If you haven’t already heard, there is a glitch occurring where people are having their rank reset to level 1 and all of their ribbons and medal progress wiped. While this has not personally happened to me, I can imagine how devastating
it would be to lose medals and rank that you worked hard for. I have read nearly every post on this subject in the last couple of days, so I have compiled all the information that I have about this issue in this post. So apologies in advance, but this is going
to be a LONG post (China will want their wall back). I don't work for Epic, so this isn't offical in any way. It's just my personal research on the subject.
This post contains information about:
What to do if you are reset and how to fix it
How and when you can get reset
How to avoid this happening
I have posted this thread in both the main Gears 3 forum and the multiplayer forum as I want the largest amount of people to see and read this as possible. I am not trying to spam the forums, just help people to prevent this problem. Please help me keep this
thread bumped so we can help people avoid this problem.
**MOST IMPORTANTLY IF THIS DOES HAPPEN, DO NOT PLAY ONLINE AT ALL AFTER YOU HAVE BEEN RESET!!!!!**
Many people are starting up a versus match, or horde/beast just to check if the problem will fix itself. However, this then OVERWRITES your old data and you can’t get it back. The most important thing to do if you have been reset is DO NOT PLAY ANYTHING that
would give you xp or cause you to rank up. There is a way to get your levels back as long as you have not started ranking up after getting reset to level 1.
To get your rank back you must DELETE YOUR GAMERTAG from your hard drive/memory stick and then recover it. This will read your data from the Microsoft servers instead of the glitched player data file on your hard drive and restore your rank. If you start playing
ANY games it will overwrite your old player data file which will then be backed up on the Microsoft servers and all your old data will be gone.
Alternatively, SpiderGear was reset offline and only cleared his cache and re-downloaded the Title Update and his rank was restored. You may want to try this first, or even as well as. Perhaps deleting your cache AND recovering your tag will cover all of your
bases.
If you try one of these methods and they work for you, please reply to the thread and let others know. Remember, you can’t have ranked up AT ALL.
If you even THINK that there MIGHT be a chance you have been reset while playing, then BACK OUT immediately to the main menu and check. I will explain the ways you can be reset below so you know what they are. Don’t finish a campaign chapter, or horde match
that you are playing because you will rank up at the end.
**HOW/WHEN THIS HAPPENS AND HOW TO AVOID IT**
There are a couple of different situations where people are running into this glitch, so I will list them all below.
SIGNING A SPLIT-SCREEN PLAYER IN/OUT AT THE PARTY LOBBY SCREEN.
This seems to be the biggest culprit. When you do this, it kicks you back to the main menu and asks you to press start. When you do, one or both players will have been reset to level 1. This can happen both if you sign someone in, or sign them out. I recommend
if you are going to play split screen ONLY SIGN SOMEONE IN/OUT AT THE DASHBOARD. Don’t try to save time by doing it while you are playing.
MOVING YOUR GAMERTAG BUT NOT YOUR PLAYER DATA TO ANOTHER XBOX
People who are playing split-screen should pay particular attention to this. If you are going to play on another console that is not your main one, you should also transfer your PLAYER DATA FILE (it’s inside your Gears 3 save in system memory) to the usb/memory
card as well. It contains your rank, unlocks, medals etc. And keeping them together should prevent any kind of data loss. I think players are having trouble when they sign in at the menu’s with a gamertag on a memory device and the game does not have a player
data file for them so it thinks they are rank 1. I believe if you recover your gamertag instead of transferring it using a usb/memory card then it will read your stats from the Microsoft servers instead, and should create a new player data file for you on
that Xbox. Then this problem should not occur.
TURNING YOUR XBOX OFF INBETWEEN VERSUS MATCHES, OR DURING HORDE, BEAST, OR CAMPAIGN.
A lot of people seems to be having this problem when they turn their Xbox off without backing out of whatever they are playing. In particular, people are turning their Xbox off or dashboarding in-between quick matches. NEVER turn your Xbox off straight after
a versus match, as this is when it is saving your stats, and can mess up your player data. This also seems to be happening to people who are playing horde/beast/campaign and just turn their Xbox off without backing out of the match. I would strongly recommend
you ALWAYS BACK OUT TO THE MAIN MENU BEFORE SWITCHING YOUR XBOX OFF OR DASHBOARDING. There are a few people who say they waited for the next map to load in a quick match, then backed out before turning their Xbox off and they were still reset.
FREEZING OR LOST CONNECTION DURING LOADING SCREENS.
This is similar to the situation above, but much more difficult to avoid. During loading screens the game is reading or updating your player profile data, and any interruption to your internet during this stage seems to cause the glitch.
PLAYING WHILE OFFLINE.
Many people are having their profiles reset while trying to play while offline. From what I have read, the glitch seems to occur when you are playing offline AND THEN SIGN BACK INTO XBOX LIVE. For example, your internet or Xbox live is down so you play some
offline campaign, or horde. Your internet/Xbox comes back online so you sign back in, THEN you are reset. I’m not exactly sure what the best way to avoid this is, but I definitely recommend NOT SIGNING BACK IN WHILE PLAYING SOMETHING. For example, don’t be
IN a horde match, or be doing campaign then sign in. I would probably say going back to the dashboard would be safest. Or maybe even turn your Xbox all the way off and then back on. Unfortunately I’m not really sure, but signing in while playing is definitely
a bad idea.
CONNECTION DROPS OUT DURING VERSUS/HORDE/BEAST/CAMPAIGN
This is actually the same as the above. The glitch occurs when you have been booted offline and then sign back in to Xbox live after you have just been offline. Some people are also reporting that they didn’t even sign back in, just turned their Xbox off and
when they turned it on the next day they had been reset.
SIGNING INTO XBOX LIVE ANYWHERE BUT THE DASHBOARD
Similar to the above. Some people have said that they signed in for the first time at the main menu or party screen because their Xbox doesn’t automatically sign them in. They were then reset once they did this. This happens most frequently if you do it during
a loading screen for obvious reasons.
SELECTING THE WRONG STORAGE DEVICE
If you select the wrong storage device your profile will have no rank, unlocks etc because your player data is not on that storage device. HOWEVER, a few people have been reporting that once they have selected the wrong storage device even when they went back
and selected the right one they were still reset.
**WHY DOES THIS HAPPEN?**
I am certainly no expert (at all), but it seems like the game in certain situations seems to fail to recognise the “player data” file that is stored in your memory, which contains all of your rank/ribbons/medals information. When this happens it seems to start
a brand new one that is blank, i.e level 1. This new file then starts to overwrite the old file when you gain xp. You might be thinking “but all your rank information is meant to be stored on the Microsoft servers”, and it IS. However, it is only BACKED UP
to the Microsoft servers. The actual information is contained in your player data file. This means, if the player data file on your hard drive is glitched and resets to rank 1 AND THEN YOU RANK UP it overwrites your old file AND sends this new information
to be stored on the severs AND WIPES OVER THE OLD INFORMATION THERE AS WELL. However, if you recover your gamertag straight away it reads the information directly from the servers and recreates the player data file for you on your drive containing all of your
actual rank/unlocks.
