Rpg Maker Developers Group

Edit / TL;DR: Solved! The problem was MrTS_MonsterBook registering unnecessary information. @Mac15001900 provided a fix and I suggested how to deal with existing saves, Mac15001900 optimized my approach.

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Hello, everyone!
Thanks in advance for any help provided.

I have had this project for some years now. During playtime on Steam, though, I've noticed that as I progress in the game, it takes longer to save and load my files, and sometimes even load a new scene. This usually starts getting noticeable midgame+, after the game has been saved over a hundred times, lots of switches and variables have been registered, and playtime is over 20 hours. During the late-game phase, the save/load time increases, and there have been times when it took over 30 seconds to load or save the game, which can be annoying for players. I've tested that on multiple computers and a friend has reported the same issue, so it probably affects even more players.

I had larger save files in the past, but the one I'm currently using to test the issue has over 40 hours of gameplay. I've saved the game 243x and the file is a little smaller than 7MB.

Other than that, the gameplay looks fluid and players haven't reported lag or other delays.

I use YEP_SaveCore 1.06 and YEP_Autosave. I've just tried deactivating them, but it still takes the same amount of time to load and save. I'd hoped OrangeAntiLag could solve the issue, but it didn't. Other threads on the same topic haven't helped me either.

I know this issue might only affect a minority of players who save hundreds of times and progress a lot into the game, but since I'm not the only one affected anymore, I'd like to find a fix for it. Is there a way to reduce save/load time or avoid its increase throughout gameplay?

Extra information:
- audio and image files have been compressed
- most unnecessary files have been removed
- offering 20 or 200 maximum save files, it's the same
- the game has 3300 switches and 1500 variables
- this problem also happens when playtesting, so it's probably not Steam's fault
- the game is available on Windows only

I can provide any other information and Steam keys if necessary.

Here is a list of the plugins I use in the game: