I played for a few hours offline. Then I went online and launched the game, only to see the game reset to the default start, 700 coins, unexplored map and all. I tried launching it offline again and it loaded my old save. Okay, I thought, so it has two savegames depending on whether you're online or not. But just now I launched it again, with internet. and it has reset *some* of my progress. Skill points are reset, and I have 700 coins. But the map is how I left it, and so is my ship's position.

My point is, if you're gonna force ironman rules on the player with only one save slot and no manual saves, make damn sure there's no chance of losing progress due to glitchiness or whatever else caused this. How can I avoid this happening again?

I may be wrong but the game depends on Galaxy for online play and strictly enforce the cloud save of the client at the moment you go online (pretty much how Steam does also). That means it create a new save game exclusively for Galaxy on the network and afterward it loads that save whenever you have Galaxy running. The Steam version and the GOG as well capable of running without the client and the older version of Steam's Tempest was able to connect without Steam client.

Start the game through the non-Galaxy executable and see if it helps. Also there should be a backup save right next to the active save slot in the appdata folder. Try to revert back to that.

Your frustration is the general 50% of the game's user score. Including me a lot of players complained about the lack of manual saving feature.

As this game doesn't offer really any manual save I used an old trick:

Go into your save folder (for me: C:\Users\YOURUSERNAME\AppData\LocalLow\LionsShade\Tempest\default)

And in between I am just saving manually the .save files into a zip file.

Every time you visit a city the game is saving (same if you exit), so all what you have to do, is alt+tab go to the folder and add to zip file.

This way you can be sure that no cloud save or similar will ever screw again with your offline mode ;)

Is there a way to prevent the game from even connecting online? I only want to play offline and have also lost a lengthy save like the OP.

What's even more frustrating, is I installed this game without Galaxy. I don't want to use Galaxy, nor do I wish to use any online features when playing single player games.

If there's no solution, this is probably going to be my first ever GoG refund request.

Don't know what you did, but I am playing all the time offline.

I admit, I haven't found the online play/functionality yet :D

I just installed the non-Galaxy version of Tempest. I do not own or installed (yet) the expansion/DLC.

And no, I do not see any online-activity on my network for this game.

This is what baffles me. I can see in the bottom right of the game screen there's an online connection area, but I haven't used it. I've tried three games since my earlier post, and never once has my progress saved. It's rendered the game utterly pointless for me. :(

Yeah, the current offline-online playing is a mess as well the saving system has flows for sure. If I doesn't backup my save I had to restart the game at least 4 times. I don't know what is the developers problem with a separate offline and online playing and why such a small game enforces a client for playing online. There is also no option for LAN. I'm enjoying the game alone but it not worth more than $5 (with the expansion).

okay....that baffles me in the moment, I heard,saw some games mentioning it.....yet I don't see it at all, so I assumed they used steam version.

What did you do to get it? (kind of intrigued why the difference)

As indicated I did not use Galaxy but used the good old GOGdownloader, installed and have never seen off online at all.

Unless it might have to do with the DLC/expansion....

For me I had only one crash till now and even this did not even screw up it did save prior, so I did not loose anything at all (even without my zip-files)

Running on Win8.1 directx 9.0c and directplay installed....

And for the saves, playing a bit around with 7zip....and good old batchfiles....once I figured out the command-line options I keep you posted......(want to create a format where it would backup the files while auto-numbering the zip-files)

EDIT: Any of you guys running Galaxy while playing Tempest? I don't.....so maybe it is not Tempest being the problem but rather Galaxy (again....)
I did see at least once a similar problem with (IIRC) The Witcher 3 being reported....

I tried completely uninstalling the game from my system, and reinstalling, all without any Galaxy involvement as before, still the same.

As such, I've wiped this broken mess off my system and give up. I've got better things to do that waste any more time on Tempest, as I've already wasted money on it.

strange.....

your reaction is understandable though......
maybe I can persuade you too a last attempt?
What happens if you start the game with the option: run as administrator? (directly right click on the exe)
(afterthought when I was about to post......) or is your antivirus lingering here into it?

As it doesn't save at all.....it might involve read/write permissions.....
And the path were it saves.....it's kind of protected....

I don't want to taunt you ;), but I really enjoy the game, so worth a last shot?

Indeed it is.

The installation and game had admin rights set (I have Win7 Pro), and there were no flags, problems, false positives, or anything blocked with my AV (Avira), so the only issue is the online connection the game starts every time it's launched.

I shouldn't have to fart around with my internet connection, or unplug it, just to play "offline" rather than the game connecting "online" when I want to play. It's just as bad as DRM and I'm surprised GoG allowed it.

Clearly this save issue isn't isolated, looking at the OP who started this thread, and in other forums I've read through.

For now, it'll stay off my system until there's an update on GoG patching the issue, or adding multiple "offline" save slots, or at least a settings option to disable "online" features and connectivity for the game.

Sadly, I just don't have the time to mess around with game files and attempt workarounds, as you have, Goodaltgamer

When I kick back and relax with some gaming entertainment, I'd just like it to work as intended. If I spend a couple of hours playing Tempest, I'd like to keep my progress. Not lose it every time and have to restart from scratch, because it then makes me feel I've wasted good time I could have spent playing another game that actually works.

I do appreciate your interest as a fellow gamer, but lately it just seems that indie productions released on GoG just aren't as well supported as elsewhere, if at all. It's not the first indie game I've had problems with, which has taken many months to resolve, or has never been resolved, and the problems are always due to a poorly released product.

It just seems to be a very mixed bag with indie games releases here. Some have been completely (or almost) flawless releases that put leading developers to shame, whilst others are utterly broken and simply not fit for sale. When the latter happens, it's hugely frustrating and I'm always tempted to seek a refund from GoG, although I never do in the end. But I do wish they would push these indie developers to provide a cleaner product, and to support them better on the GoG platform.

For most of your parts I do agree, if I pay for something I expect a working game.

But, unfortunate not all Hardware/software are always available for testing for the (good) devs. So sometimes some people will (always) encounter problems.

For time and messing around ;)

Call it experience from the old days before a lot of the features were getting common :D
And helping fellow gamers is at least for me normal ;)

The funny thing for me still is, that I do not get this online circle thing at all, I was tempted (pun intended ;) ) to try online :D

For the patch problem, unfortunate far too true, but also in general.......Hence why I do not support early access or similar. I don't like the idea of being a paying alpha-tester.

>>IF<< I ever find out how to go online, I might post about it :D (and my computer is connected, so not being offline)

Well, giving the game a try once more after some time with it forgotten, I did a little experiment.

Using the classic installer version, Tempest persists with save problems for me. It resets the map and upon loading the game, I have to enter my name and start from scratch.

However, using the Galaxy installer, and using that to play the game, saves work every time and there are zero problems.

Personally, I'm not a fan of Galaxy or any such 'online' method of managing the installation and activation of games, but in this case, it worked.

Perhaps GoG should take another look at the classic installer version, and what appears to be a need to use Galaxy for the game to function properly?

Yeah, I gathered that. Just a huge shame it won't save offline.