My cloud save conflict turned a relaxing Sunday into a hostage negotiation

I opened a role-playing game on my laptop Sunday morning and got the most stressful question a launcher can ask before coffee: choose which save to keep.

One copy was labeled local and looked newer by forty minutes. The other was labeled cloud and had a later calendar time, even though its listed playtime was shorter. I had played on my desktop the night before, then opened the game briefly on the laptop to check something. At some point, at least one machine had been offline. I could reconstruct the sequence if the launcher gave me more than two timestamps and a warning icon, but apparently I was expected to settle a tiny custody dispute in one click.

I did not click. I closed the window, which felt wise until I reopened it and the same choice returned. Then I started making the problem worse in my head. What if closing the launcher had already synchronized something? What if starting either computer replaced the good file? I disconnected both from Wi-Fi and began searching folders, but every file name looked like it had been assigned by a printer.

The lost progress would be annoying rather than tragic: one long quest, a difficult fight, and an hour spent reorganizing equipment. The bigger issue is that I no longer trust the system. This is the game I use when I want an uncomplicated evening, and now every launch feels like I should be wearing gloves.

I have not deleted, renamed, or moved anything. Both computers are still offline. I can see several save-related files on each machine, but I do not know which are complete, which are backups, or whether copying the whole folder creates a useful safety net. I also do not want to follow a random guide that assumes every game stores saves the same way.

What is the safest order of operations here? My instinct is to make read-only copies of both save folders, record the timestamps, and only then test the likely newer save while cloud syncing remains off. Is that sensible, or could launching the game change the very evidence I am trying to preserve? I am happy to lose forty minutes. I am not willing to gamble the entire character to recover it.