Saved games vanishing!

[Rockin Robbins]

This is the second time! I've played in career mode GWX mod. I have the 1.04b patch. I get near the end of the first patrol, save the game before entering port and quit until the next day. When I start up Silent Hunter the next day my saved game pane is totally empty! I've wasted weeks on this game and been slammed twice. This is getting very discouraging. Is this a loser simulation, do I just need to forget about career mode, or is there a fix that can prevent this from recurring? Please help, this is ruining my enjoyment of Silent Hunter III. Is it too much to expect a game to remember saves?

[melnibonian]

This is strange.

How close were you to port before saving? The rule of thumb say that you should NEVER save close to land (50-100Km) or close to other ships.

[Spytrx]

If it is the very first patrol I found you have to return to port and dock before the safe is recognized (at least that is how I found it working on my machine)...

If you are 30 miles out you can just teleport to port without any loss of renown...

[Jimbuna]

You state this is your second time......did you have to reinstall after the first...if you did then did you uninstall/delete everything from C\MyDocs ? :hmm:

[Rockin Robbins]

Thanks for replying. The first time I lost all save game data I was in the middle of the oceans with 3 different saved levels I had been rotating. I don't remember if I was near any ships, but I was not near land. Not only did I lose my last save, but the other two as well. I had saved and restarted dozens of times before without incident. I did not reinstall. However, I did install GWX after that. Wow, is that great, although I endured a period of doubt when the additional escorts and better skills on their part made my life miserable for awhile. I learned not to shoot deck guns at armed transports. I learned not to advertise myself to escorts and some evasion skill. I learned aggression is a limited tool. lol Then I started a second career. It actually vanished after I had entered port at the end of my first patrol with 20,000 tons under my belt. I actually motored into my slip before entering port. Now I know that's unnecessary if I'm within 30 miles or so. But I was a sad puppy for sure when all three saved game levels vanished.

I'll bet this bug is costing them big money because for every person like me who looks for a solution, there are ten who just write the game off as a loser. They aren't candidates for new releases, so Ubisoft hits themselves in the pocket. You'd think they would fix their game. Why go through all the work of producing the best simulation of anything anywhere and then fail to do the basic easy stuff that absolutely has to work to have a viable product? I was going to spring the $50 for Wolves of the Pacific but now I know I can just wait until someone gets shafted by bugs and pick it up for $15 on Half.com. lol

Hey, is anybody else having success with underwater evasion by reducing speed to 1 knot under silent running? That's working really well for me when the escorts get on top of me. All ahead slow seems nowhere near as stealthy.

[Jimbuna]

Saved games from other SH3 ibstallations will not work with GWX

[Rockin Robbins]

I installed GWX after my save game vanished. Actually, I don't know if I would have otherwise, so perhaps it's a good thing it happened the first time! I'm going to start a brand new campaign and hope for the best, while following the pointers I've picked up here.

[jackdrewe]

Hello all,
I had the same thing happen to me in career mode a few nights ago. I was on my way back to base after a MASSIVe patrol- I had sunk AT LEAST 20,000 worth of vessels (stacks of coastal merchants, 2 big cargo vessals (one sunk with 1 torpedo, very cool) and had also taken out a destroyer stalking me with an aft torpedo which was VERY EXCITING (much to the delight of my mates). Then with the destroyer taken out I was about to turn around and finish off the exposed convoy. Time for bed, so I saved and exited the game. Back home from work and PUMPED to load up Silent HUnter 3- I nearly cried when I loaded up my career to find EVERY save game missing from the save pane window. Not one left! I screamed and cursed as all my hard work and tactics went out the window.

I didn't load up an old save or anything (which I know deletes any save after that), THEY HAD ALL VANISHED from the pane. No do I have any mods installed which might be causing this

Interestingly though, the save files were all in the My Documents/SH3/career etc, so they were there but some reason the game is not recognising/displaying them. Does anyone (PLEASE GOD!!) know of a workaround for this problem??
This savegame issue has seriously killed my PASSION AND LOVE for this great game. I fact I dont think I could take it again..whats the point of wasting hours and hours just to have the glory snatched from you! (Im so depressed) I agree with Rockin Robbins- is it too much to expect a game to remember saves??

[Shelton]

after every patrol make a back up of your SH3 folder in My Documents.

[TarJak]

I've experienced the same problem. What I've found is that if you delete "Player" and only have one ID when you save and exit you lose all your saves. I try to create another "player" and then have no problems.

[Gezoes]

You sir, are my savior

I lost all my saves, but creating a bogus player worked perfectly!

[predavolk]

Can anyone confirm if the "bogus" player is the solution? The same thing just happened to me. Twice. There's another thread about this from a few months earlier where a GWX person suggests adding "x" to the career and/or SH3 folder.

Does anyone know what the actual solution is?
If so, can they spell it out in stupid-speak for me?
Will it restore my lost career?

If it helps, from what I gather from the other posts on the topic, this happens after the PC has been rebooted. I, and others, appear to be able to save, quit the game, quit and restart the game, reload saves within the game, no problem, just not turn the PC on and off again. Any help would be appreciated as it's obviously very frustrating to play this way. It's like living Groundhog Day in a u-boat! And I'm doing really well too, half my torps left, 100% realism, 25K+tons for my first real try at GWX (and 1st week playing the game- I play flight sims, this is just like REALLLLLY slow dogfighting! )!

BTW, I'm with Rear Admiral Ben Bryant- the deck gun rules! At least in 1939.:p

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by predavolk

Can anyone confirm if the "bogus" player is the solution? The same thing just happened to me. Twice. There's another thread about this from a few months earlier where a GWX person suggests adding "x" to the career and/or SH3 folder.

Does anyone know what the actual solution is?
If so, can they spell it out in stupid-speak for me?
Will it restore my lost career?

If it helps, from what I gather from the other posts on the topic, this happens after the PC has been rebooted. I, and others, appear to be able to save, quit the game, quit and restart the game, reload saves within the game, no problem, just not turn the PC on and off again. Any help would be appreciated as it's obviously very frustrating to play this way. It's like living Groundhog Day in a u-boat! And I'm doing really well too, half my torps left, 100% realism, 25K+tons for my first real try at GWX (and 1st week playing the game- I play flight sims, this is just like REALLLLLY slow dogfighting! )!

BTW, I'm with Rear Admiral Ben Bryant- the deck gun rules! At least in 1939.:p

Welcome aboard predavolk

I'm probably that 'GWX person' your referring to.

The answer is simple....go to your career folder in C:MyDocs and add the letter 'x' at the end of your kaleuns name, The game should reappear after you reboot your system.

As annoying as this is to you and so many others, there is no known permanent solution I'm afraid.

[predavolk]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

Welcome aboard predavolk

I'm probably that 'GWX person' your referring to.

The answer is simple....go to your career folder in C:MyDocs and add the letter 'x' at the end of your kaleuns name, The game should reappear after you reboot your system.

As annoying as this is to you and so many others, there is no known permanent solution I'm afraid.

Thanks for the tip jimbuna. I'll try that for sure. I did have good luck adding a dummy account- Player. I created a new player, and a new career. I didn't have to sail with it, and I got my old career back! Woohoo! But I will keep your advice as a backup- when it comes to saving, you can never have too many backups! And thanks for the welcome.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by predavolk

Thanks for the tip jimbuna. I'll try that for sure. I did have good luck adding a dummy account- Player. I created a new player, and a new career. I didn't have to sail with it, and I got my old career back! Woohoo! But I will keep your advice as a backup- when it comes to saving, you can never have too many backups! And thanks for the welcome.

No prob matey....BTW, your method also works....I was just describing what I do