Manual Save File Fix

[Survivalist]

Some people are having issues with save files seemingly disappearing from their respective slots. BUT, they are still there as a backup, which you can recover by following the steps below:

This saving issue was brought on with this new update, But we are not experiencing it on our test machines. Any Information you can give, about your PC, and the Software running on it (Like Antivirus, Anything that monitors files being modified, etc) would be greatly appreciated.

Start a new single player game, build a temporary shelter and save on a different slot. then exit to windows. That slot should be saved properly, with the three files. If it isn't, try with the other save slots until you find one that does.

Save file Location: Appdata> Locallow> SKS> The Forest

Go to your first save (The one that isn't showing in the save slot selection screen)
and "__RESUME__prev" should be there. Rename the file, removing the "Prev" Part. so it just looks like: "__RESUME__"

Then take that file, and paste it into the other save folder. Replacing the Old __RESUME__ File with the one you have just renamed.

After this, you should be able to load that slot! Let me know if it worked, it if didn't, or if you have any questions!

[bua1967]

Still doesn't work, Slot 1 is loading forever and nothing happens, Slot 2 is loading and after a while starting a new game

OS: Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit SP1

CPU Typ HexaCore AMD FX-6100, 3600 MHz (18 x 200)
Motherboard Name Acer Predator G3120
Motherboard Chipsatz AMD 760G/780G/780V/785G/790GX/880G/890GX, AMD K15
AMD Radeon HD 5700 Series (1024 MB)

HDD: WDC WD20EARX-22PASB0 SCSI Disk Device (2000 GB, SATA-III)

AV: Nod32 Version 8, MBAM pro

[Hardtimes]

I've just set Process Monitor to watch file system events on __RESUME__ in the Slot1 save directory. Started the game, loaded a save from Slot2, saved to Slot1, and exited to Windows. The contents of Slot1 are deleted on game start for me. Start the game again and capture with procmon. A number of events occur and then:

High Resolution Date & Time:	6/30/2015 5:52:33.4126469 PM
Event Class:	File System
Operation:	SetDispositionInformationFile
Result:	SUCCESS
Path:	C:\Users\Nick\AppData\LocalLow\SKS\TheForest\76561197972066531\SinglePlayer\Slot1\__RESUME__
TID:	3676
Duration:	0.0000070
Delete:	True

EDIT: That's from TheForest.exe

[Survivalist]

Hey Everyone,

There will be a hotfix solving this saving issue out shortly!

[Fredacp]

Nice! Thanks a lot!

[bua1967]

Thanks for the patch to version 0.19b but it's still not working. All new save games are saved in Slot1 and loading takes forever without doing anything. If I copy one of the savegames into Slot2 and try to load from there a new game will be started.
So same problem as it was before the patch.

[HitaruShikato]

Operating System
Windows 8.1 64-bit
CPU
AMD A10-6700
Richland 32nm Technology
RAM
12.0GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 666MHz (9-9-10-24)
Motherboard
ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC. M11BB (FM2 )
Graphics
ASUS VN247 (1920x1080@60Hz)
1023MB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti (EVGA)
Storage
931GB TOSHIBA DT01ACA100 SATA Disk Device (SATA)
Optical Drives
ASUS DVD RAM GHB1N SATA CdRom Device
Audio
Realtek High Definition Audio

running avast anti-virus

[Slipperyjim]

Wierdly this has just happened to me also, I say "weirdly" because it was fine after the last update and hotfixes, I even played as recently as yesterday no probs.
Then today I go to continue my game and hello, all save game slots were empty. I remembered seeing this topic whilst I was on the forum the other day, so came here to see the fix.

The fix you described did not work for me, I started new game and built shelter then saved and exited, located the save folder, which is when I discovered a new folder had been created under \users\username\appdata\locallow\SKS\the forest\0 in which was another folder called "singleplayer" and a further sub folder named "slot 5" with the new savegame (all three files) I had just made. However my old saves were actually in another folder called "76561198142761170" and not "0" under the forest folder, in which was \singleplayer\slot 1 - 4.

Now I copied and renamed from my old \singleplayer\slot 1 folder the file _RESUME_prev to just _RESUME_ and pasted to the new save folder. Restarted the game, selected continue and was only presented with the thumbnail for the new game I had just started. However when I copied all 4 files from my pevious \slot 1 save to the new save directory it worked fine. So I am assuming that for some reason the game is now looking for the save files in this new folder named "0" under \the forest instead of the old folder named "76561198142761170".

Here are my specs:

Operating System: Windows 10 64-bit (not pro version)

Cpu: AMD FX-8350 @4.4ghz (Liquid cooled)

Ram: 16GB DDR3 @ 1800MHz

Motherboard: ASUS ROG Crosshair V Formula Z

Graphics: Sapphire Tri-x OC Radeon R9-290 4GB

System drive: Kingston Hyper X SSD 256GB

Mass storage drive: Western Digital 1TB @7200rpm SATA 3
+external Seagate 2TB Usb 2 (for backups)

Display: Panasonic Full HD Smart TV 1920 x 1080@60hz

Antivirus: ZoneAlarm Extreme Security (full paid licence)
NOTE - ZoneAlarm is also firewall and is set to always ask me to allow/disallow when it detects request for changes to any files, after update was done and running game for first time I selected allow as I was aware it was the update (so no files changes are blocked).

Hope this helps:
Regards
Phil.

P.S. I have noticed that when trying to move the old saves to the new directory that windows 10 pops up a dialog saying "your internet settings indicate these files may be malicous, do you want to continue anyway", and I just select yes. However I am not using windows defender as my firewall. So not sure if somehow windows had blocked those files and maybe thats why a new save directory was made. But strange how it has only just done so today and not when the update or hotfixes were installed (I have not seen any new hotfix download in last 24hrs).

[| SexySpandex]

I've been playing the forest for quite a while and i've never experienced any problems with save games untill today... I did the last patch 2 days ago and i had to do 1 more little patch today ie, 49 mb and all of my saved games were gone...
I tried to find the saves by going in appdata... and everything inside the folder singleplayer was empty. After that, i tried this method and the new save works fine, but i can't modify any other files because they aren't any other files.. Thx for the topics, didn't work for me though

[SLOWpoke]

TLDR The fix for this issue seems to not be working again...need some help

My brother just got the game today and when we went to play some co-op he couldn't save...it was just a black screen with no save 'slots'. We also had a lot of trouble with him getting into the game initially with a 'could not connect to server' but we found by restarting Steam that he could enter a new game.

However once in the game he couldn't save as described above...just a black screen...and trying to continue our game, forget it. He tried playing SP and could save there but once in the MP game with me as host he doesn't have the ability to save.

He just went to bed but I'm hoping someone will have some input between now and when we try again tomorrow night...

BTW we tried finding the 'Appdata> Locallow> SKS> The Forest' but it seems to be hidden...how does he 'unhide' it?

[Survivalist]

Originally posted by SLOWpoke:

TLDR The fix for this issue seems to not be working again...need some help

My brother just got the game today and when we went to play some co-op he couldn't save...it was just a black screen with no save 'slots'. We also had a lot of trouble with him getting into the game initially with a 'could not connect to server' but we found by restarting Steam that he could enter a new game.

However once in the game he couldn't save as described above...just a black screen...and trying to continue our game, forget it. He tried playing SP and could save there but once in the MP game with me as host he doesn't have the ability to save.

He just went to bed but I'm hoping someone will have some input between now and when we try again tomorrow night...

BTW we tried finding the 'Appdata> Locallow> SKS> The Forest' but it seems to be hidden...how does he 'unhide' it?

Only the host gets to choose a save file. Client saves are linked directly to that world save, so they do not need a slot.

All client sees when saving is a black screen. When he rejoins the host on that save, it will automatically load the client from his last save on that world.

[SLOWpoke]

Originally posted by SurvivalistGaming C.M.:

Originally posted by SLOWpoke:

TLDR The fix for this issue seems to not be working again...need some help

My brother just got the game today and when we went to play some co-op he couldn't save...it was just a black screen with no save 'slots'. We also had a lot of trouble with him getting into the game initially with a 'could not connect to server' but we found by restarting Steam that he could enter a new game.

However once in the game he couldn't save as described above...just a black screen...and trying to continue our game, forget it. He tried playing SP and could save there but once in the MP game with me as host he doesn't have the ability to save.

He just went to bed but I'm hoping someone will have some input between now and when we try again tomorrow night...

BTW we tried finding the 'Appdata> Locallow> SKS> The Forest' but it seems to be hidden...how does he 'unhide' it?

Only the host gets to choose a save file. Client saves are linked directly to that world save, so they do not need a slot.

All client sees when saving is a black screen. When he rejoins the host on that save, it will automatically load the client from his last save on that world.

Thanks CM, we had already found all that out but i appreciate you answering my post. We did have trouble trying to play from our 2nd to last save...even re-starting Steam didn't work and ended up just making a new game.

[Sirky]

I still doesn't work for me I started a new game 2 days ago and now it is gone the "fix" doesn't fix it for me please help me!

[Imp]

I have the save disappearing problem on multiplayer. My friend started a mulitplayer world which we had been working on for a few days when one day we went to load in as we do when we decide to work on it furthur however everyone but the owner my friend, had no option to 'continue' we could only start a new character. This had never happened before and we were so far in. We had everything and were waiting for the sinkhole door to open so we would like to know a way to fix this if possible.

[Scyzorro =]]

it worked thank u

[Uthael]

Still having the problem. Anyone thought it might be windows, preventing writing files?
Edit: I mean, would running it with admin rights fix it?