My Partner had a few characters.. his sneaky murderer and several others. By accident he has deleted most, he still has his main but deleted a mage lvl 42 and another of about 18. he has tried to get the files back but cannot unless he pays !
So I want to know how not to do it, is there some way that the saves can have chars name or be in a different colour font? so when I tidy my saves I don't delete characters. I am on a laptop so need to know how it can be done on a pc

I haven't seen the pc save files but on Xbox they do have name, time, place and a picture.

And why can't he get them back unless he pays? Pay who? For what?

Deleted files are not actually deleted, so people who know what are they doing can dig em out.

Abotu the OP, save file has a name and place where you saved even in the folder, but if that's not enough you can actually delete saves in-game by hitting X while you're looking at a save. (if you're on PC that is, but I'm sure both consoles have an option too)

Edit .. i thought you wanna restore deleted files .. lol anyway :q

Take note of the which save files you want to keep; Open a new folder someplace separate to the game, such as in your desktop folder on your laptop's hard drive, and give it an obvious name, such as 'Skyrim character saves'; Then, transfer the specific skyrim save files you want to keep into that folder. If and when you want to go back to that character, just transfer or copy the relevant save file back into your Skyrim save game folder and open it through the load/save menu in-game.

Skyrim has a finite limit to the number of actual save game files that it can process or hold, I think the limit is around 2000. You won't know anything about it until you go to open your latest save and find out that known of your saves past the limit actually saved...note that this is actual 'existing files', not the save file number.

On a PC, just open the console and type

Save "Whatever you want to call it"

You can then title your save games. Normally this is standard procedure for games written for platforms with a keyboard. However, Skryim was not.

^ This

BTW - MORROWIND allowed you to name your saves without the console.
Who's idea was it to remove that feature?

Do what Falmer said. You could also take it one step further and get a http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=15. Make profiles for you and your partner.

If your friend is on the PC, open up the Recycle Bin, his deleted games should be there - unless he set the recycle bin to empty immediately. Just high-light them, if they're there, and copy back into the saved games folder. Unless it's been too long and those save game numbers have been reused.

Good luck.

thanks for that .. the console command is good .. it gives me what i wanted, to tell if it was a character or a save I could delete. His deletes are gone for good, they do not go to recycle bin. and the webby that said they could find them cost 40$ ! so he is making a new mage

Somebody posted this a while back, but I have not tested it. Plus it should work on the consoles.

Put a comma in the character name at Chargen. That will list the saves by name of the character.

I don't remember the exact syntax the guy posted but it was something like

Norma, Mailer

Now, I don't remember if they are listed by Norma or Mailer. So, once you figure out what shows up in the list, then you can name your character's appropriately. If this works.

Here I found the thread where it explains this

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1337420-how-do-you-make-the-save-files-use-your-characters-name-on-consoles/

I just create a folder in the save folder for each character and throw the latest save of the character I want to play in to the save folder. It's a bit more hassle, but has worked for me so far and haven't had any issue with looking for a particular saves or overwritting another save. Gee i wish the save files were smaller.

Good find. I'll have to show that to my brother and his family who play on the 360. Thanks for the link.

Here is the post in particular that explains the comma thing