REDsave design

Draft 1, 2026-11-03. REDsave is a VS Code extension that looks after Cyberpunk 2077’s save games. It has three parts:

Nothing in REDsave changes the game’s files. It reads saves, moves save folders and, for titles, may write a save’s metadata (decided after the S3 spike).

The game’s save folder

Steam, GOG and Epic copies of the game all save to %USERPROFILE%\Saved Games\CD Projekt Red\Cyberpunk 2077\ (setting redsave.savesPath for another). Seen on the dev PC on 2026-11-03, game 2.5:

Each save folder holds:

What the metadata says

From metadata.9.json of a game 2.5 autosave (Data.metadata). Every field here can be indexed; the third column says how REDsave uses it.

The fields’ names are as the game writes them in 2.5; older saves (metadata 8 and below) may lack some, and REDsave shows those as unknown, never as false. Unverified: which fields older formats have.

Names for LocKeys

trackedQuest, mainQuest and locationName are LocKeys. REDbridge turns them into the words the player sees, from their own copy of the game: on 2026-11-03 REDcode’s loc_get (through REDbridge) gave LocKey#98600 “Clampdown”, LocKey#9860 “Nocturne Op55N1”, LocKey#10963 “Little China”. So:

• REDsave finds REDbridge where REDnode, EDGEdeck or REDcode put it (REDnode’s packages/overlay/redbridge.js has the lookup), and asks it for the names of the keys its saves use.
• The names are kept in REDsave’s own storage on the player’s PC, never committed or shipped (game data).
• Without REDbridge, the title is the quest’s id made readable (mq062_clampdown as “mq062 clampdown”) and the place is left out. Search still works on everything else.
• The language: English first (en-us). The game’s language later (unverified how REDbridge reads other languages’ files).

Find (S1)

A Saves page (a webview) and the Saves view in REDsave’s side bar.

The index: one pass over the save folders reads each metadata file (about 6 MB in all for 970 saves) and keeps the result in REDsave’s global storage, keyed by folder, the metadata file’s time and its size, so later starts read only what changed. A file watcher on the save folder picks up new saves while the game runs. Pictures are shown from the save folder itself (the webview’s local resource roots), not copied. Measured on the dev PC on 2026-11-03: the first pass over 970 saves takes 384 ms, a start from the cache 196 ms.

S1: built

Built on 2026-11-03; passed the owner’s hand test the same day (REDsave 0.0.4, all 14 steps; Tests, “S1 Find”). REDsave 0.0.5 adds the owner’s suggestion from it: the examples in Search help are clickable, each one filling the box and searching.

The filters as built: lifepath: (corpo, nomad, streetkid), gender: (V’s body, female or male), voice:, difficulty:, kind: (manual, auto, quick, ponr, endgame), playthrough:<number>, version:, pl:, ponr:, modded: (yes or no); ranges level:, cred:, hours:, and the attributes body:, int:, ref:, tech:, cool: (>40, <20, 30-50, 42); date:2026-11, date:>2026-10-01; quest:<id>; fact:<name>=<value>; - before any of them leaves out what matches. Playthroughs are numbered by their first save.

Seen on the dev PC’s 970 saves (2026-11-03, read only):

Saves in loadouts (S2) are indexed the same way, and the page searches across the game’s folder and every loadout, with a chip for where a save is.

Loadouts (S2)

A loadout is a named set of save folders kept in REDsave’s library, outside the game’s save folder. One loadout is “in the game” at a time.

<library>/                          redsave.libraryPath; default %USERPROFILE%\Saved Games\REDsave
  library.json                      the loadouts, which is in the game, the swap journal
  loadouts/<id>/
    loadout.json                    name, notes, created, the playthroughs it holds
    ManualSave-12/                  save folders exactly as the game wrote them
    AutoSave-3/
  titles.json                       the player's titles and notes, by save identity (S3)

The default library is beside the game’s save folder, on the same drive and outside the folder Steam Cloud syncs, so a swap renames folders at once. Another drive works by copying (slower, checked, then the old copy removed).

The loadout in the game keeps its saves in the game’s save folder, where the game reads them; the others keep theirs in the library. So every save is in exactly one place, and moving a save to the loadout in the game puts it in the game’s folder.

Adding saves to a loadout

Saves are picked on the Saves page, which searches across the game’s folder and every loadout (S1). A search or a filter, then Select all (or Ctrl and Shift clicks), gives a selection; the actions work on all of it at once:

Examples: filter Phantom Liberty saves of one playthrough and move them all into the game’s loadout before a run through Dogtown; filter every save from game versions before 2.0 and move them to an “Old saves” loadout; select the results of fact:q112_takemura_dead=0 and move them to a loadout for a mod test.

A move asks once, with the count and where the saves go (“Move 42 saves to Dogtown run? 38 come from the game’s folder, 4 from Old saves”). Moves into or out of the game’s folder follow the swap rules below, so the game must be closed.

Decided with the owner on 2026-11-03: saves are only moved, so each save is in one place. There is no Copy for now; copies, perhaps by hard link, are a research item for later (“Later: copies by hard link”).

Swap rules

1. Never while the game runs. REDsave checks for Cyberpunk2077.exe and refuses.
2. Nothing is deleted. Before a loadout comes in, the save folders in the game’s folder go to the loadout that is in the game, or to a new one named “Saved on " if none is.
3. Only save folders move. The game’s other files in the folder (user.gls, EnabledMods.json, HDRUserSettings.json, steam_autocloud.vdf) stay.
4. A journal. Each move is written to library.json before it is made, so a swap cut short (power off, VS Code closed) finishes or rolls back at the next start.
5. Names that clash. Saves that come into a folder (the game’s or a loadout’s) where a save of the same name already is get the next free number of their kind. Only the folder is renamed: S2b’s hand test (2026-11-03) loaded a save from ManualSave-1555 whose metadata says ManualSave-1554.
6. Undo the last swap or move.

Steam Cloud

The dev PC’s save folder has steam_autocloud.vdf: Steam Cloud syncs it. Checked in S2b’s hand test on 2026-11-03: a save moved out of the folder, the game started through Steam, a new save made, the first save moved back and the game started again: Steam showed no sync error or conflict at any step. What Steam’s cloud copy holds in between (whether it drops a save while it is out) is not checked; the saves themselves are always on the PC, in the game’s folder or REDsave’s library. Until then REDsave says, at the first swap on a PC with Steam Cloud, that the saves are kept in REDsave’s library and Steam’s cloud copy follows the game’s folder. GOG Galaxy’s cloud saves are the same question (unverified).

S2: plan

Proposed on 2026-11-03, to agree with the owner. S2 is the first phase that moves saves, so it is split in two, and S2a is tested on a copy of the save folder before anything touches the real one.

What the player sees

The owner’s approach (2026-11-03): loadouts are children of a Loadouts node in REDsave’s side bar, and clicking one opens a tab for just that loadout, where saves are added to it. Decided the same day: one level of loadouts to start with; folders of loadouts are decided after some testing.

How a move works

1. Checks first, nothing moved yet. A move into or out of the game’s folder is refused while Cyberpunk2077.exe runs (moves between loadouts in the library are allowed). Each source folder must still have sav.dat. The target must have room: on another drive, its free space is checked against the saves’ sizes.
2. The journal. The whole move is written to library.json before the first folder moves: each save’s source, target and state. A folder’s state turns done as soon as it has moved.
3. Each folder. On the same drive, one rename of the whole folder, which Windows does at once and completely or not at all. On another drive, a copy of its files, each checked by size, then the source removed only after the copy checks out.
4. Names that clash. A save coming into a folder that already has one of its name gets the next free number of its kind (ManualSave-12 becomes ManualSave-1001). Only the folder is renamed, and that is enough: checked in the game in S2b’s hand test.
5. After. The index rescans the folders that changed, and the page and side bar update.
6. A move cut short (VS Code closed, power off) is finished at the next start from the journal: a folder still at its source is moved, and a half-made copy on another drive is removed while its source is still whole. Then REDsave says what it finished.

Nothing in S2 deletes a save. Removing a loadout is offered only when it is empty, and Undo moves saves back the same way.

The library

Saved Games\REDsave\               redsave.libraryPath
  library.json                     format, the loadout in the game, the loadouts (id, name, notes,
                                   created), the journal of the last move
  loadouts\<id>\                   a loadout's save folders, exactly as the game wrote them

The index reads each loadout’s folder as it reads the game’s, so search, chips and details work across all of them. A moved save is read again at its new place (6 KB of metadata, so it costs nothing to notice).

Steam Cloud (S2b)

The game’s folder has steam_autocloud.vdf. Before the first swap or move out of the game’s folder on a PC with it, REDsave explains once: the saves are kept in REDsave’s library, and Steam’s cloud copy follows what is in the game’s folder. S2b’s test checks what Steam really does, on the dev PC with one throwaway save: make a manual save, move it out, start the game through Steam, and see whether Steam brings it back, asks about a conflict, or leaves it gone. If Steam brings saves back, swaps would leave copies in the game’s folder (no loss, but not what a swap means), and S2b stops there to agree a fix with the owner.

S2a: built

REDsave 0.0.6, built on 2026-11-03; 0.0.7 fixes what its first hand test found at step 5, 0.0.8 what its second found (see Tests). Passed the owner’s hand test on 2026-11-03 (Tests, “S2a Library and Move”), on the test copy of 60 saves in C:\Users\VYRAL\Saved Games\REDsave-test\saves.

The owner’s hand test (2026-11-03) found that an undo into a removed loadout put its saves back in the folder but not the loadout in the list. REDsave 0.0.8 remembers removed loadouts (removed in library.json, the last 50) and lists again any folder in loadouts\ that holds anything but is not in the list (Library.adopt, at start, after a library change and after every move), with its old name, or one made from its folder’s name, and a note; an empty stray folder is removed.

Checked on 2026-11-03: 29 unit tests (31 with 0.0.8’s); an end-to-end script on a scratch copy of the 60 test saves (13 saves moved by rename in 28 ms, 5 copied to a library on E: in 46 ms and back by undo, a move cut short finished, all 60 saves accounted for); the loadout tab and its picker in headless Chrome.

S2b: built

REDsave 0.0.9, built on 2026-11-03, passed the owner’s hand test the same day (both parts) (Tests, “S2b Swap”): part A on the test copy, part B (Steam Cloud, a renumbered save) in the game with one throwaway save.

Checked on 2026-11-03: 35 unit tests (4 for swaps: empty folders, a swap and its undo, a swap that stops, a swap cut short); an end-to-end script on a scratch copy of the test saves with the game’s own files and three empty save folders (a swap of 60 in 97 ms with none renamed, a save made while a loadout is in staying with it, a swap back, its undo, 61 of 61 saves accounted for).

Decided for S2

Agreed with the owner on 2026-11-03, with the tree and tab approach above:

Later: copies by hard link

A research item, not scheduled (the owner, 2026-11-03: build with Move only, keep this in the notes). A copy of a save in a second loadout could be a set of hard links to the same files, so it takes no extra space, as EDGEdeck deploys mods by hard link.

The first step is a short test with a throwaway save: make a new manual save, link its three files into a test folder, save over it in the game, then check with fsutil hardlink list <file> whether the files are still linked and which version each name shows. If the game writes in place, copies stay real copies (about 6 MB each), or are not offered.

Titles (S3)

The player gives a save a title of their own. REDsave always shows it, searches it and keeps it in titles.json by the save’s identity (playthroughID plus timestampString and playTime), so it follows the save into and out of loadouts.

The owner’s wish (2026-11-03): edit the name a save shows in the game’s load menu, adding text of their own to tell one save from another, such as “Clampdown: Takemura alive” where the menu now says only “Clampdown”. So S3’s title is the quest name plus the player’s text by default, and the whole name can be replaced.

Whether the game’s load menu can show it is open. S3a is a spike to find out, on copies of saves only:

The load list is drawn by LoadListItem (SetMetadata), the save menu by SaveGameMenuGameController, as an earlier experiment in ../SaveTags (redscript with Codeware, January 2026) shows. That folder’s origin and licence are unknown (it calls a NamedSavesEnv it does not define, perhaps from another mod): read it only as a hint of where to look, and ask the owner before reusing any of it.

S3a: the spike, built

REDsave 0.0.11, built on 2026-11-03; the owner’s run in the game the same day chose way A: copy A’s plain-text title showed in Load Game, and every copy loaded and played (Tests, “S3a Title spike”).

What the game’s scripts say (read from the decompiled scripts beside the repos, UI/fullscreen/pregame/loadGameMenu.swift, not copied): Load Game fills each row in LoadListItem.SetMetadata from a SaveMetadataInfo, and its title is SetText(m_label, metadata.trackedQuest). Ink resolves a LocKey given to SetText, so the quest’s name shows in the game’s language; plain text should show as written (unverified). SaveMetadataInfo is a native class with trackedQuest, locationName, internalName and the rest, but no userName. Unknown until the run: whether the game fills it from metadata.9.json or from sav.dat, and whether a save with a changed metadata file still loads.

Checked on 2026-11-03: 39 unit tests; the copies made from a scratch copy of a real save differ from it in one line each, parse, and keep sav.dat the same.

What the run decides:

Copy B tells whether userName shows anywhere (the scripts say no).

S3b: built

REDsave 0.0.12, built on 2026-11-03 with the owner’s agreement to the plan the same day: the save’s own quest kept in its userName, the box starting with the quest’s name and “: “, adding text to several saves at once. Passed the owner’s hand test on 2026-11-04 (Tests, “S3b Titles”).

Limits: a title is plain text, so the quest’s name in it stays in English (REDbridge’s names) whatever the game’s language. Saving over a titled save in the game makes a new save with the game’s title; autosaves and quick saves are overwritten often, so titles on them do not last.

Checked on 2026-11-03: 43 unit tests; on a scratch copy of a real save, a title changed two lines, kept the file’s time, and a reset gave back the game’s file byte for byte.

Phases

Each phase ends with a hand test by the owner.

Decisions and open questions

Decided with the owner on 2026-11-03:

Still open: