According to this from Steam, if you read the page in the game with Ethan's story, or as someone else mentioned, re-watching a murder.....it triggers a Save.
http://steamcommunity.com/app/258520/discussions/0/616189106477566461/

"Update 1: for easier traveling, we have added additional auto-saves that happen every time the player re-watches a murder (skippable, btw) or simply reads the page with Ethan's story."

Phew !! Even though I'm glad of them, I think I'm going to wait and see if any more patches/updates are going to be offered before I download this third one !!

Hi,

I finished The Vanishing of Ethan Carter last night. It took me 6 nights using 1+ hour each night.

I played it with Patch #2. Noticed yesterday there is also Patch #3 available but while I feared it could have some affect to my latest auto-save, I did not install it until I had finished the game.

Don't be afraid to start playing the game because of lack of manual saving system, you don't even need any tricks mentioned on glitches section here for auto-saving. Usually half an hour is enough to solve one puzzle and auto-save. In 1+ hour I could usually finish 2 or 3 puzzles ending to an auto-save. And I often used much time taking a look around at that beautiful scenery.

My opinion is that this game is best when played in dark and using headphones to fully concentrate and adapt to the story.

The game could have had lenght twice or three times it actually had but this promises good for the decelopment team, I hope we soon hear more from The Astronauts.

Timo

Thanks TJL, I was thinking of starting it tonight and it's good to know it's doable.

I did download the 3rd patch and it didn't mess up any of my previous auto-saves. Although I still don't like not being able to save manually and would have even relished an auto save upon exit, they definitely listened to the players and added a much more reasonable auto save feature. I still had to play longer than I wanted to a couple of times and Thursday night when I had to leave to go bowling, I left the game open on my screen so I wouldn't have to start over from my old auto save when I got home. Since their goal was to make the game as completely immersive as possible, they defeated that goal for those of us who can't sit down and play for hours at a stretch with the auto save feature.

But it's definitely doable and the general concept of HOW they did the game from the story to clues and solving the murders is something new and different. None of the same old tricks we've become so accustomed to. I agree with TJL - the game could easily have had the story fleshed out with more puzzles and aspects of the story to solve and been twice or three times as long and kept me complete engaged.

I look forward to more from The Astronauts. However flawed, Ethan Carter was a great first effort.

Thanks Drac! I will need to research how to most effectively save before I start playing.

How do I download the latest patch---I am new to all this stuff.

Doreen

Where did you buy the game?

I got it from steam.

Doreen

I am not that experienced with Steam, but I believe that Steam automatically updates your game as patches are released. If I am wrong about this, hopefully someone else will let me know.

Marian,

That is my experience with Steam. Auto update is done if that is selected in the properties of the game.
- Right click the name of the game that is installed.
- Select properties at bottom of drop down menu.
- Select "update" tab.
- select auto update.

Thanks, MaG.

Mine updated automatically when I started Steam.

What have you found as your best way to "manually save" BrownEyedTigre

I am still hanging fire until someone reports that what they have done to save when they want to save has actually worked !!

I never got around to starting it yet Mad. I played a couple Ipad adventures instead.

Drat !! And there was I, relying on you for answers !!

Mad, you can't quite save when you want to - nor did they provide a nice auto-save on exit. But they provided more frequent auto-saves and the ability to trigger another auto-save by replaying certain parts. It's not perfect, but it's doable. The game really is worth this aggravation...

"and the ability to trigger another auto-save by replaying certain parts "

So are these "certain parts" that have to be replayed plentiful enough that one will not be too far back from where a person might be wanting to save and quit ??

[Sorry, Draclvr. That sounds really badly put but I can't think of a better way to ask the question !! ]

Just start playing it! You use more more time discussing about it's save system than it takes to play the game through!

It's perfectly doable as it is at the moment, I felt it cought a saving point "all the time" after patch #2.

Timo

Yes, I'm aware that improvements have been made to the save facility but my playing time is precious and doesn't always extend to the two hours at a time or so that some people were originally having to play before the game made an auto-save

So I'm making sure that when I DO play the game I won't find myself having to re-play a whole session because a save might not have been made

That's my situation too, Mad. If I have an hour, that's stretching it. But after the improvements they made, even I could play without too much trouble. After the 3rd patch, I think I only had one time that I left the game open when I had to go bowling so I wouldn't have to play that part again. I was in the middle of solving the murder in the graveyard.

I agree with TJL... just start playing and you'll be OK.

Well, for now the Adventure I've started is the new Sherlock.
But maybe I'll go for The Vanishing next - seeing as the saving is so improved !!

Thanks

I just started playing after three days and played for about a hour. Went into some houses and went to different places. More than a hour I played and quit the game. Began playing again and started at the same place I started a hour ago. The saves aren't working for me. Back to Sherlock.
Richard

If you have correctly installed Patch #2 or #3 I bet it works for you and everybody else. But simply wandering around doesn't launch any save, you have to solve a murder or read a note Ethan has left. Revisiting a solved murder scene and clicking the corpse or re-reading Ethan's note also launches an auto-save. You can use this feature to force a 'manual' save if you haven't solved or found anything new to launch an auto-save during your current session. But until you have solved at least something it may be a bit hard. But that shouldn't be a problem really.

Timo

How do you force a manual save. I haven't heard of it. I installed the patches.
Richard