Save files are corrupted

[Duskguy]

I restarted my game after a corruption issue a few days ago. Since then, been keeping track of sav.dat sizes based on what happens in game. The following posts are what I've encountered so far.

Save files are corrupted

O oh, my boi UEG is p*ssed now... Congrats to SigilFey. You are famous now...

forums.cdprojektred.com

Going from that,

Save files are corrupted

So basically it's a choice of unlimited item storage that crashes. Or a limited item system. With a rebalanced encomy crafting upgrade limit. Not exactly. There are more problems related to the issue. Setting limits in reflection with everything that the game offers is one way. However...

forums.cdprojektred.com

My current save is at 3400kb (as of writing) exactly. (playtime 44:02)

Completing an NCPD quest (on quest log) pertaining to opening a container and looting it (walked 200 meters to the container from last save point. Save file goes to 3394kb. (playtime 44:05)

That's a decrease in file size. As I've mentioned before, Location seems to affect save file slightly. But also to consider, by completing the objective, however simple, removed an icon from the map. Perhaps in this case, being so stupid simple, the removal of the icon lowered the file save more than the mission completion.

Doing the next closest mission: cybersycosis; bloody ritual, save file increased to 3399kb. (playtime 44:19; had some difficulty finding the "examine items" mission is stupid short in reality).

Walked down the street and a random police action popped up "blue star icon". Killed the 3 enemies and looted everything not nailed down. File size is 3401kb (playtime 44:21).

This gives side gigs and ncpd jobs a few KB data per job if we assume location changes/removing map icons alters file size. I am going to assume that yes, for at least the map icons considering the file size increase for discovering each area for the first time. (granted this is a limited data set). Main quests, as I and another poster here have noted, increase the file size somewhere around 50-100kbs. I'll have to keep an eye on this and make note of different quests to be sure it's always in that range, but that's what has been noticed so far.

Also of interest as someone mentioned is whether the different choices made in a quest change the file size. As of writing, I don't know, but will try to remember to check that out as well.

EDIT: Assault in progress 80 meters away. COmpleted by killing 5 enemies. Save file went to 3404kb (44:24 playtime). So I'm pretty sure these small ncpd type missions are 2-3kb each

EDIT2: Selling all the weapons and clothes looted from those missions and a previous mission brought the file to 3400kb exact again (about 200 weight in weapons and clothes). Skipping 72 hours to remove everything from the drop box brought the file size to 3395kb. Again it's a small dataset to compare, but while the file size didn't decrease a whole lot, as mentioned by others, selling items and skipping time helps reduce the file size increase while playing. I'll be skipping time after selling things from now on.

 

[chotnik]

"Another site" (I can't link it because forum rules, but, it's another community investigating this) has had this to say about crafting and bloat

Edit: So I figured I'd test this properly, I changed the crafting button to only require a click and not a hold, and gave myself 999999 of all crafting materials, and set an autoclicker to spamcraft maxdoc consumables for an hour and a half. I went from ~10 of the consumables to 9999+. The save game went from 2.6mb to 5.6mb, so I think it's fair to say that since my other save got to the same file size just by playing the game a whole lot and this one went to that file size from crafting an obscene amount of crap then it's very unlikely you'll end up corrupting your save just from normal play. Now this is something that shouldn't be an issue in the first place though and frankly it's baffling that cdpr hasn't fixed this [issue] since it was a problem in witcher 3 too.

I disassembled all 45000 or so maxdocs, and the file size went down to 4.5, removed all my crafting materials too and it stayed on 4.5, so better to just not craft ridiculous amounts of [stuff].

So even though he was able to recover save file size, the end result was a net gain of about 1.1MB. I wonder if he waited for 72 Hours or more to see if the game would have purged those items from memory. From what you've said, there's clearly some form of garbage collecting going on, i'm just not sure whether or not it's being used effectively. But that's just an issue affecting items. I would like to know why exploration increases file size as well.

The strangest thing is why would the game track stackables crafting? But it could explain why the loading is slow on bigger saves - it loads whole crafting progress...

Even if you have 9999+ maxdocs all it should save is number 9999+. That would suggest it either :
a)tracks the crafting events OR
b)usable stackables are not really stackables but items like pistols with smaller data and game tracks this OR
c)both (the worst case)

And since after dismantling his save went down any of those scenarios is possible but bug is different :
a) not fully GC crafting events
b) not fully GC items that are dismantled
c) not fully GC both or one of those so the portion remains

either way its not possible to determine without some kind of editor to see if there are actually items the save file that we no longer posses.

Post automatically merged: Dec 22, 2020

Interestingly enough, and someone correct me if I am wrong because I am having a hard time finding the post, the game will also cut off any data in excess of 8192KB when you load a save file. So for example, if you try to recover your corrupted save by adding an End of File marker (which wont work because there's missing data in the file) but let's say you tried it, the game will cut off anything added to the file over 8192KB, just the same as when it tried to save the file and cut off all data after 8192KB.

It's a weird issue, and I really hope it gets fixed soon.

I think someone mentioning some alpha version of save editor said saves are actually LZ4 compressed.
That means you cannot just simply add EOF or change anything to sav. You would need to decompress, add and compress. And since writing is broken at 8192KB its probably also not possible to decompress properly so its broken for good.

 

[ORANGEDRONE]

Just patch the game to not cap at 8MB! If you don't, there will be a mass exodus.

Something isn't optimized correctly either if every item fills up this file as a separate permanent line item.

 

[Buginfested]

This is not at all what's in line with what we've been seeing. The crafting has been proven, that's not disputed. What I dispute is that normal gameplay doesn't increase file size, as we've had people do missions and explore the city and they reported massive gains in file size, some in excess of 500KB.

If on your save you've already explored the entire map, that may explain why you see no more save file bloat. Start a new save and watch what happens when you enter a new district, buy a new car, encounter a gig, complete a gig, do a main mission story. You'll see the bloat that we're referencing.

That is possible, just started my 2nd run so will have to see for myself. However if there is bloat from missions prior to completing the map, and after completing the map there is less bloat - as in my save, shouldn't they be focused on the more serious cause which is crafting?

 

[pagefault404]

The strangest thing is why would the game track stackables crafting? But it could explain why the loading is slow on bigger saves - it loads whole crafting progress...

Even if you have 9999+ maxdocs all it should save is number 9999+. That would suggest it either :
a)tracks the crafting events OR
b)usable stackables are not really stackables but items like pistols with smaller data and game tracks this OR
c)both (the worst case)

And since after dismantling his save went down any of those scenarios is possible but bug is different :
a) not fully GC crafting events
b) not fully GC items that are dismantled
c) not fully GC both or one of those so the portion remains

either way its not possible to determine without some kind of editor to see if there are actually items the save file that we no longer posses.

So something that I remember being mentioned, but I don't think anyone chased down, is how the game handles stackable items. I recall a post made way earlier where someone mentioned that the save file would bloat when you hit an item number threshold of a consumable. So for example, if each maxdoc increases bloat by 1KB, hitting the item threshold of lets say for this example 1000 would increase the bloat by 10 or 15KB on top of the 1KB for the item.

None of those numbers are accurate, they are just used as an example to better understand what was being conveyed. Cyberpunk handles consumable items in a weird way because it lets you have, essentially, an infinite number of them. When you hit 10,000 of any item, it registers as 9999+. It can't tell you how many over 9999 it has, but, it's definitely keeping track of the total number of those items.

It would have made more sense to break them into stacks when they hit 9999, but, I'm not a developer so I have no way of knowing why it's set up like this.

Just patch the game to not cap at 8MB! If you don't, there will be a mass exodus.

Something isn't optimized correctly either if every item fills up this file as a separate permanent line item.

This has been addressed already. Lifting or even removing the 8MB cap will allow the save file to balloon even larger in size, causing loading issues, which can be seen once you exceed 5.5MB. It's a band-aid, which isn't addressing the problem, only the symptom. The real problem is the bloat, that's what needs to get fixed. I would rather see the issue be fixed for good instead of seeing the issue just get patched over and put on a lower priority. This is only going to cause more problems down the line.

 

[chotnik]

Just patch the game to not cap at 8MB! If you don't, there will be a mass exodus.

Something isn't optimized correctly either if every item fills up this file as a separate permanent line item.

Changing file size is "quick win" but doesn't solve bigger problem. If game tracks items you no longer posses and/or crafting those then the bigger your save gets the longer it will load.
But loading even 5 minutes is better than not playing at all. At higher levels you don't die so frequent so it's better than current situation.

Post automatically merged: Dec 22, 2020

So something that I remember being mentioned, but I don't think anyone chased down, is how the game handles stackable items. I recall a post made way earlier where someone mentioned that the save file would bloat when you hit an item number threshold of a consumable. So for example, if each maxdoc increases bloat by 1KB, hitting the item threshold of lets say for this example 1000 would increase the bloat by 10 or 15KB on top of the 1KB for the item.

None of those numbers are accurate, they are just used as an example to better understand what was being conveyed. Cyberpunk handles consumable items in a weird way because it lets you have, essentially, an infinite number of them. When you hit 10,000 of any item, it registers as 9999+. It can't tell you how many over 9999 it has, but, it's definitely keeping track of the total number of those items.

It would have made more sense to break them into stacks when they hit 9999, but, I'm not a developer so I have no way of knowing why it's set up like this.

It's possible it just reserves space for bigger stack and/or crafting history for those. Hence the additinal bloat.
As for 9999+ this shouldn't be an issue, game saves and tracks the number correctly, it's just display is formatted for only 4 numbers. Nothing strange in games.
You would in theory gain nothing for making it stacks of 9999. After all 9000 or 90000 is usually same size for variable.

 

[1mirg]

Just patch the game to not cap at 8MB! If you don't, there will be a mass exodus.

Something isn't optimized correctly either if every item fills up this file as a separate permanent line item.

As a person who's done pretty much everything in the game including obtaining all vehicles to even fill out my displays in the stash room with tje only thing I have left is quite literally the fridge next to dex questline and getting different endings/romances. I agree with yeah, it's ridiculous that our save files are even getting corrupted at 8MB at all.

Changing file size is "quick win" but doesn't solve bigger problem. If game tracks items you no longer posses and/or crafting those then the bigger your save gets the longer it will load.

all this says to me is that they just cobbled together some code and didn't check if there was any major issues with it. Makes sense considering how all the bugs i've seen in my 160 hours of gametime

 

[smudgegezer]

It's a known bug, if your save file exceeded 8MB then it corrupts. unfortunately, unless you have a previous save you have to restart.
heard crafting and collecting to many supplies increases your save file, it is a ticking time bomb

 

[pagefault404]

That is possible, just started my 2nd run so will have to see for myself. However if there is bloat from missions prior to completing the map, and after completing the map there is less bloat - as in my save, shouldn't they be focused on the more serious cause which is crafting?

I mean, they could address crafting in a way that removes it from the game temporarily, but, people will lose their minds over that. If they somehow manage to fix the crafting file bloat, but let's say the mystery bloat (A term I use for the generic bloat from missions or exploration or pretty much the entire sphere of unexplained bloat) still exists, it's still going to balloon save file sizes, maybe it will keep the majority below 8192KB, but I suspect that the issue will still exist.

If they fix the crafting bloat, then maybe it's possible to fix the other bloat as well, addressing the issue entirely. At this point, I am not sure how this is going to play out. All I know, is there are no good solutions here.

I personally feel like this is going to play out in such a way that they either have to put out a band-aid, which will cause problems down the road and people will rage "YOU SAID YOU FIXED THIS" or the fix isn't going to come fast enough and people are going to rage "YOU'RE NOT FIXING THIS FAST ENOUGH".

Either way, CDPR are damned.

From here out is my opinion and speculation

Issues like these have existed since REDengine 3, maybe even in versions before that, and I know issues with inventory management have been brought to their attention during TW3 days, so I know they have some idea about what could possibly be an issue with how their games handle items and inventories. What concerns me is, that, if it were an easy fix, they would have fixed it in REDengine 3, and it wouldn't have carried over to REDengine 4. Which tells me that this problem is going to be deeper and more complex than people are going to be willing to tolerate. So, I am preparing for the worst in terms of a fix for this issue.

Now, I am not a dev and only on the outside looking in, I could be close to the mark, I could be miles off. All I know is something is screwed up, and it seems a lot more complicated than the average consumer is going to accept.

 

[Midnight_Nova]

So, on the PS4, both the User Settings, and User Profile are 2 separate things, both are roughly 4.20 MBs each. All save files are 12.something as several people previously noted.
So either the 12 MB per save is reserved by the game, something else is stored with them, or the encryption could be diffirent. But these are all just speculation.

 

[Azulath]

What I'm starting to wonder is if game settings are also written into the save.dat files. The reason for this are mods like this:

Draw Distance Boost

Increases draw distance with a simple ini tweak.

www.nexusmods.com

In the comments, people complain about having issues, even though they deleted the offending setting. Others, advice to set it to default before deleting the ini file. Any input/ideas in this regard? It could be minor, but if settings are written to save.dat I'm starting to wonder what else is...

 

[igrvks]

If CDPR is serious about creating at least two story expansions, bunch of free DLC and a separate multiplayer side for this game they will HAVE to fix this issue at least by then. Just imagine 6 years of a multiplayer-live service type of deal with the obvious microtransactions etc. and the max savefile cap is 8mb. Or a 20 hour story expansion with possibly entire new location.

 

[pagefault404]

So, on the PS4, both the User Settings, and User Profile are 2 separate things, both are roughly 4.20 MBs each. All save files are 12.something as several people previously noted.
So either the 12 MB per save is reserved by the game, something else is stored with them, or the encryption could be diffirent. But these are all just speculation.

You're on to something there. I play a game called Horizon Zero Dawn, and a while back, I had a PC issue that wiped out a crucial file in my save folder for the game that allowed the game to see my save file. The save data was there, it was only missing the ini file for it. Anyways, I went down this rabbit hole and found a subreddit for PS4 hackers who talk about being able to decrypt and extract their Horizon saves from their PS4 and use them on PC, all they needed to do was generate one of these ini files by starting a new game on PC, then saving that game so it generate the ini, then more that ini file to their save folder and boom. PS4 save transferred to their PC

Anyways, I tend to get in the weeds. Point being, the PS4 encrypts their saves, and people were talking about a save file discrepancy where the PC save files extracted from the PS4 were MUCH smaller than whatever size the PS4 allotted for the save file. So I think you're right. The save.dat file is inside that 12.5MB encrypted file. I wonder if the same tools could be used to decrypt the Cyberpunk saves and used to see the actual save file size.

 

[OnyxCore]

You're welcome. I'd say your best bet is to use pixelrick's tool (https://github.com/PixelRick/CyberpunkSaveEditor) that allows you to decompress saves, save/load them and actually see all the structures stored in the file.

Drat. Tried this and only get an error dialog that it was unable to start correctly (0xc000007b).

So close...

Thanks for the pointer though.

 

[cIass101]

So basically all you do is save and the save bloats?

Yes exactly, I just press F to go out of the car, I do like a 360° rotation to look around and I just save. At this point, the sav.dat is always 0x800000 octet, and that with the default values of MaxSaveSize & MaxSaveSizeTotal, I have found a way to edit the exe to update 0x800000 octet to 10000000 (100MB) octet but same result, the sav.dat does not go beyond 0x800000 octet

Does it corrupt both files or just the new save? also are there any "hidden message sources"?

Not sure what you mean but only sav.dat is corrupted, the *.json file or screenshot are ok next to it. Not sure what do you mean by "hidden message sources" ? I have seen your last post but you do not need to craft with the save file I quoted in my previous post, just saving over it reaches the limit

 

[ORANGEDRONE]

Could also remove the permanent nature of items that get written to the save file. If I delete something in game, it should delete from my save file too. This isn't a long term solution but, would give us some way to avoid the ticking time bomb.

 

[Tracido]

Could also remove the permanent nature of items that get written to the save file. If I delete something in game, it should delete from my save file too. This isn't a long term solution but, would give us some way to avoid the ticking time bomb.

I'm willing to start a new game for enhanced content or added features, pretty much always, but just to play it at its current state in the current experience, I really hope this is solved soon.

Also, that does sound like it would solve the bloat towards corruption at least. I'm just not sure how the source code deals with removing it in the game world in the first place, let alone our saves. I'm watching mine jump up 0.02MB and down 0.02MB during a mission, it's just not making sense technically yet to me, either.

 

[amengsk]

The save file is tracking crafts in some capacity, even when you are at max level crafting already. This is obvious from a simple test;
- Save game (1)
- Craft 50 armadillo armor mods
- Save again (2)
- Disassemble all 50 armor mods
- Save again (3)
- Load save (2), sell all 50 armor mods instead and save again (4)

Save (2) will be the largest, followed by (4) and then (3). (4) is likely larger than (3) because of the buyback feature on merchants. You will never get back to the file size of save (1), even if you remove the money and materials gained through a Trainer.

If you collect/craft a lot of legendary gear and make a lot of mods to slot into them, you will bloat your save file faster than others. I am at 6.8MB with 106 hours played.

 

[Midnight_Nova]

You're on to something there. I play a game called Horizon Zero Dawn, and a while back, I had a PC issue that wiped out a crucial file in my save folder for the game that allowed the game to see my save file. The save data was there, it was only missing the ini file for it. Anyways, I went down this rabbit hole and found a subreddit for PS4 hackers who talk about being able to decrypt and extract their Horizon saves from their PS4 and use them on PC, all they needed to do was generate one of these ini files by starting a new game on PC, then saving that game so it generate the ini, then more that ini file to their save folder and boom. PS4 save transferred to their PC

Anyways, I tend to get in the weeds. Point being, the PS4 encrypts their saves, and people were talking about a save file discrepancy where the PC save files extracted from the PS4 were MUCH smaller than whatever size the PS4 allotted for the save file. So I think you're right. The save.dat file is inside that 12.5MB encrypted file. I wonder if the same tools could be used to decrypt the Cyberpunk saves and used to see the actual save file size.

It would be tomorrow, as I am hitting the hay soon, but I am more than willing to share both a manual, and automatic save if it can help the community.

 

[Pengingamer]

Hello, I have been a silent reader (I'm a Polish guy living in Germany and so I play the game with polish dub)of the forum and thread. I love CD project games the company and cyberpunk is my absolute favourite game, and I'm even some things are going wrong. Now I want to share you my experience with the save file so far. I have been monitoring it today but never before. I have around 34h40 playtime as of now.
Every time I save I create a new save file only sometimes I save onto the same save file. Why am I doing that? so can lead to a different game state if want to and play a different part of the story with my decisions. How big is my save file now? Its 3409 Kb. What I noticed. But my save file 5 minutes before was 1kb larger. At the beginning of my playing session today (2 hours long) the save file was like 3.393 kb large. And I never dropped weapons or items I found only sold once a few, and I'm not a big looter. But tend to look for some weapons and kept every weapon enemies dropped.

Also, I always collect these things where you can read the large text for the story (forgot their name). Today I collected one of these and it told me that I have too many items in my bag. Did one of you had this message before? I ask because many of you say that looting is the problem. And then I dropped some weapons to collect the items. But it didn't changes my save file size really. my playstyle so far was: doing some main story and also a little more sidequests as I was suggested to side quest so the main story doesn't end that fast and as it also they change the ending.

Now I checked all my save files and the biggest increase was only during half of hour playtime. It was right before I did that quest where you have to collect and chase this taxis. It went from 2.348kb to 3.171kb ( it was during patch 1.04) after that it only increased by a few kb step by step and also didn't by as my current one is 3410kb. Maybe that helps. I play on pc on a nvme SSD. I have the GOG version. My current version of the game is 1.05