Well, when you say it like that, I have to respectfully disagree. I really think that the overall system of backup saves is a very GOOD thing. I very much like having that safety net there when there's a possibility that my game could get corrupted (or whatever) and I'll still have the ability to revert to a recent copy of it. (I have indeed made use of this to restore a game with many hours of play in it.)
That said, there are certainly -aspects- of the system that could be improved upon. Primarily, the file-naming convention. The main thing I see here is that we need a direct correlation between our save names in-game and the file names on our hard drive. And if deleting saves in-game is not actually deleting the files on the drive, then that too is an issue. The game shouldn't be leaving behind all sorts of junk files that it no longer even recognizes as valid itself. (Though again, leaving a backup in case of accidental deletion -- hmm. I'm hesitant to say that's a bad thing. There just needs to be a system of cleaning these up more easily.)
Well, when you say it like that, I have to respectfully disagree. I really think that the overall system of backup saves is a very GOOD thing. I very much like having that safety net there when there's a possibility that my game could get corrupted (or whatever) and I'll still have the ability to revert to a recent copy of it. (I have indeed made use of this to restore a game with many hours of play in it.)
That said, there are certainly -aspects- of the system that could be improved upon. Primarily, the file-naming convention. The main thing I see here is that we need a direct correlation between our save names in-game and the file names on our hard drive. And if deleting saves in-game is not actually deleting the files on the drive, then that too is an issue. The game shouldn't be leaving behind all sorts of junk files that it no longer even recognizes as valid itself. (Though again, leaving a backup in case of accidental deletion -- hmm. I'm hesitant to say that's a bad thing. There just needs to be a system of cleaning these up more easily.)
Well I went through and deleted a whole bunch. My main game loaded fine and all my simmies were exactly where I left them this morning. Yay!
Load times are still about 30 seconds, but as I said, this is a very big save. I still have to check my other two saves.
I agree @Ayradyss I have used the save files to restore a game from a previous save too. That is a good thing. And like you say, it's the naming. Because they all look the same when you open that folder.
For me, if it just gave the filenames something understandable that relates to what I see in-game, I'd be happy! Maybe call my Experimentown 3 save file experimentown3.save, and give the backups an extra bit with their previous saved time and date stamp before the .save.var0.
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For me, if it just gave the filenames something understandable that relates to what I see in-game, I'd be happy! Maybe call my Experimentown 3 save file experimentown3.save, and give the backups an extra bit with their previous saved time and date stamp before the .save.var0.
Hahahaha I am so with you! I tried to clean them up yesterday, and I thought I was keeping my primary save files safely tucked away on my desktop... but ALAS... when I placed it back in the folder and fired up the game (after deleting what I thought was my old saves I didn't need) it didn't recognize what I had placed back in the folder. My saves were gone.
This isn't such a big deal for me right now, because I keep all of my important families and sims in my Gallery. Before I decided to try this, I made sure my GT family was freshly uploaded into the gallery as well... so I didn't lose anything super important to me... the only thing I lost was the bakery I had started... which is actually a plus for me. LOL For future maintenance, though, I definitely need to do some reading up on this so I don't make the same numb mistakes again. >.<
Sorry you lost your games! his is exactly what I fear. I will go through everything and update my library and gallery with sims and lots before I do anything. Thank you for the excellent idea.
I'm sorry to sound like a broken record but if your hard-drive crash, unless things are uploaded to the gallery for sharing you will lose everything in the library for sure and "possibly" the gallery. (from experience)
Backup the tray folder on a usb or something once a month, and of course any other files you need. Actually think I'll do that right before I download GT.
WHAT?! You can lose your personal library stuff on the gallery unless it's publicly shared?! What what what what what?! I did not know this... this is terrible... what the heck... what's the point then... holy crap...
Having different file names I agree would help a lot. I like how in the Sims 2, the save files are separated into different neighborhoods and how in the Sims 3 saves are saved into different file names for each family. I also like how in the first Sims game pictures are saved in the C drive. The backup saves do help for both the Sims 3 and 4. I just wish the Sims 4 saves were organized better in the file itself.
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.” –Helen Keller
Well I went through and deleted a whole bunch. My main game loaded fine and all my simmies were exactly where I left them this morning. Yay!
Load times are still about 30 seconds, but as I said, this is a very big save. I still have to check my other two saves.
I agree @Ayradyss I have used the save files to restore a game from a previous save too. That is a good thing. And like you say, it's the naming. Because they all look the same when you open that folder.
That's good to know. Usually deleting saves that you don't use anymore won't improve game performance that much, but it might save you some of your hard drive storage and keep things nice and clean.
WHAT?! You can lose your personal library stuff on the gallery unless it's publicly shared?! What what what what what?! I did not know this... this is terrible... what the heck... what's the point then... holy crap...
I have a lot of work to do...
Fudge monkies!
It was weird. My computer was telling me my hard drive was about to kaput. So I tried saving my sims 4 stuff on my external hard drive. For some reason I wasn't able to. Anyway, when I got the new hard drive, everything in the library was gone. Only thing in my gallery was the sims I made during the demo which is shared.
I found out a month or so later that I did in fact have "a" save from some time ago which I forgot about. It saved me half the work. I just need to redo my elderly home again.
Still, I put everything in my library, but back up the saves, tray and screenshots folder. If you have mods, of course that folder too. So it won't be a lot of work with just those few folders if anything should happen.
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The tray folder Includes everything in your library. If you start a new sims 4 folder you need to copy your tray folder back. Alternatively if you have everything backed up to the gallery you can just redownload it. However restoring the tray is easier.
As others have said, the best thing to do is to back up your entire sims folder to an external hard drive regularly particularly before patching,
For some reason my game only saves 2 saves and the scratch file. It never saves anymore and I do not have the file Serial GUID So I am not sure why there are so few files in mine and so many in yours. My game plays fine, and I play rotational and there is no progress lost. Now I feel like I am doing something wrong!
It never changes it always looks like this. Should it?
If you have only 2 saved games and don't use "save as", then you should be fine.
There never is more than 2 saves in that folder. I like it as I do not have to keep going in and deleting.
Really, a way to give a name to the save file when we create a new save will make things easier. I mean, if we have in our save file TheLegagyOfJay.save.ver4 it will be easier to delete because we remember jay, and that we have delete the save file. But save name like Slot_00000003.save.ver4 just make me wonder what is it, and if i delete it will i lost my actual save.
So I only have 3 saved games to load when I load up the game, but when I look at my save file in documents, there are something like 80 in there! How do I know which ones are safe to remove?
I really wish we could get a better, or clearer way of recognizing the game files in the file folder!
I want to clean it up to make it run better for the new EP, but I am afraid to delete anything in there for fear of messing up my games. I have been playing one save for a very long time.
Does anyone have a guide or tutorial available on how to remove these files safely without ruining the most recent save?
I felt the same way you did the other day. Only you would be able to get away with using symbols to curse in your header which is against the rules. Just found that amusing. But yes, the game also saves the game (why is ridiculous) if you click on 'new game' start to make a Sim then change your mind, don't save it, and then go back to the one you were playing. It makes it even more difficult to find the actual files you want to keep in the save. No one ever mentions that fact.
"Games Are Not The Place To Tell Stories, Games Are Meant To Let People Tell Their Own Stories"...Will Wright.
Really, a way to give a name to the save file when we create a new save will make things easier. I mean, if we have in our save file TheLegagyOfJay.save.ver4 it will be easier to delete because we remember jay, and that we have delete the save file. But save name like Slot_00000003.save.ver4 just make me wonder what is it, and if i delete it will i lost my actual save.
I'm right there with you. I like to keep my files to a minimum. I used to purge, easily, saves from Sims3. What I named them in game, was how they showed up in the Documents file. This game does it so strangely, I'm scared to death to delete ANYTHING for fear I'll undo all of my games. And, while I dubbed myself the Queen of Redux, I'm trying very hard to break that bad habit. LOL
So I only have 3 saved games to load when I load up the game, but when I look at my save file in documents, there are something like 80 in there! How do I know which ones are safe to remove?
I really wish we could get a better, or clearer way of recognizing the game files in the file folder!
I want to clean it up to make it run better for the new EP, but I am afraid to delete anything in there for fear of messing up my games. I have been playing one save for a very long time.
Does anyone have a guide or tutorial available on how to remove these files safely without ruining the most recent save?
I felt the same way you did the other day. Only you would be able to get away with using symbols to curse in your header which is against the rules. Just found that amusing. But yes, the game also saves the game (why is ridiculous) if you click on 'new game' start to make a Sim then change your mind, don't save it, and then go back to the one you were playing. It makes it even more difficult to find the actual files you want to keep in the save. No one ever mentions that fact.
lol, oops? It's actually code for gosh-darned files!
Glad I came across this thread, I wanted to delete some old saves from when I first got the game but didn't know how. My game actually ran faster afterwards too.
Comments
Well, when you say it like that, I have to respectfully disagree. I really think that the overall system of backup saves is a very GOOD thing. I very much like having that safety net there when there's a possibility that my game could get corrupted (or whatever) and I'll still have the ability to revert to a recent copy of it. (I have indeed made use of this to restore a game with many hours of play in it.)
That said, there are certainly -aspects- of the system that could be improved upon. Primarily, the file-naming convention. The main thing I see here is that we need a direct correlation between our save names in-game and the file names on our hard drive. And if deleting saves in-game is not actually deleting the files on the drive, then that too is an issue. The game shouldn't be leaving behind all sorts of junk files that it no longer even recognizes as valid itself. (Though again, leaving a backup in case of accidental deletion -- hmm. I'm hesitant to say that's a bad thing. There just needs to be a system of cleaning these up more easily.)
Good points.
Load times are still about 30 seconds, but as I said, this is a very big save. I still have to check my other two saves.
I agree @Ayradyss I have used the save files to restore a game from a previous save too. That is a good thing. And like you say, it's the naming. Because they all look the same when you open that folder.
For me, if it just gave the filenames something understandable that relates to what I see in-game, I'd be happy! Maybe call my Experimentown 3 save file experimentown3.save, and give the backups an extra bit with their previous saved time and date stamp before the .save.var0.
Exactly! That would really help!
WHAT?! You can lose your personal library stuff on the gallery unless it's publicly shared?! What what what what what?! I did not know this... this is terrible... what the heck... what's the point then... holy crap...
I have a lot of work to do...
Fudge monkies!
That's good to know.
It was weird. My computer was telling me my hard drive was about to kaput. So I tried saving my sims 4 stuff on my external hard drive. For some reason I wasn't able to. Anyway, when I got the new hard drive, everything in the library was gone. Only thing in my gallery was the sims I made during the demo which is shared.
I found out a month or so later that I did in fact have "a" save from some time ago which I forgot about. It saved me half the work. I just need to redo my elderly home again.
Still, I put everything in my library, but back up the saves, tray and screenshots folder. If you have mods, of course that folder too. So it won't be a lot of work with just those few folders if anything should happen.
Twitch jovi_jov
Twitter BarbieSimmy
Origin SimsBarbie
As others have said, the best thing to do is to back up your entire sims folder to an external hard drive regularly particularly before patching,
There never is more than 2 saves in that folder. I like it as I do not have to keep going in and deleting.
How we can find what file correspond to each save game for backup?
You can put your the folder to "Detail" and then look at the date and time to see which ones.
I felt the same way you did the other day. Only you would be able to get away with using symbols to curse in your header which is against the rules. Just found that amusing. But yes, the game also saves the game (why is ridiculous) if you click on 'new game' start to make a Sim then change your mind, don't save it, and then go back to the one you were playing. It makes it even more difficult to find the actual files you want to keep in the save. No one ever mentions that fact.
I'm right there with you. I like to keep my files to a minimum. I used to purge, easily, saves from Sims3. What I named them in game, was how they showed up in the Documents file. This game does it so strangely, I'm scared to death to delete ANYTHING for fear I'll undo all of my games.
http://www.getfreeebooks.com/star-trek-original-series-fan-fiction-trilogy/
lol, oops? It's actually code for gosh-darned files!