What is the trick to saving games in the playing of URU?
I have just started trying to play, but cannot seem to save games. The only way to leave the game appears to be to hit the Quit key in the bottom RH corner of the screen, but there has to be some way of saving before doing that.

petert

You'd think so, but you'd be wrong. There is no save feature in Uru. The game stores your progress but you have to retrace your steps to get back to the spot where you were when you quit.
A serious flaw in an otherwise very good game.

Does that mean that I have to go all through the moves I have made so far in order to get going again, or can I go straight to the point where I quit? If I can remember how to get there?

petert

All the changes you made in the game are automatically saved. So if you flipped a switch, then quit the game, when you come back the switch will still be flipped.

If you are still in the Cleft, the game returns you to the Cleft area. If you've gotten to Relto, the game returns you to Relto. If you were in one of the worlds you link to from books in Relto, you return to Relto, then link back to the world you want using the linking books again.

Hope this helps.

Doesn't seem quite so bad as I thought.
So far, after about a couple of hours, I had only got as far as lighting up 3 handprints, and when I quit from that and came back to the game, I had made no progress at all, perhaps because I had not progressed far enough into the game enough.
On restarting,I had gone back right to the beginning (in the desert, facing away from the sign with the handprint on the back), and the light was not glowing on the print.
I will set off again, and keep at it until I leave the desert - into the cleft?

petert

Petert, the game does save what you have done, so you are in good shape. None of the handprints stay lit, but when you press the next one, you will see that four parts of it light up.

As long as you are in the Cleft area, the game will always start you in the same place, near the gate, but everything you've done will still be done...

Thank you for this news. The thought of having to replay all the moves each time of playing seemed pretty stupid to me.
I seem to remember that Myst had some of the same characteristics - it always returned you to the Age, not the specific location though you did have a Save facility there.
Perhaps all of the Myst series are like that?

petert

The annoying thing about Uru is that the instruction manual says that once you touch a journey cloth, you can return to that point if you quit the game and restart. What it doesn't tell you is that you can only do that after you finish the initial desert cleft section. For a while I thought the game was broken because I was always starting back at the sign.

Once you've played through this level, things get better. Zandi will give you hints about where to find the various journey cloths if you want to speed things up.

Success! - well, partial success.

I got as far as Relto, then quit the game, and when I then restarted,I had returned to Relto, and not to the desert.
But you have to admit that this lack of an obvious Save facility is a bit confusing, and the Players Guide really should make this clear. It is an idiosyncrasy compared with most other Adventure games - well, the ones I have tried to date - and a sentence in the booklet to say that Saving is automatic and explaining what it does would not come amiss.

Anyway, thanks to all who helped.
petert

You're make progress,Petert!

From now on, no matter where you are located when you sign off, you will always start in your Relto--but everything that you've done will be saved...