Buggered save files

[Don Corleone]

Me again, same game (Spanish, normal, started in Early, clock just struck 1206). I'm a little miffed because my 1206 save file is screwed up. When I load it, instead of what should be there, I get a game in 1087, in Conan mode. I've never used cheats, so I'm surprised the game defaulted to that. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-help.gif Any suggestions?

[RedKnight]

Don, this may not help your present situation, but might help avoid it in the future...

I don't know about anybody else, but MTW always locks my PC if I try to exit it normally. So, instead, I just switch out and then use the Task Manager to shut it down. No big deal.

However, I have found that when I save a game just before killing MTW, I MUST exit all the way to the main menu, or the savegame will be wonky, probably in the same way you describe.

I hope this helps a little Sorry about your problem.

[Imperial Buffoon]

Was it a quicksave? There are a number of stories of misshapen quicksaves elsewhere in the forums, maybe someone managed to get his game back although I don't think I've seen that.

[Don Corleone]

That would be it, it was a quicksave, right before a battle. Guess that's a no-no, huh?

[Tricky Lady]

I've experienced something similar last weekend too. I reloaded a game (that I loaded already successfully some days before), and instead of loading the chosen faction, it loaded as the rebels, in 1087 (whilst the savegame was supposed to be somewhere around 1240...). Tried other savegame where I was 100% that I didn't save using the quicksave button, and these games were corrupt too.
Shut down MTW, rebooted PC, relaunched MTW and loaded the same games again, and this time they all launched smoothly... Weird.

[Colovion]

My botched save files were always a result of saving over (overwriting) old save files. I stopped overwriting and I haven't had a buggered save file since. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif

[katank]

I also love the convienience of quicksaving before battles if I have many many battles to fight in a turn and can't get through it all in one session.

quicksaves are frustratingly unreliable though.

[Imperial Buffoon]

Quicksaves before battles are also great to keep you from reloading to change your strategy. At least you have to face up to your own decisions - well, you have the opportunity of doing it several times http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
I never played anything other than VI but the between-battle saves make the game a lot better for me, otherwise I would never fight the large endgame battles.

[katank]

that's true.

I do that too to force myself to win with the decisions I made although too often this crashes the game as quicksaves seem expecially vulnerable when it's between battles.