Saves in W10

[Tryst49]

The autosave says it has completed sucessfully but if I quit to desktop and reload, I have lost all my work since my first session of playing.

Not sure why. It appears to have saved all the autosaves during the first session, but the next time I loaded the game, it refuses to save any more, even though it tells me the autosave was successful. That means I can play once from the start, but if I quit and come back later, I have to complete the game entirely since it won't save the game any more. I can play for 2 or 3 hours and come back the next time to find those hours have been lost and I am back to where I was when I loaded the game on the previous session.

The fact that I hate Windows 10 because it f***s up every game I play is beside the point. I feel that ALL games should keep it's files in the game folder and not splash them all over the system disk on your PC. MY C drive is for the OS and associated files, I don't want game files on it, that's why I have a seperate drive for games.

Edit: Just noticed that it is not updating the last exit file.
The most recent autosave is: 04/07/2021 14:03
The Last exit file is: 30/06/2021 16:10

Since it resumes from the last exit, the file is 4 days old.

[Superguru]

This game is saving into the Documents folder. The path is X:\Documents\Dyson Sphere Program\. In case X is C for you I would recommend to move the Documents folder to the other drive. You can right click Documents, go to settings, then path and there you can move it to a different location.

I can only guess why your progress gets lost. As you were able to save before my only guess is that the drive is getting too full somehow preventing save writing. Just a guess as I do not know your disk status. Perhaps moving the documents folder already solves this.

[Tryst49]

The C drive is a 1Tb and it only has windows 10 on it, 874Gb Free. I would imagine that is enough for a save file.

If I delete the save file and re-save, it does update it to the new save, but it will not overwrite. The same goes for the Last Exit file, if I delete that, it will create a new one with the latest save on it, but that will also fail to overwrite. Wierd that the autosaves seem to update properly without a problem.

It seems the game is failing to delete the old file before saving the new one and Windows 10 is refusing to allow it to automatically overwrite the file.

However, I would much prefer a game to put the files in it's own folder along with the game. I don't want to move the documents folder just to make a game save on a different disk, that forces all my documents to save on that disk as well.

[Superguru]

That is absolutely enough space.
Sounds a lot like a Windows permission issue. Those are nasty. You can try to give more permissions for the "Dyson Sphere Program" folder. Right click folder, Settings, Security tab. Edit..., then give more permissions to the user running the game or all if not sure which one it is.
If this does not help then somebody with more Windows knowledge needs to help here.

[Arcane]

Antivirus might be protecting files as well. So I would check antivirus/security settings too. Definitely seems like a file write issue.

Also recollect what has changed in your PC setup in the last week, might be something worth looking into?

BTW you can do a manual save, instead of an autosave. Do manual saves work?

[Tryst49]

Originally posted by Arcane:

Antivirus might be protecting files as well. So I would check antivirus/security settings too. Definitely seems like a file write issue.

Also recollect what has changed in your PC setup in the last week, might be something worth looking into?

BTW you can do a manual save, instead of an autosave. Do manual saves work?

A fresh install of Windows 10 and Steam so it's now running on a completely clean system. First time I have used W10 for this game so it's an issue I have never had before, Win 7 had no problems with saving.

Manual save and Last Exit save do not overwrite. I have to manually delete the old files for it to create a new one, otherwise it will not create a new one, even though it tells me the save was successful.

The sequential autosaves don't have this problem which I find strange. They will overwrite with no problems. This is why I can't believe it's a permissions issue or an issue with Avast AV. I have never had problems with the antivirus program before when I used it with Windows 7.

However, if the saves were put where they should be, in a folder with the game files, I don't think this would be an issue at all. I see the primary disk as an OS disk and shouldn't be a dumping ground for files from every game or program that runs on my PC.

[Mylon]

Continue only loads regular saves, not autosaves. You can load the autosave manually.

[TLHeart]

Originally posted by Mylon:

Continue only loads regular saves, not autosaves. You can load the autosave manually.

continue loads the lastexit auto save every time. It does not load the regular saves.

[Phantom]

Sometimes the game bugs out and instead of loading save files from your documents folder (where it supposed to) it will attempt to load files from the "Dyson Sphere Program" folder within the game install folder instead

[Arcane]

Originally posted by Tryst49:

A fresh install of Windows 10 and Steam so it's now running on a completely clean system. First time I have used W10 for this game so it's an issue I have never had before, Win 7 had no problems with saving.

I have Win 10 and DSP saves into the Documents folder on my system disk. I also have Avast. No issues whatsoever with either of those.
So your fresh system has some security or file write issue. Probably.

Originally posted by Tryst49:

Manual save and Last Exit save do not overwrite. I have to manually delete the old files for it to create a new one, otherwise it will not create a new one, even though it tells me the save was successful.

This sounds like overwriting a file is not allowed somehow. Do you have some sort of system protection of any kind? Have you disabled the WIn 10 security since you are using Avast? Win 10 security sometimes conflicts with 3d party Antiviruses.

Originally posted by Tryst49:

I have never had problems with the antivirus program before when I used it with Windows 7.

No one ever has a problem until they do :)
Win 10 is incredibly stable and mature OS at this point.
It might be hard drive issues with errors on writing files. Do you have bad blocks? What is SMART saying about your HDD? Is it old?

Originally posted by Tryst49:

However, if the saves were put where they should be, in a folder with the game files, I don't think this would be an issue at all. I see the primary disk as an OS disk and shouldn't be a dumping ground for files from every game or program that runs on my PC.

This is a normal arrangement for Microsoft since it was intended to be used like that from the start. You can complain to MS software architects. DSP does not do anything unusual here.

[Tryst49]

My M$ security is turned off, the disk is a brand new M2 drive.

As for the file write issue, I can't see why it denies overwriting the Last Exit and the Manual Save files, but does allow the autosaves to be overwritten. They are in the same folder have the same file attributes and the ONLY difference between them is their name.

I can manually delete them both using the function in the game and they will create new files on Exit and when I save manually, so there's no issue with protection since overwriting them would have the same effect, albeit through Windows automated delete/replace system.

As for M$ creating it like that, I have several games created in Unity that keep save files and also configuration files in the game folder. It is the default for Unity and Unreal engines and a couple of others that you can override.

Personally, I find it totally stupid that saves such as that are kept on the main drive since, it fills up the drive with data and can restrict the access of a dynamic swap file should you need it, considering that some games have really huge save files. I had one game where 100Mb for a save file was pretty average.

[Balinor]

Try going to settings, update & security, windows security, virus and threat protection.

Scroll down to Manage ransomeware protection and click. Then select Allow an app through controlled folder access, click add an allowed app, recently blocked apps from the drop down list. Hopefully DSP is in the list and is just getting caught on an edge case.

Fingers crossed that will solve your problem.

[Tryst49]

Originally posted by Balinor:

Try going to settings, update & security, windows security, virus and threat protection.

Scroll down to Manage ransomeware protection and click. Then select Allow an app through controlled folder access, click add an allowed app, recently blocked apps from the drop down list. Hopefully DSP is in the list and is just getting caught on an edge case.

Fingers crossed that will solve your problem.

Can't access it with real time protection turned off. It won't let me turn it on because Avast is running.