DevLog #2: Save file compression

Some time ago, I encountered a bug during development, that caused RUTHLESS:1 to relentlessly duplicate the mechs in my storage, well above a number a 1000. Obviously, this comes with the unwanted side-effect of bloating the respective savefile. It did not take long until something occured to me: What if someone actually plays so long they have more than 1000 mechs in their storage?

The solution: Compressing save files. This is a scenario where compression is highly efficient, because much data in the savefiles are duplicates. For example, the more mechs of the same type you have, the more compression can do its work. A regular savefile will take up about 90% less disk space after compression. And don't worry, your old savefiles are still compatible, all that happens is that they will be displayed "Legacy Savegame" in the Loading Screen. After loading and saving them again, the will be compressed and display their metadata again, just like before. This feature will be available in the upcoming version 0.5.0.

This is it for now.

Greetings from Berlin

Alex