Anime Shop Simulator Save Files - Which One Is Your Slot, and How to Share It

Anime Shop Simulator launched on 11 September 2026 from One More Time, and the shop you build with up to three friends in online co-op lives on exactly one machine - the host’s. When that person is out, the shop is shut.

Moving it is straightforward, but this game has two traps that cost people a session’s progress: the save files are numbered one lower than the slots you see in-game, and there is a backup file that will quietly undo a transfer you just did correctly.

Close the Game Before You Copy Anything

Save, return to the main menu, and fully quit Anime Shop Simulator before touching the folder.

Copying .es3 files while the game still has them open is how a shop ends up corrupted. It costs ten seconds.

Where Does Anime Shop Simulator Save Files?

Paste this into File Explorer’s address bar or the Win+R Run box:

%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\OneMoreTime\Anime Shop Simulator

AppData is hidden by default on Windows, so browsing to C:\Users\<YourName>\ will not show it. The path above opens regardless.

The developer folder is OneMoreTime with no spaces, even though the studio writes its name as One More Time on the store page.

Which File Is Which Save Slot?

This is the part people get wrong. Inside that folder you will find:

0_save.es3
1_save.es3
2_save.es3
3_save.es3
4_save.es3
5_save.es3
globalSave.es3
settingsSave.es3

The files count from zero. The game’s load menu counts from one. Shift by one every time:

Send 2_save.es3 when your friend asked for the shop in Slot 3 and you have handed over the wrong shop. If you are unsure, sort the folder by Date modified - the slot you played last is the newest file.

Which Files Must Not Travel

Two files in that folder are not save slots and should stay where they are:

• globalSave.es3 - shared profile data, not a shop.
• settingsSave.es3 - that player’s own options, keybinds and preferences.

Copying either over a friend’s copy overwrites their settings and does nothing for the save you were trying to move.

The .bak File That Undoes Your Transfer

Each slot has a matching backup beside it:

0_save.es3
0_save.es3.bak

When a slot will not load, the game silently falls back to the .bak. So if the new host already has an old 0_save.es3.bak sitting there from their own playthrough, and the save you pasted hiccups on first load, the game loads their stale backup instead - and you are looking at a shop from three sessions ago wondering what happened.

Two ways to avoid it:

• Copy the .bak across together with the save file, so the fallback matches the save, or
• Have the new host delete their existing <N>_save.es3.bak for that slot before pasting.

Either works. Doing neither is the single most common way an Anime Shop Simulator handover goes wrong.

Why the Day Counter Looks Wrong After a Transfer

A freshly pasted save often shows a blank or stale shop name, save time or in-game day in the load menu.

That is expected. The load menu reads those labels partly from globalSave.es3, which deliberately stays on the original machine. Load the save once and the label corrects itself. Nothing was lost.

How to Share an Anime Shop Simulator Save Manually

1. Save, quit to the main menu, and close the game fully.
2. Open %USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\OneMoreTime\Anime Shop Simulator.
3. Identify your slot - remember the file number is one lower than the menu slot, or sort by Date modified.
4. Copy <N>_save.es3 and <N>_save.es3.bak. Leave globalSave.es3 and settingsSave.es3 alone.
5. Zip the two files and send them over - Discord, USB, cloud drive.
6. New host: close the game, delete any existing .bak for that slot, and paste both files into their own ...\OneMoreTime\Anime Shop Simulator folder.
7. New host: launch the game, load the slot, invite the group. Whoever loads it is the host.

Then do it again in reverse after the session, every session, forever. That is the part that wears groups down.

How SaveSync Handles It

SaveSync moves the right files to the right folder on every PC in the group, and clears stale .bak files automatically so the fallback problem above cannot happen.

1. Click Anime Shop Simulator in the list on the left to open its save management page.
2. Click “+ New Save” (top right).
3. Select your save from the dialog and click “Create Save”.
4. Wait for the green checkmark.
5. Click the share icon, search your friend’s Steam username, click “Share”.
6. They click “Activate” - then they can host the shop and the save syncs automatically.

It also keeps a full save history, so you can see who uploaded what and when, and roll back to an earlier state if a shift goes badly.

Keep the Shop Open

A shop four people built should not close because one of them is at work. Quit the game cleanly, move the .es3 and its .bak together, and hosting can sit with whoever is free that evening.

New here? Start with Getting Started with SaveSync. Also useful: does Steam Cloud sync co-op saves, how to play co-op when the host is offline, and the Supermarket Simulator save sharing guide if your group runs both shops.