I support temporarily on Patreon to get access to the new build, and then immediately unsubscribe (I get charged any time I want to download the new Patreon-exclusive build, but that's fine by me) because I don't want NSFW notifications in my personal email and I like being able to access my Patreon account without having to look over my shoulders/because I don't always want to see NSFW content. So I wanted to try out the new content without paying for Patreon exclusive but found out that my saves were nuked because I tried loading Patreon-exclusive saves on a non-Patreon version of the game.

As well, I can understand, assuming it was intentional, that you want to prevent people without Patreon versions of the game from cheating and getting Patreon-exclusive content, but it should just prevent you from loading the save, and not nuke it.

MajalisDeveloper3 years ago(+1)

It's actually because the public version is earlier, so it might not support elements from saves in later versions. In general, you shouldn't take saves backwards in version from their current state (I might even save the version on the save file and let the user know if a save file is outdated).

Moltar1233 years ago

Oh, you're right, it is an earlier version... I see, I thought even though it had been nearly 2 weeks, that the free version of the game would be more up-to-date. Either way, I would have a strong preference for it to not nuke the save and instead just render it 'unusable' (I.E. an error message saying "This save is incompatible") In the previous case, I used the free version after using the Patreon exclusive version because I figured it was newer, and I ran into the same issue. Saving version information would be very helpful, and having the game recognize this version mismatch as well would be great.

MajalisDeveloper3 years ago

It now does create a backup of the save when it encounters a problem (in the current patron version)