[TWD] PC Save system is just broken

Lost all my progress twice, once halfway through ep3 and then again halfway through ep2. No response from support after emailing , tweeting AND posting on this forum.

Either fix the issue or refund us telltale. At least have the decency to respond.

Comments

  • edited October 2012
    Same thing happened to me... Once I paused the game and selected main menu or exit, the game restarted from the beginning. This is ridiculous..
  • edited October 2012
    3 times for me. I'll never get to Episode 4.
  • edited October 2012
    phonicpod wrote: »
    at least have the decency to respond.

    this
  • MattPMattP ModeratorFormer Telltale Staff
    edited October 2012
    We are aware of this issue and despite many attempts have not been able to reproduce this issue. If you can provide any further information on what you were doing when this occurred, including which specific buttons you pressed, that would be very helpful.

    Also, do you play on computers will multiple users logging into different accounts? Does exiting the game resolve the issue (at least temporarilly)?
  • edited October 2012
    All my saved games are in my documents folder but when I load up TWD it only gives me the option to start a new game. Also, I had already downloaded episode 2 but the game doesn't seem to think I have and wants me to download it again. I haven't done anything to my hard-drive, it should still be there. I want a refund if this cannot be sorted out.
  • MattPMattP ModeratorFormer Telltale Staff
    edited October 2012
    You most likely have a second prefs.prop file that needs to be removed. Please check to see if you have a Gamedata folder in your Documents\Telltale Games directory. If so, please delete it. Also check your install directory to make sure a prefs.prop file has not been created there. If this is the case, only remove the prefs file, and nothing else.
  • edited October 2012
    What if there's only one prefs.prop file?

    I never saw one in the steamapps folder, and I had one in the telltale documents folder.
  • edited October 2012
    MattP wrote: »
    You most likely have a second prefs.prop file that needs to be removed. Please check to see if you have a Gamedata folder in your Documents\Telltale Games directory. If so, please delete it. Also check your install directory to make sure a prefs.prop file has not been created there. If this is the case, only remove the prefs file, and nothing else.

    Where should the prefs.prop file be on a Win7 install?

    Where would the "wrong" one be created?
  • edited October 2012
    well, I just don't understand why you can't make it to read all saves, every time. Why the prefs.prop file needs to even be involved. Is this seriously necessary? I have tried returning to a prior version of the file, and it still doesn't show my saves.

    Am I just fucked? Can you not patch your save system to just read all of our older pre-e4 saves? I don't see why this is so difficult.
  • edited October 2012
    Seem to have figured out a workaround.

    After getting the profs.prop, make a new save file for episode 3. Rewind, save.
    Copy over your old save file. Continue it. Should be at the end of episode 3.
    Start Episode 4.

    BTW: The workaround involved me renaming the save I wanted to continue from to "save 6", which was the newest one created by the game. IT's still not fully working; my other saves aren't present, just the one I workarounded here.

    On the coming attractions thing, it showed the wrong choices. I'm still not sure if the right choices carried over, but at least I'm in episode 4 now. So far, the few references in game to before episode 4 have been correct.

    All I have to say is you guys seriously need to update your QA methods before you publish. This is fucking janky as hell and stinks of a rushed "check it once, oh it works, ship it" kind of release with a tainted test environment. Or straight up ignorance and never checked it :P
  • edited October 2012
    Start checking real world user environments in your test cases. I did nothing edge on this. This was a straight up subscription through steam, playing one playthrough until new episodes dropped. This is the second time you've had this problem.
  • edited October 2012
    You must keep pref.prop file sync. copy latest file to both two location.
    Location 1: My Documents\Telltale Games\The Walking Dead
    Location 2: STEAMFOLDER\steamapps\common\the walking dead\Pack\default

    http://www.telltalegames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37049
    This solved my problem.
  • MattPMattP ModeratorFormer Telltale Staff
    edited October 2012
    The prefs file works together with your save and contains a lot of important information. There should only be one of these files in your Documents\Telltale Games\The Walking Dead folder. However, other games also use this file in their directories, so please don't search for this file name and delete all instances.
  • edited October 2012
    I just downloaded this from the Telltale site and have been running into this problem as well. I came across this thread and did a little investigating. I originally had the games saved to an external drive and noticed that the Documents\Telltale Games\The Walking Dead folder was under my main C: drive even though the game itself was on the external F: drive. I figured maybe the game went looking for the prefs file in the wrong place and moved all of my Telltale games to the C: drive. I started another game and would periodically check the menu to see if everything was working. I was able to get up to at least the farm without any trouble but when I tried opening the menu when in the office at the pharmacy, I ran into the problem again. Every button on the menu just causes the game to start over from the opening credits including the main menu button. I have to use the task manager to force the game closed. I downloaded the game directly from the Telltale website. NOT Steam which is what a lot of the suggestions seem to assume. I ran a search on my computer for prefs.prop and I only have one for the walking dead. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit. Considering that my pc and run battlefield 3 without breaking a sweat, I'm sure I exceed the system requirements for this game. My understanding is that this problem cropped up with the release of episode 4. Telltale needs to go over the games program with a fine tooth comb and see what is different between pre and post episode four.
  • edited October 2012
    Hey
    (Pc Windows 7 with steam)

    It was last night when i played (3rd slot) episode 2 through
    and almost the 3 one(after the point with duck).I waited till
    it was saved and closed the game.Now i wanted to play a lil more
    and it tells me im at episode 2 where i stoped a few days ago :mad:
    I already looked at my steam folder and documents and i got prefs
    once in both files.

    I already had the problem that i saved carley and when i started the next episode i had doug,but i was looking on here and could solve the prob.

    So what is with this prob?what can i do?
    Im getting pretty pis.... off about.I really like the game and thats
    why i wanna play it always a lil different but always are there some probs.
  • edited October 2012
    I too downloaded the game client directly from Telltale. After the initial issues with Episode 4 and not being able to download I put the game down. Today I came back to play after hearing that the download issue had been fixed. My saved games are now gone.

    I only have a single pref.prop file in the correct place.. but should I even have to check for this? I did pay money after all and up front for all 5 episodes pre-launch to boot.

    Putting the game down again, I have no interest in wasting my time replaying the game or screwing around with files. I guess I'll check in again in a week or two and see where this issue is at; unfortunately this is becoming a recurring event.
  • edited October 2012
    MattP wrote: »
    The prefs file works together with your save and contains a lot of important information. There should only be one of these files in your Documents\Telltale Games\The Walking Dead folder. However, other games also use this file in their directories, so please don't search for this file name and delete all instances.

    None of this applies to anything in my folders or drives. No duplicates anywhere.

    I am on the non steam version, Nothing will save, no choices will carry through. Only one save game will even show up and it is mid way through episode 1. Had to play episode 2 all way through without stopping as not a single save using slot 2 recorded.

    Episode 3 looks to be the same happening. Only way to play the game is each episode independant of the other, I never know who is still alive or what choices were made since random generation is the only way it will function.

    None of the player found workarounds seem to apply to my situation.

    I WILL NOT be paying for anything past what I already have access to unless the issue is fixed. Great game and story if you can fix it. I paid for a unique game that will save my choices but it wont even save anything much less my choices. What did I pay for?
  • edited October 2012
    I did what you said Matt P, no duplication there at all. Somehow my downloaded episode has vanished as well as all of my progress. This is not very impressive, I want a refund as I do not fancy starting again and having to download episode 2 again.
  • edited October 2012
    FFS now I message on the screen saying I don't have a license to play TWD and that I need to purchase it. Is this some kind of joke?
  • edited November 2012
    This HAS to be fixed, it's a massive game-breaker that decisions don't carry over and progress is lost.

    It can't be that hard, make the game read-write it's saves to only one directory and only one file and stop this criss-crossing mess of files that have to work together.

    If this isn't fixed I'm not buying another Telltale game, it's a shame, because TWD is such a good experience, but it's broken, to the point where I regret paying money for it.
  • edited November 2012
    I created a forum account only to say that i have the same issue has most people here ,completed chap 1-4 and lost the save, tryed to restart it from start made it to ep3 closed the game for the night and now i just got back from work and the only save i got is ep1 got the rewind option but all of episode 2 seem erased ... i deleted everything in the save folder and checked teh cache on steam im ready to play it one last time to ep4 but i dont want to lost my save again so can u telltale please help a customers enjoy your game whitout the fear of losing all progress again explain me a workaround atleast but do something please because if i start for the 3 time and lost everything again its sadly gonna be the last time i buy a game from you guys ...

    ps its not the 1st time im having problems whit your games (back to the future).

    Im playing the steam version for the pc.

    Forgot to say that i had to rewind many many time because my choice where not following like the doug/carley .
  • edited November 2012
    The same thing is happening to me. I bought the game a few days ago and it's really fun, but I get up to about 2/3's of the way through episode 1 and it resets itself. If I pause it at any point, it resets itself, even if I hit "continue game". I've been reading this forum and it seems like the only way to fix this is extremely convoluted because telltale hasn't bothered to create a patch. I didn't pay money so that I couldn't use a product. That being said, has anyone had any success getting their money back?
  • edited November 2012
    I think that it's really sad that the support is simply a link to a forum and that there is no way of contacting any "higher ups" for help.
  • edited November 2012
    WANT TO KNOW A QUICK FIX TELLTALE?!?!?? CUS I GOT ONE!
    SIMPLY- create the ability to choose at the beginning of an episode the choices you made in the previous.this will auto create a new file to start with and although will not fix this ANNOYING IRRITATING PROBLEM, IT WILL however make it less frustrating. Please and thank you.
  • edited November 2012
    I created a forum account only to say that i have the same issue has most people here...

    This.

    I don't normally do this, but I had to complain. Just finished Ep3, started Ep4 and it crashed, then when I went back in to the game my save game has vanished. What kind of save game system is this?!

    I just spent the last hour trying various "fixes" from all the support on here (thanks community, no thanks TTG), but nothing has worked for me.

    I would think at least the option to select your previous choices would be good, so that a save game loss isn't as big a deal.

    This is really poor, just when I was enjoying the game so much. I will keep checking here for a solution every day or two but from what I've been reading, a solution doesn't look likely any time soon.

    Shame, TTG, shame.
  • edited November 2012
    I now have alot of experience with this game. Overall, the story experience is great, but the programming is the worst I have ever seen in a game. Whoever decided to link critical save game information into a preferences file should be fired. I have never seen such a stupid decision in any game I have played, and I have been playing them for about 25 years.

    I have had all of the typical problems and they all result from the game stupidly creating or updating the prefs.prop file in either the My Documents structure or the actual Install directory structure. When you 'lose' save games, the game has accessed the prefs.prop file from the WRONG last saved position; and since, the prefs file is critically linked to the saves, it 'loses' them.

    I have tried the recommendations to delete the prefs.prop file from the Install directories, but the stupid programming still will create a prefs.prop file in that location. The game currently reads the Install location file but writes to the My Documents location.

    The solution I have found is to back up all the save files and both prefs.prop files from the directory locations EVERY time AFTER I play the game. Then use the latest prefs.prop timestamped file to copy it to the alternate location. This is working for me now.

    I also just got Windows 8 (Win8) to experiment with. Upon start, the game would black screen and lock up the entire O/S. A power off or hard reset was required to restart the PC. I have now solved this problem by downloading an older dinput8.dll file and placing it in the Install structure Gamedata directory. Other information about this file can be found in the forum.

    Telltale needs to get some competent programmers or risk losing all of their PC customers. I certainly will not buy any more Telltale games.
  • edited November 2012
    I had to register just to pitch in here because this is absolute rubbish. I have restarted the game three times now because of this issue and frankly I'm sick of it. Each time I told myself that this was an indie developer, and I should expect some bugs which would eventually get ironed out. Well, I'm pretty sure this is a pretty major bug and three episodes later it is STILL HERE.

    Why is it that every other game I have played has the simple capability of backing up your save games and simply copying them to the save folder to restore them. This guards against issues like corrupt save files any errors which require you to re install the game. Due to some maddeningly illogical decision not to have a save game stand by itself, this is apparently not possible here. Why have this prefs.prop file in the first place? It's 7kb on my machine, if every save game had to be 7kb bigger in order to eliminate this problem would that really be such an issue? So many more problems seem to happen as a direct result of this horrid design. I have tried many solutions and I see blank 'start new game' save slots each time and I've had enough.

    Please, fix this. This is clearly not an isolated issue and frankly if you can't reproduce the problem, you aren't doing your job.
  • edited November 2012
    I purchased the game this morning (PC version, non-steam because I thought having Steam in the mix could make it buggy) and got part way through episode 1. I attempted to exit the game and it bounced me back to the opening screen. I attempted to exit the game again and again back to the opening screen. I ended task, re-launched the game and straight to opening credits, no save game status at all.

    So I figured, well, this is a different kind of game than I'm used to, perhaps I just need to go farther into the game for an auto-save. An hour later, same behavior same loss of entire progress.

    How is it possible that I just spent $25 on something that is as broken as this? Am I to understand that the only way to play this game is to do so entirely in one sitting? I guess the issue has only been happening for 5 months (said quite sarcastically). Get on the ball telltale, this is unacceptable. Fix it, or refund it.
  • edited November 2012
    For what it's worth I have a single prefs.prop file, it's located in: \Documents\Telltale Games\The Walking Dead, I'm running Windows 7 x64, I am local admin on my machine, I'm not running STEAM, UAC is not turned on, and I'm still pissed off.

    I find it difficult to believe that this cannot be recreated. It seems that proper operation on the PC version is the situation that is difficult to recreate.
  • edited November 2012
    Another person here who felt the need to register just to complain from anger ... I have lost progress twice and have had to replay episodes. I have finally reached the point I was at previously in Episode 3, and then i realize that Carly is dead and Doug is alive (the opposite of what I did). Shortly after I notice that none of my choices are what I chose.

    This is completely unnaceptable. This game is 100% about the choices and relationships , yet the technical issues render that portion of the game pointless. What then , is the point of playing ?

    C'mon Telltale, get your shit together
  • edited November 2012
    Also created an account because game is broken

    Running on steam on windows 7.

    Just completed Episode 2, when I try to continue with Episode 3, I get a popup window saying that the exe file unexpectedly crashed. When I try to reopen the game, the save file reverts back to the car encounter at the end of episode 2. I did this 3 times, without being able to load into Episode 3.

    Please fix this already!
  • edited November 2012
    Had the same problem with disappeared save game and it was exactly the same as posted before by another user: Win7, steamcopy, 3rd savegame slot, played 3rd episode till after duck-scene, waited until saved (I think it was in mid of dialogue with the homeless guy) and left the game. When I restarted I only had older savegames to go further (from episode 2).

    Problem was solved with this:
    http://www.telltalegames.com/forums/showpost.php?p=707755&postcount=13
    thanks for posting DarkSoroush.
    I didn't take the newest file though, because opening the game made one file with newer date although it had the old savegame state in them. Best thing is to make a backup of the file if you aren't sure which one is the one with your saves.

    Same problem appeared afterwards with the autosave after episode 3 and now for being able to play episode 4 I again had to copy the file. But it worked and my decisions were carried over at least.
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