Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends - how to get the damn thing to work

"Download is not complete"? "There is no save data"? Oh yeah, buddy - we feel your pain. Here's how to bend Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition to your will.

Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition is everything I ever dreamed of - at about four in the morning, after too much cheese, on a day with too many PlayStation Network updates. Bless you, Omega Force; I think I've written enough here and elsewhere about how much I love you and your games that you can take this bit of criticism in the spirit in which it was intended - like the sharp, short, sexy slaps you give a lover before you lock them in a cupboard for an hour to think about what they've done.

Rarely have I experienced such frustration and f**k-around getting a console game going as I have with my PlayStation 4 over the past few weeks. Omega Force isn't exactly known for its user-friendliness - the multiplayer in its last few games has been a nightmare of invite wrangling and eye-twitching connection waits - but Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition, its first PS4 release, is a whole other ball game, the kind where the spectators cry in the stands and careers are destroyed in heartbeats.

I had actually meant to have some sort of "here's why Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition is great and I love it" feature up last week, but I hadn't been able to play it for various spectacularly ridiculous reasons you'll learn about below. I've got it working now - sort of - but as a result of all this nonsense I haven't had much time to play the actual game itself, so in lieu of some editorial coverage, please enjoy this guide to getting the blasted thing going.

Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition PS4 - importing your PS3 save to PS4

When you first start up Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition you'll be asked if you want to create a new save file. Obviously you don't, amirite! Because you have about 80 hours of progress from the PS3 version you'd like to import, please. But then when you venture into the game's data menu, intelligently honing in on the "download data" option, you'll be met with a bizarre error. The save file the game finds online appears to be blank, and when you go to download it, you get the message "there is no data". Then when you try again, you're asked to try again after some unspecified cooldown period on accessing your own data.

Having repeated this process a few times, resetting your console on each occasion so that you can get back online, it is permissible to throw the DualShock 4 down on a soft surface and swear fluidly and at length, with very specific anatomical references.

Turns out using logic and problem solving is absolutely the wrong way to go about getting the save import to work. Here's a step by step guide, with the really, really important bits in bold:

1. Fire up Dynasty Warriors 8 on your PlayStation 3 and connect to the PlayStation Network to make sure you have the latest patch installed.
2. In the options menu of Dynasty Warriors 8 PS3, go to save/load and press the square button to bring up the upload menu. Upload your data.
3. Exit Dynasty Warriors 8 PS3 and switch your PS3 off completely to make sure you're not on the PSN anymore. Don't ask me why this voodoo is necessary, I don't know. Be happy you don't need to light candles.
4. Switch on your PlayStation 4 but do not open Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition. Instead, open the settings menu, go to the application save data management section, and delete any Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition data you may have created while f**king around with the save/load menu in your earlier misguided attempts to use the brain you were given at birth (a grievous mistake, apparently).
5. Load up Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition. It will ask you if you want to make a new save file. Say yes.
6. GLORY BE, Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition will then ask you if you want to import your save file data. Do so.

It is now complete. Yeah so it turns out that save/load data thing is for after you've done all this, and want to enjoy the benefits of cross-save. So you know, f**k you for trying to figure it out and be proactive rather than just pressing the button like a monkey, I guess? This didn't put me in a good temper.

Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition PS4 - solving the "the download is not complete" drama

Now that you have a save file with all your many, many hours of staring at Ling Tong's perfect shoulders smashing baddies in the face ready, I bet you can't wait to jump in and start playing! But what's this? All the campaigns - which you have naturally finished, achieving all stars to unlock the hypothetical branches - are locked! Free mode is locked! Lu Bu's campaign is locked, why is Lu Bu's campaign locked, I have lived my whole life to be Lu Bu, this is why I started gaming in the first place, f**k you.

This will not stand, you say to yourself, perhaps. Maybe you are supposed to play the achingly slow tutorials, even though you have been playing Dynasty Warriors games since you first mastered twin analog sticks and can figure out whatever new shenanigans the series introduces in less time than it takes to perform a charge-five combo? But when you play the achingly slow tutorials - maybe you even play all four, because you are determined to make this work - you remain locked outside of the entirety of the game's content! Why? Why, Omega Force? Why?

While you are building a little wicker man effigy of the entire Tecmo Koei development crew, pause a moment to place a few Sony figures on your pyre. This is somewhat Sony's fault, too. Remember how it promised us we'd be able to play PS4 games before they finished downloading? Oh no, you say, dread rising in your heart. Oh yes, I answer, grimly fishing a lighter out of my boot. Oh yes indeed. You see that "because the download is not complete" message when you try to load up anything but the tutorials? Ha ha, yeah. *flicks Zippo* Let's burn this bugger down.

1. Go to the home screen of your PlayStation 4 by pressing the PS button.
2. Highlight the Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition app and press the Options key on your DualShock 4. Select "information".
3. Wait patiently for a few seconds until your PS4 stops telling lies.
4. Observe the section which notes how much (or little) of your 24GB required download is complete.
5. Wait for approximately: forever for this to finish. Note that the PS4 will switch itself off in line with your power save settings regardless of this download's progress, so adjust accordingly and/or throw the console out the window, whatever seems easiest.

This problem only affects the PSN version, I believe, as installing from disc is faster than my painfully slow ADSL. Happily, Lu Bu's campaign becomes available by about 18GB, so you won't have to wait for the whole 24 to get into some new content - although the other kingdoms remain inaccessible for at least a few more gigs.

This everything I have to say about Dynasty Warriors 8: Xtreme Legends Complete Edition for now, except that it seems to load a little more snappily and the lighting effects are genuinely glorious. Stay tuned for opinions less tinged by my hair-trigger temper and general impatience once I've had a chance to play modes other than "shouting at menu screens" and "praying for divine intervention with regards to non-functioning game installs".