How to fix Elden Ring and Shadow Of The Erdtree Corrupted save files

The Lands Between and the Land of Shadow from Elden Ring: Shadow Of The Erdtree are filled with treachery, but none of it is meant to cause permadeath. That horrible fate can only be brought about by corrupted save files that won’t let players resume their playthroughs — but it’s usually fixable.

One of the staples of Souls games is ditching a save game option in favor of a system that automatically records all manner of progression. It works great for the most part, but there’s a good reason why it recommends you close it properly via the menu. Any issue that causes your game to crash or PC to reset midgame can cause the save file to become corrupted as the game didn’t save and close properly. At some point, even hackers could ruin your saves:

Nowadays, if any issue causes your save file to no longer be recognized by the game, you’ll come across one of the following messages:

I first came across the problem for the first time a few years back while playing Sekiro after a thunderstorm caused the lights to go out. It immediately made me think I’d lost over ten hours of progress. Luckily, I was mistaken, but the process was much more complex and way less automated back then. The modern save fixing process might look a bit daunting at first, but it’s actually pretty simple and effective if you follow all the steps correctly.

How to fix saves on Elden Ring

It’s always a good idea to try Steam’s automatic file repair. You do that by clicking on Elden Ring on your Steam Library, hit Properties, pick Local files, and then hit Verify Integrity of game files. Once the process is complete, restart Steam, re-open Elden Ring, and see if this has fixed your problem. If it has, then you’re set. In the more likely case that it hasn’t, we have to do perform manual save file maintenance.

First off, we’ll need to locate your save files. The saves are in C:\Users\(your name)\AppData\Roaming\EldenRing. You’ll find them inside the numbered folder.

• Cut the .SL2 file and set it aside in a new separate folder.
• Rename the .back file just by deleting the “.bak” part of the name. This will cause the existing backup to become the de-facto save file.
• Turn off Steam Cloud saves. You do it by selecting Elden Ring in your Steam Library, going to properties, then in the General Tab you will set keeping game saves in the steam cloud to OFF.

Merely deleting or replacing the corrupted save file with the backup will do nothing if Steam Cloud is on because the game will immediately re-download the corrupted file and overwrite the functioning save with the bad data. I advise you have Steam Cloud off no matter what, as it’s already a likely cause for this type of issue.

• See if this solves the problem. If it does, then delete the old .sl2 file you’ve set aside and enjoy the game.
• If not, then add .bak to the end of the new file, and bring the old .sl2 file back to the folder.

Since the problem persists, we’ll have to tinker with the save files themselves. Download ER Save Repair utility here.

• Make sure you already have the original .sl2 save file set aside. Back it up if you don’t.
• Launch the Save Repair program (ERSR)
• Enter your Steam ID (It’s the big number on the folder containing the saves)
• Select the file you wish to repair.
• Select the number of save slots, in case it has more than one.
• Press Run. Don’t use your mouse or keyboard during the process, as the creator of this app warns that it will interrupt the process.

This process doesn’t have a 100% success rate, but it remains the best, simplest, and safest way to remove the corruption from your Elden Ring save files.