Is this thing writing over my backup saves?

[dnrob7]

I made a backup while on the map screen and now I find myself mid hero mission from 2 missions ago? WTF is this ♥♥♥♥♥ thing doing?

[MyUrp1]

When you loaded your game, you picked the wrong save. Try the other one.

[Gomez]

I suggest you disabling STEAM cloud if you play locally to avoid this issue

[dnrob7]

Originally posted by MyUrp1:

When you loaded your game, you picked the wrong save. Try the other one.

Right, because the answer must be that I'm retarded.. Can't be a problem with the game, surely?
I did try the other one. At first it loaded into the map screen, I did something in the tech tree I immediately didn't like, Alt F4 out, load it again and now it too is in the old hero mission but the hero is in a different place in that mission.. Just crazy town.

Originally posted by Gomez:

I suggest you disabling STEAM cloud if you play locally to avoid this issue

Righty. I'll look into that^

[QWEEDDY2]

backup whole folder (zxsaves, zxsavesbackup, zxsavesaccount files).

[dnrob7]

Still doing it.. What is the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ point of a "backup" save if there clearly is no such thing as a backup save in this game? It WILL auto save over it for you no matter what. It won't make an "auto save", so it will go out of its ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ way to destroy any progress you might have made.
I like the game, I really do, but I can't deal with this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ save system. Stop insisting on documenting every mistake I make while STILL LEARNING THE ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ GAME!

[dnrob7]

Damn.. I have to stop drinking so much. Do excuse my childish outburst there^
I got drunk and emotional for a moment.
I think I have a way of doing the saves in mind that doesn't involve copying files and all that crap. Still don't thing I should have to but if it's always been this way then i don't see it changing now.

[Kaldrak]

Originally posted by dnrob7:

I think I have a way of doing the saves in mind that doesn't involve copying files and all that crap. Still don't thing I should have to but if it's always been this way then i don't see it changing now.

It's pointless. These devs are relentlessly, and I mean RELENTLESSLY hostile to the idea of player controlled saving. They literally think it ruins the experience and will do everything in their power to prevent anyone from implementing something like that for their overly long, boring story missions that take forever to do and are full of cheap tricks and artificial difficulty spikes you can't really predict unless you've either seen the mission before or played the map before.

They delight in wasting a players time and will tell you to simply play the map again. This is probably due to length padding an otherwise very short campaign mode.

[Tickle Me Elmo]

I have found the "They Are Billions Save Automation Tool" (see DaneelTrevize/TABSAT on github) - works great. Just quit to the menu now and then and restore a save when you like.

I don't really get why that's necessary when I play the "normal" difficulty, but so be it. I have fun.