sorry for the question, especially since I didn't read carefully, and when I did read, it wasn't clear.
Is there a way to convert your own old savegame file somehow? I mean, the special treatment of special characters can't be the reason for such a huge problem. A huge problem for me is playing such a great game again without any new changes to the existing gameplay.
So if it's some kind of problem with ISO-8859 and UTF-8. I think that can be solved. But if the paths, decisions and values are somehow stored differently in the substructure, then it's only honest to communicate it that way. And I think that can also be solved. If the developers don't want to do this because - well - they'd rather develop the game, then I can understand that, but please communicate it that way.
For my part, I would much rather convert
my old save file than play the great game again. I could accidentally learn something by doing this instead of “wasting time” with fast forwarding. And since it's not a RenPy game, there's no fast forward. I'm sure there are some people in the community who feel the same way and, like me, haven't started the game or, even worse, are using some savegame with characters “used” by others.
The following lines are only intended as a source of inspiration to the developers and not to endorse any
other game here. UE5 is also used there and the scenes are static during the dialogues. But they are not pre-rendered. Instead generated directly by the engine. The characters are static. The scene is perfectly staged. The facial expressions and gestures are preserved. Just like the static, prerendered images in this game. However, the direct generation by the game engine brings the scene to life even more than a static image. Dust particles, flickering candles, waves, reflections and everything else that we experience in the free-moving scenes in this game is conjured up in real time by the game engine. The size of the game is also considerably smaller, as there are no pre-rendered scenes. Wouldn't that be something to consider in game development? Even more vivid scenes would be realised which, although static, could be viewed from all sides.
Does this game use different models and workflows for the static and free-moving scenes? Can't it be simplified? Don't the developers want to simplify it? Look, there is already a (first) scene on the bot or so many scenes on the island that realise the “encounters” in exactly the same way as the example I gave earlier.
Thanks in advance for any answers, comments and remarks.