» Sun Jan 30, 2011 4:28 pm
[quote name='anithinks' date='10 October 2010 - 06:47 PM' timestamp='1286750829' post='16469252']
With modded Oblivion so crash-prone, i would suggest more saving and the ability to save more, not less... :shrug:
But continue the discussion....
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It's really the criteria for the save I am most interested in. Crashing is unfortunately a reality, and so are corrupted saves. In the perfect game we wouldn't need to consider this as part of the final product but I suppose we must. Perhaps there could be one backup save per character that gets kept everytime a new save is made. But the entire idea of "save more, not less" is really relative on how you like to play. The product I am proposing is a different save system that is not dependent as much upon your personal desire to save an instance of the game. The way this would work is the way it is already working in many other games, including RPGs. I used Halo and Diablo II as examples because their systems are specific and well implemented but perhaps I can add a more generic definition to the possibilities. Here is a very good excerpt from Wikipedia:
[quote name='http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saved_game']
Types of saved games
Save points
Save points are employed either when a game state is too complex to save at any given point or as a way to manage the difficulty level (i.e. a save point located before a difficult area, or one single save point before a set of difficult bosses rather than in between).
Checkpoints
Checkpoints are locations in a computer or video game (generally found in platform games) where a player's status is saved and where the character respawns in the status saved by the checkpoint. A respawn is most often due to the death of the in-game character, but it can also be caused by the failure to meet an objective required to advance in the game. Some of these checkpoints are temporary and last until a new checkpoint is activated, the level is cleared, or the player loses all his/her lives. Most modern games, however, save the game to memory at these points, known as auto-saving. In many racing games with a limited race completion time, checkpoints passed by the player increase the amount of time available to finish the race by adding time to the countdown. In some games, bonuses are awarded for passing checkpoints.
Autosaves
A common feature of games with long load times is to automatically save the game immediately after loading a new level (much like a checkpoint save), so that if the most recent manual save was very close to the end of the last level and the player then needs to reload, they do not have to spend time reloading the previous level, playing for a short period and then loading the new one again.
Save states
A unique method of saving games is possible when playing under arcade and console emulators. These give the advantage of saving games even if the game or the system did not support such a feature. This is done by means of a RAM dump, which saves all the RAM data of the emulated console into a computer file for later use. Saved games of this kind are usually called "save states". "Save state hacking" is the practice of modifying the data in these saved states to achieve various effects, some of which would otherwise be impossible.
Some games that feature save points also use a variation of a save state called a suspend save; these saves will record the complete state of the game and the player will continue from that exact point when they resume. However, the point of this save is to allow the player to stop the game because they are interrupted and do not have time to reach a save point; as such, this save state is erased when the player continues the game so that the player cannot use this feature to inch their way through the game. Restoring from the same suspend save multiple times is often considered savescumming, and is generally considered cheating on most roguelikes.
Quick saving
Similar to save states, quick saving is the term used for saving the player's progress in a game at any given time. Normally, to save progress the player must reach a designated point in a level (checkpoint), or if saving is permitted elsewhere it is usually achieved through the use of a menu. In games that allow quick saving, one can save progress with a simple keystroke, bypassing the menus or checkpoints. Accompanying quick saving is the quick loading feature, which is a complementarily assigned key to load a game instantly.
Some people consider the use of quick save in a game to be a form of cheating since it allows the player to incrementally "inch" through a difficult level regardless of skill. Others see the omission of quick saving as a fatal flaw in a game, believing that the player should have control as to when the game is saved. A good balance can be achieved if a game's difficulty level is set so that quick saving is not required but to still provide the facility for those players that wish to make use of it. Some games (e.g. Painkiller) exclude quick save capability from the highest difficulty levels.
Quick saving is usually a feature found in PC games and is often not present in console games. One reason for this is hardware limitation: because a quick save must contain information about the entire level state, rather than minor statistics such as player health and inventory, it can require significantly more memory to store the information (a quick save for Doom 3 is approximately 10 megabytes in size, while a corresponding save game for any PlayStation game only occupies a few kilobytes). Half-Life for the PS2 gets around this by saving the quick saves directly to the console's memory; if the game is left for any reason without going into a menu and saving properly, the quick save is lost. In The Orange Box, which when for the PlayStation 3 contains no autosave function, the player is merely reminded to quick save at important checkpoints. On Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus, the quicksave function is accessible at any time during play through the pause menu and is useful to use it in safe spots so that in the occasion that you die in the next dangerous part of a level it is not necessary to repeat a relatively long section of playing to try it again, however, because it's possible to quick save when you are cornered or otherwise bound to lose, and because you can't quick save on more than one location some strategy is needed to know when it is useful and safe to quick save.
Save anywhere
Another type of saved game is the concept of save anywhere, which allows the user to save at any point of the game at any time at any state of the game. The phrase "SAVE SAVE SAVE" is a reference to this feature and if often included in guides to these types of games to ensure that the user takes maximum advantage of this feature. This was chiefly a computer-only save game ability until the introduction of hard drives on console systems.
Some high-end models of digital audio players and portable media players have the "save anywhere" system for playlists and randomization modes for audio files (and videos).
Integration of saved game systems into gameplay
Game designers often attempt to integrate the save points into the style of the game. Resident Evil represents save points with old fashioned typewriters (which require an ink ribbon item for each save), the Grand Theft Auto series used representations appropriate to the era of the setting: audio cassettes for the mid-1980s (Grand Theft Auto: Vice City), 3?-inch disks for the early-1990s (Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas) and compact discs for the late-1990s (Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories). Many RPGs integrate the function of saving into the form of a journal that the characters can write into, or by auto-saving whenever the character stays at an inn or other resting place.
Square is notorious for commonly treating save points as legitimate objects within the game world. In Chrono Trigger, a save point in Magus' castle will actually attack the character if he attempts to use it. In Final Fantasy VII, there is a save point at the Gold Saucer amusemant park that forces the player to spend in-game currency to use it. There is also a phony save point serving as a distraction early on. If it is checked, the player misses out on a new character. In Final Fantasy VIII, the effects of a mysterious magical spell cause one save point to suddenly replicate into dozens of save points when touched. In Chrono Cross, Terranigma, and Xenogears, the character's recording of his memories in the game's various save points becomes a plot point later in the game.
In Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest, it costs two banana coins to use any save point more than once. Also, there is a puzzle in Alundra 2 that entails a cost in GP proportional to the number of times the game has been saved, penalizing frequent savers.
Perhaps one of the most famous integration of saved games in gameplay is Metal Gear Solid. Depending on how often the player saves, Psycho Mantis and Revolver Ocelot comment on how often they save, and also comment if save files from certain other Konami games are on the same memory card.
Another way saved games interact with each other is through passing along data to a particular game's sequels. A famous example of this is in Konami's own Suikoden series. By having and utilizing a save state from Suikoden's final save point that includes all 108 Stars of Destiny recruited, extra characters and plot elements are introduced in Suikoden II, and both previous games can stack with Suikoden III to show the player even more. Another notable example is the Ratchet & Clank series, in which having saves from previous entries to drastically reduce the price of previously purchased weapons that reappear in later games. Saves of non-related games can also interact with each other; for example, Super Smash Bros. Melee will reward the player with a Captain Olimar trophy when he or she boots the game with a Pikmin game save on the memory card. The character Rosalina becomes available on Mario Kart Wii if you have a Super Mario Galaxy save on your console. In Mass Effect 2, the player can import a save from Mass Effect which can alter the events that transpire in the game.
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I have many specific ideas on the 'how and what' to implement into a Dynamic Save System, but since this is a Request Thread I am very much at the mercy of the individual or group who are willing to take this idea and implement it into Oblivion. I hope somebody does do it honestly, and that individuals continue to contribute ideas until somebody qualified is willing to take this Mod as their own. Until then these suggestions are here for brainstorming and I hope you benefit.
Thanks,
-Vvemoth
