[OniShingo]

Hi guys, I'm a new user on the forums and I'm not too happy to say that I had to register after having issues with the game, which is awesome by the way. (I've been waiting for the best time to start playing TW1/2, they've been sitting in my library for decades.)

Anyway, my problem started this morning, when I realized that during my usual "save managing routine", I deleted the wrong files, leaving me with some 10-hours old saves and that's it.

So I decided to recover the deleted files with many recovery utilities, but whatever I try to do, when I put the recovered files in TW's save folder, the game tells me the save is corrupted.


I also tried to open the recovered save with ScriptedRon's Savegame Editor, but it tells me that it misses an .SMM file. Regarding this issue, I just theorized that the .SMM file might be there, but I just have to find the right "number" to put in the savegame name. For example, my last working save is named like this:

000138 - Swamp Forest-045.TheWitcherSave

The recovered files don't have their original filename, so it just goes like "$RN3M56K.TheWitcherSave", which I should rename correctly, but trying with "000139 - Swamp Forest-046.TheWitcherSave" didn't work.

I hope someone can help me and tell me if there's a way to recover it, maybe unpack the save and find the correct number corresponding to the .SMM file, I don't know. Something easier would be appreciated of course.

Thanks in advance.

[Guy N'wah]

Bummer.

Undeleting a deleted file almost always fails, no matter what utility you tried to use. If the game says the file was corrupted, it was not successfully undeleted.

There is no separate .SMM file that needs to be restored. The problem is more likely that the recovered file is too corrupt to recover the .SMM file from it.

On Windows, delete and empty trash makes that file gone forever. Windows will almost immediately overwrite recently deleted files with new scribblings, making recovery impossible.

[OniShingo]

Guy N said:

Bummer.

Undeleting a deleted file almost always fails, no matter what utility you tried to use. If the game says the file was corrupted, it was not successfully undeleted.

There is no separate .SMM file that needs to be restored. The problem is more likely that the recovered file is too corrupt to recover the .SMM file from it.

On Windows, delete and empty trash makes that file gone forever. Windows will almost immediately overwrite recently deleted files with new scribblings, making recovery impossible. ›››

That could be the case, I know, but I'd like to at least try to recover it as I'm not really in the mood for starting over. When I try to edit it with the save editor, the number on the .SMM file missing changes depending on the number i put on the name of the save file. If i rename it as "000139" it tells me that "save_000139.smm is missing" and so on.

Maybe finding a way to unpack the save without opening it with the editor could help rebuild a working save, if there is a way that is.

[*Tommy*]

As another alternative to starting over you could ask for a save file that someone might have. You would need to say approximately where you are in the game. And the major choices you have made thus far.

[Corylea]

OniShingo said:

Maybe finding a way to unpack the save without opening it with the editor could help rebuild a working save, if there is a way that is. ›››

If you use the saved game editor to not just OPEN your saved game but to UNPACK it, you'll see that the unpacked saved game includes a large number of files, including every quest in the game, the location files of the places you've been to, and that .smm file. If you look at the contents of the .smm file with something like Notepad++, you'll see that it contains all of the journal entries that you've gotten in that particular game.

The game uses journal entries not just to give you information but also to control the quests; a lot of quests begin, update, or complete upon receipt of a particular journal entry.

So the .smm file is not some unimportant thing that you can do without, nor is it something you can successfully fudge. If you don't have the right one inside your saved game, most of your quests will be too messed up for your game to work.

I think Tommy has the right idea; you need to ask for someone else's saved game, if you can't stomach the thought of restarting from one of the saved games you do have. I have a bunch of saved games available for download here. Or you could post where you are and what you've done and see if anybody has anything closer.

Below is a screenshot of an unpacked saved game; you can see that it does include a .smm file:

[OniShingo]

Thanks for the quick reply.

Yes, I've been checking an unpacked save file and it indeed contains a whole lot of stuff, that's what basically made me drop the idea of making a "franken-save" if you know what I mean. I thought the game saved in a more straightforward way, looks like I was wrong.


Anyway, Tommy's right and I came up with the idea of using someone else's save like he suggested right after making this thread (which brought me to Corylea's Saved Game Bank). Got the one called "Chapter 2 Ready for Golem" if I recall correctly, which was pretty close to the point I've reached in my game. However being TW a non-linear game, with many quests, choices and such, I didn't feel like that playthrough was "mine", also because some quests were completed in a different way and I had equipped some rings I hadn't encountered yet.

This is why I decided to start again from my last working save, helping myself with some editing to skip the "chore" missions (bring me 10 pieces of this and that) and hopefully catching up fast, because the game just rocks.

Thank you guys for helping me decide!