We need a save cleaner utility

[macrocosm144]

It depends on how your save is broken whether the tools work or not, but regardless, your save is already FUBAR & will most definitely not work, so doing so means you at least have some chance to remedy it, its not a guarantee, but if its the few cases that resaver & similar can easily contend with, you're good to go. I have personally saved multiple playthru's in Skyrim & Fallout 4 with these tools, & never had them not work, or break it more than the already 100% broken state they were in that caused me to take action. YMMV

[fraquar]

Something like a resaver is the absolute last resort.   

Modders should be looking to mod/play their game where they don't have to rely on the absolute last resort.

a)  Test mods before you commit them to your load order

b)  Don't add or remove mods once you've started game play

c)  If your do decide to ignore b), then by the love of god back up your last good save file - and document the changes you made so you can revert back to it easily.

And yes, you will lose whatever "progress" you made since you backed up that save - which is better than losing an entire play through.

[LarannKiar]

"Cleaning" save games externally or statically (i.e. when the game is not running) is particularly difficult as the necessary information (basically the answer to the question whether it is safe to delete) may not be available (i.e. the developer can't ask the game).

What the engine would need in my opinion is more safeguards to prevent runtime created objects (not only object references) filling up save games. Actually, there are, both in the save loader and in native managers but unfortunately they're still not enough. They would need to be implemented into various classes which requires a lot of time from the developers. 

Once DLCs and official Creations (in the upcoming months or years) cause the game to slow down (stutter) very quickly (i.e not after Level 50 but Level 10), BGS may need to release an update for this issue.