Why exactly can’t PC players Save Game at will?

[Slyrr]

Doom Eternal could have been great. I’ve followed Doom since the 90s. Doom 2016 was fun. But I’ve struggled with Doom Eternal because of one humongous flaw. You can’t save the game.

Part of the reason why I have eschewed all console systems in favor of PC is because I can’t stand the way console games use the checkpoint system to save progress, and doesn’t allow saving at will.

And I’ve bristled as game developers have trended more towards importing console elements into PC games. Checkpoints in Doom Eternal is one example.

I’ve heard people say it’s to test our skill or endurance. And others say it’s impossible to save in Doom Eternal “because that’s just how it is”.

But I still want a save feature, because the current model makes playing the game a chore, rather than being fun. There’s nothing more horrible than almost getting to the end of a gore nest, only to die and then be forced to start all over again. Ditto for the brazza-frakkin jump puzzle sections.

Most NORMAL gamers are used to saving a game at will so we don’t have to put up with that frustration. I’ve avoided playing this game specifically because of the frustration caused by having to devote pointless hours to repeating nests and jump puzzles where the checkpoints are too far apart.

Surely a multi-billion dollar game company, staffed with the best programmers money can buy, could devote SOME of their considerable resources to implementing a normal save game function? Just for the benefit of players who don’t enjoy being forced to “test their endurance”? If other players want to prove how great they are by NOT saving the game, fine. All they’d have to do is choose not to save. But me? I want to save at will, dangit.

[carter.]

talloyer a écrit :

Slyrr a écrit :

I hear you, dude. But as I said, that’s not how most players roll. If you prefer to not save, more power to you. All I’m saying is - I want the CHOICE to be able to save the game where and when I want. Because I DO constantly find myself saying “I need to do all of that AGAIN”, and I can’t stand it. Horrible, horrible decision to force that on all players when there are plenty out there who don’t see it as a “challenge”, but as a tedious, pointless annoyance.

Don't argue with idBoys, they always find an excuse to defend the poor choices of id Software.
Answering directly to your OP, it's because of consoles. id Software no longer bothers to give PC exclusive features of the master platform.

STILL with the "idboys" thing? shut the ♥♥♥♥ up PLEASE

[Knud den Store 🧙‍♂]

We only need midway saves for Ultra Nightmare and Extra Life because holy smokes, have you tried to do a Master Level? Zero Master record is under 40 minutes, which is twice as much for a mere mortal.

>Most gamers
Pretty sure checkpoints have become the standard since Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4, that was 14 years ago.

Save scrubbing takes the fun out of the game in my opinion.

[FireGryph]

It was a design choice made by id and such is the choice we have to live with, simple as that. Imagine Dark Souls had a save game feature, just save wherever you are. It would be an entirely different game.

Now, if you actually do not enjoy the combat and feel frustrated because you have to redo the whole arena, sounds to me like Doom Eternal is just not the game for you. The whole reason to play this game is for the combat, so if you dont enjoy the combat.... why are you playing the game at all? Are you just trying to play for the sake of finishing the story? Turn down the difficulty then.

[Moondane]

it saves after every combat encounter, allowing you to save in the middle of a combat would make the game way easier and more cheesable, and could lock you in a bad spot if you saved in a bad situation. If you're dying too much just lower the difficulty.

[tyl0413]

Moondane a écrit :

it saves after every combat encounter, allowing you to save in the middle of a combat would make the game way easier and more cheesable, and could lock you in a bad spot if you saved in a bad situation. If you're dying too much just lower the difficulty.

It could let you do whatever the ♥♥♥♥ you want with the game you bought without having to get approval from people like you or the developers, go to console if you like having your experience restricted to "how the developer intended", most games should feature autosaves along manual saves, use whatever you like, the more options = the better.

[Moondane]

tyl0413 a écrit :

Moondane a écrit :

it saves after every combat encounter, allowing you to save in the middle of a combat would make the game way easier and more cheesable, and could lock you in a bad spot if you saved in a bad situation. If you're dying too much just lower the difficulty.

It could let you do whatever the ♥♥♥♥ you want with the game you bought without having to get approval from people like you or the developers, go to console if you like having your experience restricted to "how the developer intended", most games should feature autosaves along manual saves, use whatever you like, the more options = the better.

the game has cheat codes built in that let you bypass challenges, i see manual saves as the same because they remove all consequence of death. if they added this system by default people would just take it for granted and use it like any other, because otherwise they'd be self-imposing a challenge. i'm fine with them adding manual saves as a cheat, because that's literally what it is.

more options isnt always better, the game could give you the option to disable enemies as well, but that would ruin the point of the game.

[tyl0413]

Moondane a écrit :

tyl0413 a écrit :

It could let you do whatever the ♥♥♥♥ you want with the game you bought without having to get approval from people like you or the developers, go to console if you like having your experience restricted to "how the developer intended", most games should feature autosaves along manual saves, use whatever you like, the more options = the better.

the game has cheat codes built in that let you bypass challenges, i see manual saves as the same because they remove all consequence of death. if they added this system by default people would just take it for granted and use it like any other, because otherwise they'd be self-imposing a challenge. i'm fine with them adding manual saves as a cheat, because that's literally what it is.

more options isnt always better, the game could give you the option to disable enemies as well, but that would ruin the point of the game.

You can't and shouldn't tell how people should play their game, give them the tools to play however they want as optional toggles. Especially when it's something this simple that has lots of legit uses, that' why it was a thing for such a long time and still is in some games. Sometimes it would be nice if i could just quit these modern games straight away instead of having to get to the next checkpoint.

[Moondane]

tyl0413 a écrit :

Moondane a écrit :

the game has cheat codes built in that let you bypass challenges, i see manual saves as the same because they remove all consequence of death. if they added this system by default people would just take it for granted and use it like any other, because otherwise they'd be self-imposing a challenge. i'm fine with them adding manual saves as a cheat, because that's literally what it is.

more options isnt always better, the game could give you the option to disable enemies as well, but that would ruin the point of the game.

You can't and shouldn't tell how people should play their game, give them the tools to play however they want as optional toggles. Especially when it's something this simple that has lots of legit uses, that' why it was a thing for such a long time and still is in some games. Sometimes it would be nice if i could just quit these modern games straight away instead of having to get to the next checkpoint.

As a developer I could in my game, and as a player I can give you the reasons why the developers opted to do it in theirs, that's what I just did. It's how game design works, you're giving limitations that you must overcome to proceed. The game could give you free flight as an option but it doesn't, it forces you to walk. Removing the consequence of death is a power on par with giving the player infinite health or infinite BFG ammo, it just requires more active participation from the player in order to use it at its maximum potential. That's why it should be treated as a cheat in this particular game.

Like I said, it saves after every combat encounter and the most you'd be missing by quitting without saving is a minute of walking unless you want to save in the middle of combat. If you want to quit so bad you could just redo the encounter later, they're designed with checkpoints in mind so you'll never spend more than 5 minutes on a single encounter unless you're playing very safe.

Manual saves exist in games where it is appropriate and most games with manual saves will still disable them during combat, which as I said, is the only practical reason for them in Doom besides saving you from a short platforming session or some walking.

[tyl0413]

Moondane a écrit :

tyl0413 a écrit :

You can't and shouldn't tell how people should play their game, give them the tools to play however they want as optional toggles. Especially when it's something this simple that has lots of legit uses, that' why it was a thing for such a long time and still is in some games. Sometimes it would be nice if i could just quit these modern games straight away instead of having to get to the next checkpoint.

As a developer I could in my game, and as a player I can give you the reasons why the developers opted to do it in theirs, that's what I just did. It's how game design works, you're giving limitations that you must overcome to proceed. The game could give you free flight as an option but it doesn't, it forces you to walk. Removing the consequence of death is a power on par with giving the player infinite health or infinite BFG ammo, it just requires more active participation from the player in order to use it at its maximum potential. That's why it should be treated as a cheat in this particular game.

Like I said, it saves after every combat encounter and the most you'd be missing by quitting without saving is a minute of walking unless you want to save in the middle of combat. If you want to quit so bad you could just redo the encounter later, they're designed with checkpoints in mind so you'll never spend more than 5 minutes on a single encounter unless you're playing very safe.

Manual saves exist in games where it is appropriate and most games with manual saves will still disable them during combat, which as I said, is the only practical reason for them in Doom besides saving you from a short platforming session or some walking.

I'm cool with gameplay limitations not with unreasonable technical limitations, especially in this specific case where previous entries of this franchise and games similar to it all had manual save and worked just fine with it and no one cared how often others saved. Should it be taken away from everyone just bc you wanna force those who abuse it to "play properly"? The save system especially in this specific case is a technical limitation not a gameplay one, it can be used to affect the gameplay and i think those who wanna do that should have the right to do it and even if not it's still a legit useful feature for those who use it "properly" so I'd say theres more advantages to having it then not. Those who wanna cheat will cheat regardless so you're not "helping" them anyways, you're just taking away a useful feature from legit players.

[Moondane]

tyl0413 a écrit :

Moondane a écrit :

As a developer I could in my game, and as a player I can give you the reasons why the developers opted to do it in theirs, that's what I just did. It's how game design works, you're giving limitations that you must overcome to proceed. The game could give you free flight as an option but it doesn't, it forces you to walk. Removing the consequence of death is a power on par with giving the player infinite health or infinite BFG ammo, it just requires more active participation from the player in order to use it at its maximum potential. That's why it should be treated as a cheat in this particular game.

Like I said, it saves after every combat encounter and the most you'd be missing by quitting without saving is a minute of walking unless you want to save in the middle of combat. If you want to quit so bad you could just redo the encounter later, they're designed with checkpoints in mind so you'll never spend more than 5 minutes on a single encounter unless you're playing very safe.

Manual saves exist in games where it is appropriate and most games with manual saves will still disable them during combat, which as I said, is the only practical reason for them in Doom besides saving you from a short platforming session or some walking.

I'm cool with gameplay limitations not with unreasonable technical limitations, especially in this specific case where previous entries of this franchise and games similar to it all had manual save and worked just fine with it and no one cared how often others saved. Should it be taken away from everyone just bc you wanna force those who abuse it to "play properly"? The save system especially in this specific case is a technical limitation not a gameplay one, it can be used to affect the gameplay and i think those who wanna do that should have the right to do it and even if not it's still a legit useful feature for those who use it "properly" so I'd say theres more advantages to having it then not. Those who wanna cheat will cheat regardless so you're not "helping" them anyways, you're just taking away a useful feature from legit players.

There is no practical legit reason for it, it's not taking anything from legit players. The guy who made this thread wants to use to skip encounters altogether by saving in the middle of them, that's the only practical use of manual saving. It's a technical limitation because they've designed their game based on autosaving, they could have implemented it in development if they wanted. The way the new games are designed is what most people would call savescumming in classic Doom, which is to save after every encounter. Saving during combat encounters is like using save states in the middle of Super Mario Bros levels. It's cheating, not the way the game was designed to be played, I wouldn't mind if it got added as an explicit cheating tool, it won't because it's too late now. The original poster is complaining that he made it to the end of a Megaman level and died and now he has to replay it again.

[tyl0413]

Moondane a écrit :

tyl0413 a écrit :

I'm cool with gameplay limitations not with unreasonable technical limitations, especially in this specific case where previous entries of this franchise and games similar to it all had manual save and worked just fine with it and no one cared how often others saved. Should it be taken away from everyone just bc you wanna force those who abuse it to "play properly"? The save system especially in this specific case is a technical limitation not a gameplay one, it can be used to affect the gameplay and i think those who wanna do that should have the right to do it and even if not it's still a legit useful feature for those who use it "properly" so I'd say theres more advantages to having it then not. Those who wanna cheat will cheat regardless so you're not "helping" them anyways, you're just taking away a useful feature from legit players.

There is no practical legit reason for it, it's not taking anything from legit players. The guy who made this thread wants to use to skip encounters altogether by saving in the middle of them, that's the only practical use of manual saving. It's a technical limitation because they've designed their game based on autosaving, they could have implemented it in development if they wanted. The way the new games are designed is what most people would call savescumming in classic Doom, which is to save after every encounter. Saving during combat encounters is like using save states in the middle of Super Mario Bros levels. It's cheating, not the way the game was designed to be played, I wouldn't mind if it got added, it won't because it's too late now.

Don't care if OP wants to cheat with it, doesn't affect anyone else, i just sometimes want to close the game instantly without losing progress, it's a useful feature, should be there, that's it.

[Moondane]

tyl0413 a écrit :

Moondane a écrit :

There is no practical legit reason for it, it's not taking anything from legit players. The guy who made this thread wants to use to skip encounters altogether by saving in the middle of them, that's the only practical use of manual saving. It's a technical limitation because they've designed their game based on autosaving, they could have implemented it in development if they wanted. The way the new games are designed is what most people would call savescumming in classic Doom, which is to save after every encounter. Saving during combat encounters is like using save states in the middle of Super Mario Bros levels. It's cheating, not the way the game was designed to be played, I wouldn't mind if it got added, it won't because it's too late now.

Don't care if OP wants to cheat with it, doesn't affect anyone else, i just sometimes want to close the game instantly without losing progress, it's a useful feature, should be there, that's it.

You don't lose any meaningful progress unless you intend to close in the middle of a combat encounter.

[Slyrr]

Unless you have other things to do, and don't want to put up with the hassle of being forced to quit out simply because they couldn't be 'bothered' to include a feature that's been in video games for ages.

Again, it's not borne of any desire to 'cheat' any more than the 'extra lives' are cheating. And it's been pointed out multiple times now that nobody is asking for the checkpoints to be removed. It's a mystery why anybody would get their dander up at the prospect of a save game feature being added for the benefit of people who don't have hours to waste, being compelled to go thru the same area multiple times, just to 'test your endurance'.

Test of endurance indeed - more like 'trying our patience'.

[Moondane]

Do you play on "I'm Too Young To Die", Slyrr? Not judging, simply asking. Because if you're dying multiple times to the point where an area that should be done in 5 minutes is taking hours and you're not lowering the game's difficulty, then the one not respecting your time is yourself.

[The Youkai Slayer]

Moondane a écrit :

Do you play on "I'm Too Young To Die", Slyrr? Not judging, simply asking. Because if you're dying multiple times to the point where an area that should be done in 5 minutes is taking hours and you're not lowering the game's difficulty, then the one not respecting your time is yourself.

Even I felt the heat blast that came from this mans Plasma Rifle...