Error saving Spyro in psxfin 1.13

[AgoustBolchz]

I'm new to this so I sincerely apologize in advance if I do something unappropriate, and would be thankful for any advice if I'm mistaken with anything.

I wanted to transfer save games from pSX to ePSXe. I've been playing all my games with save states so the process was: loading one, saving in memory card and moving the memcard file to ePSXe folder. That worked with all but Spyro. When I try to save, it states "no save file, restart with a memory card", as depicted in the photo attached. I thought, "I open the game from scratch, save a new game with 0.1% done, load the save state and overwrite that one. Easy". But no, I save the new game and, when I open the save state and try to save, again it says I should restart with a memory card.

Already checked with Memcardrex's latest version and the newly created memory card is there with only the 0.1% Spyro save file... so why when I load the state the emulator "forgets" that there's a memory card connected? Can't figure out the uniqueness of this game since all the others worked out fine. Any help is much appreciated.

[Warrior]

If that is spyro 3 its copy protection and your save data bit the dust because of it.

pSXfin and epsxe are inferior to RetroArch, I highly suggest you study that over the competition.

[AgoustBolchz]

Hi Warrior, thanks for the quick answer. It is Spyro the Dragon, the first one. What is that copy protection you spoke of? Do you know if the first installment of Spyro also had it?

I tried Retroarch but I didn't like it much. Thanks for the recommendation anyway.

[daky]

That copy protection is the infamous anti-piracy thing related to the third Spyro game. To put it shortly, if you owned a pirated copy of the game, that protection would make it act weird; the number of the eggs you found would decrease, the unlocked characters would become locked again, the game would randomly change the language, etc. Luckily, nowadays you can find a normal ROM of the game and 100% it without any trouble. I personally did this this January, so I can confirm that. As far as I know, the first Spyro game never had such issues.

To (try to) answer your question, have you maybe loaded the state that was saved before you saved your progress on the memcard? It often causes issues with accessing data on it.

[AgoustBolchz]

Hi daky,

Cool, I didn't know about that copy protection of Spyro Year of the Dragon. Thanks for the explanation.

Yes, I needed to transform all those save states into memory card files so I could also open them in ePSXe, so the process was always 1) open the game 2) load a save state 3) save on memory card 4) open it on ePSXe. I could with all my games except Spyro. When I load a save state it forgets there's a memory card connected. Maybe because when I started that game and saved a state I didn't have a memory card connected... but it's weird since the save state shouldn't have any "memcard on/off" data inside. Any clue to how can I bypass it?

[skullpoker]

Save state saves all data on the current game, including memory card, sound, etc. so it can cause a lot of problems later on.

I think at this point, you are just going to have to start your game over on ePSXe or keep playing spyro on PSXFin. Or maybe you can find a saved game file for it close to where you were in the game.

[AgoustBolchz]

Hi skullpoker.

I thought about that at the beginning but then forgot about it as every game I came across managed to save with the memcard connected after loading. There must be something wrong with Spyro I guess... something really specific.

I just searched save games but all are 100% done... I was 55% if no one comes with a possible solution in the next weeks I guess I'll start again

[skullpoker]

It was the fact that you used Save State with no memory card in. That's the whole problem. So if you can get the emulator to load in a memory card after you load state you might be able to save your game and transfer it. But I have no idea if PSXFin can do that since I have not used it.

Even if you have to load a new blank memory card, it's pretty easy to copy your files around in ePSXe when you "run BIOS".

[AgoustBolchz]

Sorry for the delay. PSX allows you to take and insert a memcard during gameplay and it's still poping the same message. Any other solution?

[daky]

Try starting the game from the beginning and see if the emulator will read memcards.

Also, check if the (virtual) memcard is valid and formatted.

[AgoustBolchz]

I tried with both formatted and unformatted memcards, both working with all games except Spyro. The emulator reads the memcard at the beginning. Apparently the game has some sort of "create save file" at the beginning of the game so if you start without a memcard and don't create it, if you insert a memcard later you can't create a save file. BS if you ask me, a huge flaw of the game. Basically, there's no solution, I have to start again since every save game I found online is 100% Thanks for your help anyway guys. Have a nice day.