who's addicted to save/reload? this guy.

[QuantumPion]

I just realized last night how dependent I am on saving and reloading, and how it affects the way I play games.

I was playing Master of Magic last night, well into a game on hard that was actually going well for once. As usual, I left my capital defended only with 2 spearmen and no city walls because it was not near any danger, or so I thought. The enemy managed to sneak 2 ghouls past me and took out my capital, thus game-over. I always figured I could leave my cities defended lightly because if I ever got sneak attacked I would just reload to take care of it. I save a lot of resources by not protecting my cities, and there is no risk because of the ability to reload.

I do the same thing in Civ4. I never build up an army until I'm ready for war later in the game because I figure if I get backstabbed I can just reload a few turns back and build up some defenses or bribes. And in X-COM, whenever any soldier dies I would reload because I like to have a squad of elites but I don't want to take the time to tread carefully and keep everyone alive.

This seriously affects my gameplay in a negative way and I've come to realize is not just "sort-of like cheating", but is infact outright cheating. Instead of reloading to win every game I play I really should accept the fact that my choices lead to me losing. I think I want to try playing games from now on without reloading and accept those defeats on the hall of fame as a badge of honor instead of trying to keep them pristine with only perfect wins. Who's with me?

 

[diesbudt]

Depends on the game for me.

If it is a game in which you can miss important things and not back track to get them again, I save fairly often on many different files.

Civilization game, I rarly save unless I am getting ready to log off it.

If it is an RPG game, I save whenever I get around to it. Sometimes that is every few minutes sometimes it can be as long as an hour.

 

[Anteaus]

I don't consider it an addiction as much as a strategy. As someone who has been gaming since the 80s, the save/reload style was virtually required on earlier RPGs where in some cases it felt like it was literally a matter of flipping a coin whether you were going to come out of a particular battle alive. Today's games have much smoother difficulty curves where there is a reasonable expectation that you'll come out ok as long as you don't screw up, whereas in the gold box era much of the game was completely trial and error. The Buck Roger's games were really hard and I'm surprised I didn't put a hammer through the monitor during those days.

I do the save/reload thing, not because I'm trying to cheat or get an advantage, but because thats just how I've always done it. With recent games I reload far, far less than I have in the past (the games are simply easier), but I save virtually every 3-5 minutes unless there is an autosave.

 

[Arkadrel]

I don't consider it an addiction as much as a strategy. As someone who has been gaming since the 80s, the save/reload style was virtually required on earlier RPGs where in some cases it felt like it was literally a matter of flipping a coin whether you were going to come out of a particular battle alive.

And you know what? I loved it

Battles so damn tough, you have to do the right things to even have a chance of winning => loseing until you figour it out => reload.

Its better than so damn easy you can play intire game without save/loading.
I personally dont consider it cheating, and think it enriches more than it hurts, the gameplay experiance.

With recent games I reload far, far less than I have in the past (the games are simply easier), but I save virtually every 3-5 minutes unless there is an autosave.

^ this..

Challengeing + save/load > easy mode without need to save/load.

I think I want to try playing games from now on without reloading and accept those defeats on the hall of fame as a badge of honor instead of trying to keep them pristine with only perfect wins. Who's with me?

Not me

PS: go buy Donkey Kong Country for the Wii
(seriously so rare there are decently challengeing games of that type anymore)

 

[JTsyo]

I go with the flow. In fact in ME3 (major spoilers),

Spoiler

I chose to let the Geth kill off the Quarians. I was just sitting back and watching and missed the Paragon action for when Tali committed suicide.

I did reload on that but still made the same choices but was ready for the Paragon action.

 

[diesbudt]

And you know what? I loved it

Battles so damn tough, you have to do the right things to even have a chance of winning => loseing until you figour it out => reload.

Its better than so damn easy you can play intire game without save/loading.
I personally dont consider it cheating, and think it enriches more than it hurts, the gameplay experiance.

^ this..

Challengeing + save/load > easy mode without need to save/load.



Not me

PS: go buy Donkey Kong Country for the Wii
(seriously so rare there are decently challengeing games of that type anymore)

Me too. I miss some of those hard fights that felt like 5-10 minutes and if you made 1 mistake along the fight someone on the party died, forcing you into a domino effect that would eventually end in your demise.

 

[CPA]

Civ I would consider it cheating, because AI is going to do the same exact thing when you reload. Knowing that you can change your strategy to offset the AI.

Some Civ games I will save a lot, some I will not save but when I log off.

 

[Theshawty]

OP: I can relate.

 

[thespyder]

This seriously affects my gameplay in a negative way and I've come to realize is not just "sort-of like cheating", but is infact outright cheating. Instead of reloading to win every game I play I really should accept the fact that my choices lead to me losing. I think I want to try playing games from now on without reloading and accept those defeats on the hall of fame as a badge of honor instead of trying to keep them pristine with only perfect wins. Who's with me?

I think this is wholly subjective. I have been playing Legend of Grimrock lately and I do the exact same thing. Like voting in Chicago, I save early and often. I don't want to have a dead party member to lug around. Nor do I want to needlessly waste a potion that I might need later.

but at the end of the day, you play the game the way it is fun for you. If you think that saving every turn is 'Cheating' then stop doing it. But understand that not everyone is going to think/see it that way. When playing Xcom, I got invested in my soldiers. I named them and made sure that I kept them alive as much as possible. And I would save every few turns or before/after any significant push. I don't feel this cheating one bit.

Quite to the contrary, when playing a game with fixed save points, I think that is cheap and exploitative way to artificially prolong the game. Let me save as often as I like. If you think that it detracts from the 'Strategy' of the game, simply don't save as often.

 

[pontifex]

depends on the game. some games i do it a lot, others not so much.

SKyrim is one where i saved/reloaded a lot.

 

[KaOTiK]

I use it a lot with games that have consequences for your actions. I like to save before making the decision, then make the decision I was not going to make and see what happens and then reload to do the one I wanted to pick first. Sometimes stuff doesn't happen in a way it should in a system like that so it is nice to see outcomes and to get a better sense of the game overall by doing as much as possible.

 

[bguile]

Me too. I miss some of those hard fights that felt like 5-10 minutes and if you made 1 mistake along the fight someone on the party died, forcing you into a domino effect that would eventually end in your demise.

I've been playing Temple of Elemental Evil with Circle of Eight Mod. I save/load religiously because this game is freaking tough. I've had to scrap two parties now and working on a third. First party had too low of a hp because I didn't realize that hp were randomly rolled every time you leveled up. I've gotten so used to it being maximized that I didn't even notice it until I couldn't figure out how my level 4 cleric ended up with only 16 hp and was dying everywhere. Now everytime a character levels, I reload unless I get a decent roll on my hp. There's probably an option to set for max hp on level up but I don't mind it that much, its sort of nostalgic.

On the second party I did a lot better, and could have kept going but my monk wasn't really cutting it once I got to the temple, so I scrapped for a third party, which I am working on now. They are much better built but I still have to save every 5 feet because you never know how the next battle is going to go.

 

[OCNewbie]

I think it's more exciting to have limited reloading, depending on the game. A critical component of a good adventure gaming experience is risk, I think. If you eliminate all risk (by constantly saving/reloading), you essentially feel invincible, and all your choices become less critical/important when you always have a do-over in your back pocket.

 

[thespyder]

I've been playing Temple of Elemental Evil with Circle of Eight Mod. I save/load religiously because this game is freaking tough. I've had to scrap two parties now and working on a third. First party had too low of a hp because I didn't realize that hp were randomly rolled every time you leveled up. I've gotten so used to it being maximized that I didn't even notice it until I couldn't figure out how my level 4 cleric ended up with only 16 hp and was dying everywhere. Now everytime a character levels, I reload unless I get a decent roll on my hp. There's probably an option to set for max hp on level up but I don't mind it that much, its sort of nostalgic.

On the second party I did a lot better, and could have kept going but my monk wasn't really cutting it once I got to the temple, so I scrapped for a third party, which I am working on now. They are much better built but I still have to save every 5 feet because you never know how the next battle is going to go.

The Co8 interface actually has a setting where you can designate Max HP if you so choose. (if I am remembering correctly). And yeah, it can be an unforgiving master to play. Particularly with the updates that Co8 made. But then that is what makes it such a great game.

I think it's more exciting to have limited reloading, depending on the game. A critical component of a good adventure gaming experience is risk, I think. If you eliminate all risk (by constantly saving/reloading), you essentially feel invincible, and all your choices become less critical/important when you always have a do-over in your back pocket.

The other side of the coin is that I really hate having to replay the same sequence over and over and OVER again because some yahoo thought they could artificially extend the game play of a game by making long times between saves and incredibly tough sequences at the end of them. I say again, if you don't want to save often, DON'T. But don't handicap those of us who may want to do so.

And you can still maintain a risky and strategic atmosphere even with save any time environments. You just have to apply different thinking to your approach.

 

[Martimus]

The Walking Dead doesn't allow saving and reloading and that is an Adventure game. I like it in some ways, but in others I hated that I accidentally picked the wrong option (read not the option I wanted to pick) and I had to live with the consequences of that.

I do find playing games without saving/reloading is quite liberating. Just playing the game and letting the cards fall where they may can be very fun compared to the OCD saving and reloading I find myself doing on occasion.

 

[gevorg]

As long as there is auto-save, I don't bother to save until I log-off/quit. Obsession with saving before making a decision takes all the fun away.

 

[cytoSiN]

<--- Guilty as charged. I bound F5 to a mouse button to make quicksaving easier...

 

[Iron Wolf]

Civ I would consider it cheating, because AI is going to do the same exact thing when you reload. Knowing that you can change your strategy to offset the AI.

Some Civ games I will save a lot, some I will not save but when I log off.

Civ autosaves every 10 turns anyway, so saving is not that big a deal. I only load up saves when I realize a few turns later that I made a boneheaded mistake (like put a city in the wrong place) and want to fix it. Most of the time if I'm losing, it is to the point that loading a save is not going to help, and maybe even restarting the whole game doesn't help.

Incidentally, there is an option to randomize upon reload, so the results won't necessarily be exactly the same, and you can even randomize leader personalities, to further add more uncertainty to the game.

 

[thespyder]

Civ autosaves every 10 turns anyway, so saving is not that big a deal. I only load up saves when I realize a few turns later that I made a boneheaded mistake (like put a city in the wrong place) and want to fix it. Most of the time if I'm losing, it is to the point that loading a save is not going to help, and maybe even restarting the whole game doesn't help.

Incidentally, there is an option to randomize upon reload, so the results won't necessarily be exactly the same, and you can even randomize leader personalities, to further add more uncertainty to the game.

Also, iterative games such as TBS/RTS games, saving every few turns isn't going to prevent you from encountering something that merely going back a few turns won't avoid. If you are building up in the wrong area, or using the wrong strategy, switching over may take a considerable amount of time. At least I know that with GalCiv2, that can be the case.

Just saying that there are ways around the save whenever you want strategy that still make the games challenging.

 

[Remobz]

The only saving and reloading I do these days is when I do target practice with my .38 special gun

 

[Smoblikat]

Depends on how ive died. If I died because the game was being stupid/glitched ill reload, but if I died while trying my hardest I gladly accept my fate.

 

[moonbogg]

I've done that compulsively for games over the years. It ends up being the focus and gets ridiculous. You know the most I think i've ever done it was on Mario Kart trying to beat my own time trial. I would make it past the first damn turn and if it wasn't tight enough, BAM, i'd reload and do again. I could sit there taking the same turn over and over again for hours and never finish the race.