· By the Checkpoint64 team · meta release co-op design steam

Checkpoint64 2.0; a new look, Checkpoint Connect, and a shelf you can drive with a pad

Checkpoint64 2.0.0 is the biggest update since launch. Every screen has been redrawn, and there's a new way to play together: Checkpoint Connect lets your team join a game server running on your PC. Nobody forwards a port. We've also added a handful of smaller things people have been asking for since the summer.

Here's what's in it.

A new look: the shelf

The old app was a header bar across the top and a grid of cards that each tried to carry every button. It worked, but it looked like a settings page, and it never looked like a place where you keep things.

2.0 is built around a shelf.

  • Each game gets a plank, and each save is a floppy standing on it. The floppy shows the save's name, a one-line status and an AUTO light. AUTO shows its state by shape and in words, not only by colour.
  • Click a floppy and its details open in an inspector beside the shelf: back up, restore, launch, edit files, the auto-backup switch and the full version timeline. On a narrower window it slides in as a drawer instead.
  • The top header is gone. A sidebar on the left holds your libraries (personal and every team), the main pages and a storage meter for the library you're in. To switch libraries, click one. You no longer need a dropdown.
  • The logbook docks to the bottom of the window and opens upward. Every entry is now a plain sentence, and clicking one opens that save in the inspector.

Every other screen was redrawn to match:

  • Add a game puts what's installed on this PC next to the full catalogue, side by side. Before you create a save, it tells you what the first backup will do: roughly how much it will upload, and how much of your storage it will use.
  • Settings is one page with a menu down the side (General, Connections, Usage, Billing, My feedback, and Your data & account). Your storage and plan stay in view on every settings page.
  • Teams shows one card per team, with its members, its storage and its latest event. You can accept invitations and redeem join codes on that page without leaving it.
  • First run used to be a nine-step tour that ended with "now go add a game". Now it opens on the games already installed on your PC and takes you straight into adding one. It also answers the two questions people actually have before they pick anything: has anything been uploaded yet, and what happens to your files.

If you already finished the tour, you won't see the new first run. You can replay it any time from Settings.

Checkpoint Connect: play on a teammate's server, no port forwarding

This is the one we're most excited about.

Many co-op groups end up with one friend who runs the server. For everyone else to join, that friend has to forward a port on their router. That goes badly if you're on a flatmate's router, a student network or a mobile connection, or behind CGNAT, where the ISP shares one public address across many customers and there's no port to forward.

Checkpoint Connect carries the connection for you instead. The host's Checkpoint64 accepts connections from teammates and passes them to the game server on their own PC. Each teammate's Checkpoint64 opens the same port on their own machine, and their game connects to it as if the server were local. The two copies of the app connect directly when they can, and through a relay when they can't. Nobody forwards anything, and CGNAT stops mattering.

How it works in the app:

  1. Start your game's server on your PC, the same way you do today, either the game's own "host" option or a dedicated server exe.
  2. In your team's library, hit Share a server. Pick the game. For many games we already know the ports, so they're filled in for you. For anything else, pick Other game and type the ports.
  3. Your teammates see "{you} is hosting {game}" with a JOIN button in the same library. The team also gets a green LIVE tag in everyone's sidebar, so they know a server is up even from another page.
  4. They hit JOIN, and point their game at the 127.0.0.1 address it shows, with a copy button.

A few things worth knowing:

  • It's your server; we don't host your game. Checkpoint64 shares a server that's already running. It never starts one. For more on doing without a dedicated server entirely, see the dedicated server alternative guide.
  • Only your team gets in. When someone connects, the host's app checks with us that they're a member of that team. If they aren't, they're turned away.
  • Your read-only members can join too. That includes Patreon supporters and community members who came in with a join code. Hosting needs a full member.
  • UDP and TCP both work. That covers games like Valheim and Factorio over UDP, and Terraria or OpenTTD over TCP.
  • It works on every plan.
  • It's marked BETA, and we can pause it remotely if something goes wrong. If that happens, the app says hosting is paused. It won't say you were removed.

The host panel shows each connected teammate with their ping and data rates. If a teammate's connection drops, the app reconnects them automatically, and their game session carries on.

Checkpoint Connect sits on top of what the app already did for your team: it doesn't replace it. When the host logs off for the week, the world is still on the shelf for the next person to pick up.

And more

Pin a version. Found the save from right before the boss, or the world as it was before a redesign? Pin it. Automatic cleanup will never delete a pinned version, and a manual delete asks you to unpin it first. You can pin from the inspector without opening the full history.

Controller support. You can now use the whole app with a gamepad. The D-pad or left stick moves between controls, A presses, B backs out, the bumpers step through everything in order, and the right stick scrolls. On a Steam Deck, A on a text field brings up Steam's on-screen keyboard. The pad only acts while Checkpoint64 is the focused window, so it won't react while you're playing.

New saves keep a sensible amount of history. New saves used to start on "keep everything", which filled up storage faster than anyone expected. They now start on "keep the last few backups", set below your plan's limit so you have room to raise it. Existing saves are unchanged. Anything you've already backed up stays exactly as it was.

Clearer when you're out of space. If your library is full, a banner on the shelf says so, rather than an error on one backup. Auto-backup also stops retrying a backup that the quota has already refused.

System notifications toggle. If you'd rather Checkpoint64 didn't send desktop notifications, you can now turn them off in Settings. They're on by default.

18 more co-op games, and server ports for 19 more, so Checkpoint Connect fills them in for you. Subnautica and S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat saves are now found correctly for Steam players. See every supported game.

Fixes.

  • The Linux .deb installs on Debian 12 again.
  • Steam users no longer get logged out and stuck on a login screen they can't use.
  • A save now shows whose it is, on the floppy and in the inspector.
  • Read-only members are never offered a restore they can't perform.

Same deal as always

2.0 is a free update for everyone. The free plan is still a real plan and never expires. Lifetime is still a one-time purchase. Your saves are still yours.

As always, if something in 2.0 feels wrong, tell us from the in-app feedback page in Settings. You'll see our reply there.

See you on the next checkpoint.

Download Checkpoint64 or grab it on Steam. If your group plays together, start on the co-op page.