Huber Syndrome - Episode 19: Save Scum

Do you remember when RPG save points never fully healed you? Where you had to use a tent or a cottage? Or the old fashioned Dragon Quest saves where you'd have to go to a church? Many old RPGs did that from what I remember. Then they would ask if you were going to continue your journey or not. But eh - to each their own I guess.

Pet Rent is So Dumb

awesome

I think this depends a lot on the game and player, and has an easy solution to boot. Allow those who want it to check [x]Ironman, and everyone is happy. Games with little RNG, and games that forgive failure and allow you to go on in some form are better suited to autosaving all the time. On the other hand, the more volatile and prone to accidents a game is, and the harder the punishment for failure, the more I question "the high stakes". After all, it may just be a simple misclick, that costs you half an hour of progress, your favorite character, or even the wohle run. Chances are you'll never touch the game again...

Leif

Single player games are intimate affairs between the player and the game. If someone is save scumming in DXMD, and you are against it, their save scumming doesn't affect your play through. And your strict principled view of not save scumming doesn't affect them. Everyone wins. When the developers introduce a mechanic to prevent it, now you have some people unhappy for no real gain. (not to mention those that will now be upset when they lose progress because of a bug, or an unforeseen circumstance like a power failure). The other argument is that limiting saves enhances the game's atmosphere by introducing the real fear of losing progress. Like Resident Evil, that's fine, but it should be the player's choice, like offering a difficulty setting that enables limited saves and then recommend that they play on that setting, but not forcing them too. In summation, I think that how a player is allowed to save is probably not something that should be prescribed in single player games.

Don McKay

I'm fine with the ability to save scum. If you don't like save scumming, but still do it, then I see that as a sort of character flaw. I don't like to enforce how I prefer to enjoy games on others because many people just wouldn't get joy out of the "value" of saving in Resident Evil, and some people enjoy save scumming, and that's fine. It's a single-player game, doesn't bother me one bit. If you don't like it. Don't do it. If you don't like it, and you still do it... Perhaps reexamine yourself instead of the game?

Stephen Smith

The first Dead Rising had an interesting (but to me a bit crippling) save system. You had to go to the restrooms to save, and a bit later in the game it was really hard for me to do so without dying. I really try to complete the games that I start, but I have never been able to complete the game, and I've tried many times. The save system was probably not alone in making it almost unplayable, but it was a big frustration for me non the less. Good episode Huber! :D

I wonder what Huber thinks of Wii U's save state function for Virtual Console games. I remember seeing Damiani using save state in a boss fight trying to get a different result for each action. Mario punch and doesn't do the highest damage, load state, load state, load state. It was hilarious. Save state is even worse than any save system since it's instant and saves anywhere.

Dude, The Experience flips me out every time. Love it.

Gan Khef

Good comment

Gan Khef

MISSED OPPORTUNITY: Should have been done in one-shot without edits. QUIT SAVE SCUMMING HUBER SYNDROME. J/K, We love you!

Isaac King

I remember playing Half-Life and using quicksaves a lot. I also remember accidently slipping to F5 and F7 more often than I liked. Especially the latter sucked ... xD

Camian

While it's true that limiting the ability to save can enhance the fun by raising the stakes it's also often a lot of fun if you can experiment in a game and go back if you're done. For example I'm now 20 hours into No Man's Sky and I wonder if it is possible to attack and even kill alien NPCs. I can try out thanks to the ability to load a specific save file because I wouldn't want to waste 20 hours of my life by potentially turning the whole galaxy against me.

Sebastian Erben

The save system from Fire Emblem didn't really allow abuse due to the way the random number generator functioned. If you lost a unit to a critical hit and turned the game off to try and RNG your way to victory, loading the mid-mission save would just let you watch your unit die again.

I know this game is a little divisive, but Majora's Mask had a somewhat interesting save system. Basically, you can't save whenever you want, which was standard at the time for Zelda games. Instead, you had to save at statues situated throughout the world. The statue also acted as a point which you could warp to (once you had found the statue). It was interesting because of how it was built into the overall game design of "you have 3 days to do things". So you'd effectively develop a schedule on how to play Majora's Mask. You'd figure out the beats of the game, and understand how, and more importantly, when, to go and find the save statue. This would in turn allow you to decide when to appropriately turn back time, allowing you to fly back to the save stations on your next 3 day cycle. This idea of "scheduling" your play style aptly fitted in with the overall theme of Majora's Mask of how things run on a schedule in the 3 day cycle.

Andrew Chalmers

Huber, why do you know which F key is the quick save key.

Ibrahim Sozer

I've been playing Mankind Divided and the autosave isn't really something you can rely on. You'd think it would save anytime you talk to somebody or complete another step of a sidequest but it doesn't. So I have to save pretty much every time I make progress haha. I'm using it as checkpoints though, not to save items on repeat plays like some kind of CHEATER!

Brian_FETO

Save limitations are certainly a powerful tool in survival type games, whether permadeath or not to raise the stakes. It's cool to see it used well to raise the tension when that's a core element of the game. I HATE games (at least bigger ones that aren't like quick little roguelikes or whatever) that don't let you keep a backup save or something, though. If you design a game like that, you'd better be 100% sure that the game has no gamebreaking bugs, has no dead end conditions (unless they're intentional game over situations), etc. that would make a player have to revert. Still, for most games when survival isn't a key element, saves need to be completely in the player's hands. I understand situations like combat lockouts where it would be hard to load back in correctly or whatnot, but limitations on saving, in most games, is just an indication that the developer doesn't respect the player's time, or doesn't respect the player's ability to enjoy the game on their own terms. For the Deus Ex example where you can cheese a door or whatever, who cares if players want to do that? It's a single player game, play how you want to play. If the devs make locked doors an annoying side show that aren't worth opening, that's on them for putting in a system that wastes our time or wastes resources for trivial elements (obvious exception - if the game is based around making those types of decisions, managing limited time/resources and choosing whether to risk it, and a bad decision is a key element of the tension in the game). For most other games the answer should be to make lockpicking/hacking/etc enjoyable enough and quick enough that most players will want to do it, and to make the resources required abundant enough that they can do it for its own sake regardless of what's behind the door.

Bradley Spies

Great episode Huber, but it's time to stop teasing us with background comments on other shows... time for a Yakuza episode. Yakuza Zero is coming out soon and time to let the uninitiated know what's up with the Dragon of Dojima!

Chip Damage Mike

Once again I’ll bring up Alien Isolation. I can’t remember any other game where saving is one of the most scary and intense things you do in the game. Making your way around the ship, trying to avoid the alien to find a save point. Unlike Resident Evil, there is no soothing music when you find the save point, the xenomorph can still kill you while you’re saving!! Absolutely loved it.

Tim O'Keeffe