Re-downloaded Spore after several years, why are 3/4 of my creations missing?

[sporeohol]

I've posted about this here before, but I'm not satisfied with my previous answer and am wondering if there is another way to recover lost creations?

One problem I've noticed when recently re-downloading and launching Spore again is that the majority of my adventures specifically are not available. Like they show up on the sporepedia, but they have this red cross-out thingy in the corner as shown. Also I seem to have just downright lost 3/4 of my creations completely, going from roughly 4000 to 856.

I know there probably isn't a way to recover the creations that are completely lost as they aren't even viewable on spore.com, but is there at least a way to rescue my old adventures without having to re-publish them and erase all the history behind them? Thanks!

[Kyle_Necrowolf · Accepted solution]

The spore server will purge creations (assets) that have not been interacted with in a long time.

Usually the only way to get them back is if you have the PNG files or the game's saved data.

That being said, I checked the server and it seems you have 826 assets that have not been purged, but I can find 1706 assets total, so there are 880 assets that have not been fully deleted yet. I'm not really sure why this happened, but, if you use the Spore.com search feature, it will list all 1706 results. They will however be invisible in the results page, appearing as a blank space. If you are familiar with browser dev tools, you can use this to unhide them - but I'll see if there's an easier method. EDIT: Seems like this doesn't work in most cases. I can definitely see the creations are still on the server though, so just need to find a way to get them out.

As for the adventure, that means the assets used in the adventure have been deleted/purged/banned. No way to fix that besides editing and reuploading the adventure, with working versions of the assets.

[Kyle_Necrowolf · Accepted solution]

The spore server will purge creations (assets) that have not been interacted with in a long time.

Usually the only way to get them back is if you have the PNG files or the game's saved data.

That being said, I checked the server and it seems you have 826 assets that have not been purged, but I can find 1706 assets total, so there are 880 assets that have not been fully deleted yet. I'm not really sure why this happened, but, if you use the Spore.com search feature, it will list all 1706 results. They will however be invisible in the results page, appearing as a blank space. If you are familiar with browser dev tools, you can use this to unhide them - but I'll see if there's an easier method. EDIT: Seems like this doesn't work in most cases. I can definitely see the creations are still on the server though, so just need to find a way to get them out.

As for the adventure, that means the assets used in the adventure have been deleted/purged/banned. No way to fix that besides editing and reuploading the adventure, with working versions of the assets.

[sporeohol]

Hey! Thanks for taking your time to check all of this out. I do have a bunch of old HDDs that may have some old save game/asset data on them. I'll check just to make sure they're there and maybe figure out if there's some way to import the data onto my newer HDD. I have no idea if that will work but it's worth a shot. If nothing else I guess re uploading them is still better than losing them forever

[sporeohol]

UPDATE: I managed to find a whole crap load of old spore stuff on an old HDD from 2013. I compared both the Origin Games > Spore folders from my current HDD and the old HDD and it looks like the folder on the old HDD has waaaaay more files and shiz on it than what's in my new folder. Idk though if I can just simply copy the missing files from my old folder into my new folder or if that would somehow corrupt/overwrite my files or potentially even completely brick my game... I'm not a very tech savvy  person if  you couldn't tell lol. So I'm gonna leave it for now until I know exactly what to do.

[Kyle_Necrowolf]

@sporeohol Check the My Spore Creations folder in Documents on the old HDD, if you have that. If so, you can drag the PNG image files directly into the game on the new computer.

Any other creations are located at C:\Users\your_name\AppData\Roaming\Spore in a file called EditorSaves.package. You cannot merge or move this file without removing everything in your new game, but you can open it and get the PNGs. To do this, you will need a tool called SporeModder FX https://emd4600.github.io/SporeModder-FX/ - use the Unpack Mod/DBPF option, and choose the EditorSaves file. Go through the folders and you will find the PNGs for your creations, once again you can just drag these into the game.