Ever mis-click and screw up hours of gameplay in a Choice of Games title? Ever see an option and think "I want to know what'd happen if I tried that, but I don't actually want my character to DO it"? Ever just want to hold onto an old character's save for sentimentality's sake? Know how to manually back up saves already, but just sick and tired of trying to organize them, or even remember where the heck Steam saves them? Want to quickly save a copy of your current game state for bug reporting? Well, here's a solution to those issues!

CoGSaver is a small GUI program that allows you to create, name, and load as many saves as you'd like for your Steam/CoG games; and includes quicksave/quickload functionality for those "I wonder what happens if..." moments.

1. First, you'll need to download CoGSaver:
This download[drive.google.com] will provide you with an executable .jar file. If you wish to run it as-is, you will need at least Java 11 installed on your computer. You can download Java here[www.oracle.com]. If you're a security-minded and tech-savy individual, the .jar also includes the CoGSaver source code for you to inspect and compile on your own.

2. On first run, you will need to click 'Select Game' and locate your "storePS...gametitle...PSstate" file: something like storePSnightroadPSstate or storePSwayhaven1PSstate. Figure out where your Steam folder is and look in "\Steam\userdata\<yourSteamId#>\1290270\remote" (for Night Road on Windows.) Click on the storePS___PSstate and click Open. A subfolder will be created in the same folder as your storePS___PSstate to hold your saves. (Linux users: check "~/.steam/root/userdata/<yourSteamId#>/1290270/remote")

3. Pressing 'Quicksave' will copy your current storePS___PSstate file to a file named quicksave.cogsav in the same folder. You can save at any time, whether the game is running or not.

4. Pressing 'Quickload' will copy quicksave.cogsav back to storePS___PSstate, OVERWRITING YOUR CURRENT GAME with the game you previously saved. Note that if you press Quickload while your game is still open, you will see no effect, as your game will overwrite your save one last time upon closing. In order to restore a save, you must exit the game, then load or quickload, and then restart the game. If using Steam's cloud save feature, be aware that after loading a save, you will have to click through the Steam pop-up asking you if you want to use your cloud save or your local save. I recommend disabling cloud save if you are going to be reloading often.

5. Pressing 'Create Save' will open a window pointing by default to the folder that was created in step 1. For many CoG titles, there will be a default save name suggested that includes your character name and current scene name, but this filename can be edited as you wish. If CoGSaver is unable to determine these for a particular title, that does not mean CoGSaver is incompatible with your game - it will still save and load just fine, it just means the author of the game did not use any of the common variables used to store this information, and you'll have to name your files manually if you want to have a descriptive title.

6. Pressing 'Load Save' will open a window pointing by default to the folder that was created in step 2, allowing you to select from your manual saves. Remember, saves cannot be successfully loaded while the game is open.

7. One final warning: There is nothing I or anyone else outside of the publishers can do to ensure that saves will remain compatible with updates to the game. Night Road in particular seems to be extremely bad about releasing save-breaking updates. If your beloved sentimental save gets rolled back, please yell at the publishers, not me. I am as powerless as you in this regard. You can consult another user's Steam guide here for instructions on preventing Night Road from updating, but while this will maintain save compatibility, you will miss out on whatever additions or bug fixes the publishers release.

If you only intend to use this program for Night Road, your job is easy: your Night Road save is located under your Steam directory at: ...\Steam\userdata\<yourSteamID#>\1290270\remote\storePSnightroadPSstate (for Windows users.)

If you wish to use CoGSaver for other games, a simple way to find the folder corresponding to the game is as follows: Open the Steam library tab. Right click on the game you wish to locate and click 'Make desktop shortcut.' Go to your desktop and right click on that shortcut and select 'Properties' and you will find an entry like: steam://rungameid/1290270. Search your Steam folder for that last number (you can see where the corresponding number was in the Night Road filepath up above) and you'll quickly find the game's save folder.

Please understand that I am not a professional or full-time programmer. Every mod or program I have ever created was made for my own use and only uploaded to the internet at wide as a courtesy. While I MAY implement minor feature requests if time and interest permits, I am a full-time student and only a sporadic gamer. That said, all my source code is available and you are welcome to make whatever modifications you desire yourself.

And finally: BLM, Love is love, etc. If you're a bigot of any stripe, CoGSaver isn't for you. To the rest of you: Happy hunting!