Save Repair Guide (version 0.1.0)

This guide will explain how each part of a NoEN save file works. With this guide, you should be able to fix any corruptions or issues you may have with your save file, to the point where you could likely even recreate a lost save file from scratch. Please refer to the Table of Contents below for easier navigation through this document.

Table of Contents

1. Basics

1a. Isn't this cheating?

1b. How the game reads files
i. Intro
ii. Templates
iii. Formatting

2. Universal Settings

2a. Intro

2b. Variables

3. Save Files

3a. Intro

3b. Variables
i. Settings
ii. Story Progression
iii. Active Run

1. Basics

a. Isn't this cheating?

I mean, you can use the information within this guide to "cheat" if you want to. But, since this is a single-player game with no leaderboards or stakes, I really don't care. In the past, I have been a prolific save editor myself (to give myself more items in Tomodachi Life and Style Savvy...) so I won't judge you if you want to use this guide for that reason.

Also, losing save data just sucks, man. Especially as I continue developing the game, there'll be more and more potential progress to lose. If this guide ends up sparing even just one person from having to grasp with the frustration and disappointment of data loss, then my goal in writing it has been accomplished.

b. How the game reads files

i. Intro

NoEN determines whether to show a save file as "empty" or not based on whether or not the date is written as "EMPTY..." (with no quotes.) This is because there are technically never any "empty" save files. If the game opens, and any files are missing from the "SaveData" folder, it will just create new ones with default contents. (It will also create a new SaveData folder if it doesn't find one with that exact name.)

You could completely alter the contents of a file, but if you leave the date as EMPTY... then it will show up as "empty" ingame. It does not matter what you write in for the date when editing; the game saves the date as a string of text, and loads it as a string of text, so abnormal date values should not cause any problems.

ii. Templates

The following two scroll boxes contain the entire default contents of the files NoEN generates to hold its save data. You could copy and paste the entire contents of either of them into a text editor, save the file as a .txt file with the appropriate name, then put it into the SaveData folder, and the game would be able to read it.

Default settings file (created as universal_settings.txt):

Default save file (created as file_1.txt, file_2.txt, or file_3.txt):

I will go into more detail regarding what all those numbers mean in the relevant sections for each file type.

iii. Formatting

Certain parts of the formatting are vital to how the game interprets files, while others can be altered without causing problems (although said alterations will be overwritten when saving ingame.) Improper formatting may result in default values being filled in to variables, Data Access Errors, or even crashes.

The following aspects of the formatting are vital:

• The arrows ( =>):
  The game scans for variable names by searching for these arrows. The space before the arrow is part of what the game scans for, so it must be included as well. There does not need to be a space after the arrow, but the game puts one there by default.


• The exact variable names:
  Once again, the spaces used within the names are also important. For example, "equipment(Denzell)" and "equipment ( Denzell )" are NOT the same as "equipment (Denzell)".


• Proper spacing in arrays:
  This point is very similar to the previous point, but I thought I should clarify since it's still very important. The arrays are those sets of numbers kept in brackets. In arrays, there must be spaces seperating the brackets from the contents, but there cannot be any spaces among the actual contents.
  For example, the default party array is "[ 0,1,-4,-4 ]" (-4 represents a "null" or "noone" value in GameMaker). "[0, 1, -4, -4]", "[0,1,-4,-4]", or "[ 0, 1, -4, -4 ]" would not work. Additionally, an empty array must be written as "[ ]" and not "[]"; but, as of right now, at least, the only array that accepts being completely empty as "valid" is the Inventory array ("inventory (items)" under the Active Run section of the save files).


• Line breaks:
  I'm sure this one is mostly self-explanatory, but there's also another important aspect to it. In addition to the game requiring line breaks between each defined variable, there cannot be any line breaks within variable values (such as long arrays). This will cause the game to be unable to recognize the full contents of the variable/array.

The arrows and variable names in particular are what the game scans for when searching for variables to load in. It will ignore any lines that do not contain both of these elements, assuming that they do not contain variables at all. That being said...

The following aspects of the formatting are negligible:

• The section headers
• The line spacing
• The warning message at the top of each save file

The game will add these elements back in to files that are missing them when saving, but it ultimately does not care whether they are there or not. I only added them in to make the files a little easier to navigate for humans.