Protecting Your Save Data

Your game saves represent hours of gameplay. Here’s how to protect them from battery death, corruption, and accidents.

The three layers of protection

1. Save Vault (automatic)

Playback automatically backs up your saves to the Vault:

• Saves every 5 minutes during gameplay (if changed)
• Saves when you exit a game
• Keeps up to 250 backups per game
• Stored on your computer, not the cartridge

This happens automatically with no configuration needed.

2. Autosave to Cartridge

When enabled, Playback writes saves to your cartridge whenever the game saves:

1. Go to Settings > Playback
2. Enable Autosave to Cartridge

This ensures your cartridge always has your latest progress, just like playing on original hardware.

3. Manual backups

For extra safety, create manual backups:

1. Go to the Data tab
2. Click Backup Save
3. Save the file to a safe location

Consider keeping copies in:

• A cloud storage folder (Dropbox, Google Drive, iCloud)
• An external hard drive
• A different computer

When to be extra careful

Before replacing a cartridge battery

Cartridge batteries eventually die. Before replacing one:

1. Back up your save with Playback
2. Store the backup in a safe location
3. Replace the battery
4. Restore your save using Upload Save

When using reproduction cartridges

Reproduction cartridges often have unreliable saves. For these games:

1. Disable Autosave to Cartridge (to avoid corrupting the cartridge)
2. Rely on the Vault for your backups
3. Back up manually after major progress

See Rewritable Cartridge Save Issues for more details.

Before using cheat codes

Cheats can corrupt save data. Before using cheats:

1. Disable Autosave to Cartridge
2. Create a manual backup
3. Use cheats
4. If something goes wrong, restore from your backup

See Cheat Codes for more details.

Recovering lost saves

Even if something goes wrong, the Vault has your back. Here’s how to recover from common scenarios:

Cartridge battery died

Your save is gone from the cartridge, but not from the Vault:

1. Open the Vault folder for your game
2. Find your most recent backup
3. Replace the battery in your cartridge
4. Use Upload Save to restore

Save lost while playing on original hardware

If your save was lost or corrupted while playing on an original console (power loss, cartridge bumped, etc.), you can recover it:

1. Insert the cartridge into your Operator
2. Open the Vault folder for your game
3. Find a backup from your last Playback session
4. Use Upload Save to restore

As long as you’ve played the game through Playback before, you’ll have Vault backups to recover from.

Accidentally overwrote a save

1. Open the Vault folder for your game
2. Find a backup from before the overwrite
3. Use Upload Save to restore it

Save data appears corrupted

If a game reports corrupted save data:

1. Try cleaning the cartridge contacts (often fixes read errors)
2. If the issue persists, check the Vault for a working backup
3. Use Upload Save to restore

Vault folder locations

Tips

• The Vault is your safety net. It’s always working in the background
• Manual backups to cloud storage add an extra layer of protection
• Check your cartridge batteries periodically, especially for old games
• Clean cartridge contacts regularly to prevent read/write errors