I've been following this thread since yesterday and I am really concerned about this issue, but I'd also like to offer additional input/insight:
- At the very start of this thread, someone argued that loading save files would corrupt them. This is almost certainly not the case. I calculated the hash of my quicksave before and after I loaded it and both times the result was the same.
- This issue was compared with W3 and I had a look at my W3 saves. My very first save which I did as soon as I was able to save, is about 17KiB in size. My last and largest saves, with everything completed there is to complete has 4.5MiB. I would also like to add that I picked up every item because in games like these I am a hoarder and I usually use mods that disable the weight limit. However, aside from the Witcher gear and some runes I did not really craft anything. (I had three playthroughs and this error never occurred.)
- My very first CP2077 has 1.05MiB and my current one has 1.45MiB. (I just met Viktor to install my Cyberware)
- In my W3 palythroughs I did noticed that opening the load screen did take quite a while. However, I was able to fix this by just moving every save file out of the folder, with the exception of the most recent one.
Regarding CP2077, I'm currently at a point where I am afraid to keep on playing. I did intend to craft a bit, because I did not want to run around with weird clothes that don't fit together. (I do this enough in real life.) So, I wanted to just upgrade gear that looks cool. Also, I am one who looks under every stone and behind every corner. I do want to see everything and anything on my first playthrough and I do not accept the notion of just having multiple playthroughs as it has been suggested earlier. I will tackle it a few times, but in all of them I will strive for 100%.
Furthermore, I there are already problems with the savegame size and CDPR has no intention to fix it, then they should also re-evaluate their content-DLC plans.
While I do find this issue severe, I also hope that this does not end in a lawsuit as someone else expressed his hope for. This would hurt CDPR badly to a degree where probably wouldn't see a sequel. However, I also doubt this will happen anyway.
That being said, I am unsure if I should continue playing and before stumbling over this issue, I never considered to get a refund for my game. Now, I'm not so sure. The thing is, I have pre-ordered the game and would do so again because I wanted to support the development. At this point though, it is unclear if/when this error will be fixed and if I were to put my money where my mouth is, I would get a refund...
Last but not least, I encourage each and everyone who is having this issue to report it. I would report it on the page linked below because it has a "Contact Us" button, while the other one has a useless message.
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Regarding a possible fix, I read the uint16 suggestion and this sounds like it could be the issue. If this is the case, I think the fix wouldn't be too difficult and not that error prone. One could change this type to uint32 and add a converter for older savegames. The problem here would be that each item in memory consumes 2 Bytes additionally. This would of course increase the memory usage and probably exceed the console target, so they would have to reduce memory usage in some other area.
Another way would be to have savetrim tool that gets triggered on load when a savegame is larger than 4MiB for example.
Anyway, I hope this will be addressed soon in some way, because other than that I really do enjoy this game.
P.S.: Please don't post any kind of spoilers in this thread. As you can tell, I'm still at the very start.