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Thread: Who makes the most polished games?

  1. #1

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    As in, whose games are released complete, bug free, stable on a wide ranges of systems, have the most depth, have thought about how to make the game players life easier, and generally display a high level of love & thought from their developers?

    I would have to say Bioware. Look at the Readme for some of their patches - they are usually a list of fixes for really minor, obscure, hard to get into situations. I often look at some of them and think how/why did someone try that? The level of depth in their games is amazing, there's always Easter Eggs and funny little touches throughout their vast RPGs (remember the room in BG with the Elvis pictures on the wall? )

    For me KOTOR is the finest example of this, I don't know of a more polished game out there.

    I've never seen a multi point wishlist for how to make this good game great for a Bioware game, like the one we all have for MTW, or froggys CK 25 point list.
    "I request permanent reassignment to the Gallic frontier. Nay, I demand reassignment. Perhaps it is improper to say so, but I refuse to fight against the Greeks or Macedonians any more. Give my command to another, for I cannot, I will not, lead an army into battle against a civilized nation so long as the Gauls survive. I am not the young man I once was, but I swear before Jupiter Optimus Maximus that I shall see a world without Gauls before I take my final breath."

    Senator Augustus Verginius

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    Rock 'n' Roll Will Never Die Member Axeknight's Avatar
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    The makers of Hidden and Dangerous Oh, wait...

  3. #3

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    PC Gamer summed that game up perfectly - a bug-ridden piece of genius

    *whispers*

    follow me
    "I request permanent reassignment to the Gallic frontier. Nay, I demand reassignment. Perhaps it is improper to say so, but I refuse to fight against the Greeks or Macedonians any more. Give my command to another, for I cannot, I will not, lead an army into battle against a civilized nation so long as the Gauls survive. I am not the young man I once was, but I swear before Jupiter Optimus Maximus that I shall see a world without Gauls before I take my final breath."

    Senator Augustus Verginius

  4. #4

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    I would go with Looking Glass, they may be dead now but their games never actually *needed* patching. Yes they were patched, but they never needed it, and it was always the most obscure things that did get patched. Looking Glass loved their work, and it showed. Nothing ever needed adding becasue they had included it all in the first place, very little needed fixing because it had all been tested to death, barely needed tweaking becasue it had already been tweaked carefully. Playable out the box, and beautiful for it.

    Bioware, no way. Their Infinity engine games all had the same bug on release (that cache leak that slowed the game down to a crawl), and they never adequately fixed that even with patches. The games also have had technical problems on every single computer build I have had since 1995, that would be about 7 or 8 vastly different builds. Shameful.

    CA, well they don't need so many technical patches, which is good because you barely *get* any patches. There is still plenty of room for improvement in MTW, but notihng will ever be done.

    Paradox can have an honoury mention as the company who patches most, but also needs to most. Still I suppose after the first 5 or so bug fix patches the rest are just extra features or tweaks players have requested. Now if only they would finish the game before releasing it...
    Frogbeastegg's Guide to Total War: Shogun II. Please note that the guide is not up-to-date for the latest patch.


  5. #5

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    Oops, yeah, forgot about that memory leak, hehe
    "I request permanent reassignment to the Gallic frontier. Nay, I demand reassignment. Perhaps it is improper to say so, but I refuse to fight against the Greeks or Macedonians any more. Give my command to another, for I cannot, I will not, lead an army into battle against a civilized nation so long as the Gauls survive. I am not the young man I once was, but I swear before Jupiter Optimus Maximus that I shall see a world without Gauls before I take my final breath."

    Senator Augustus Verginius

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    master of the pwniverse Member Fragony's Avatar
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    I would say nintendo, they are real perfectionists. Blizzard entertainment's games are also very well done, with insane production values (oh the movies of diablo2/warcraft3).

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    Tovenaar Senior Member The Wizard's Avatar
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    Don't make me drool at the thought of those, Frag... but in light of balance issues in online play, Blizzard is not the maker of flawless games...

    Bioware would indeed be a good contender, as well as Nintendo. Or maybe Lionhead... they say there was this big bug at the end of the game but I never encountered it...



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    Throwing stones from afar Member Cazbol's Avatar
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    I would have said Bioware until I played NWN: Hordes of the Underdark in multiplayer. Bioware admits to giving up on making it playable in multiplayer to get the expansion out before christmas to increase sales, and it shows. The game is full of things that show they were trying to make it work in multiplayer but in the end they just gave up. Worse still is that they didn't do an awful lot to tell people that this was a single player only module so a lot of people felt cheated. The box even states multiplayer requirements but they later tried to excuse it by saying that the new items could be used in user made modules that might work in multiplayer.
    They really lost a lot of goodwill on that one.

    I guess I'll vote for Blizzard because I haven't seen any bugs in the two games of theirs that I've played. There can be no perfect balance unless all sides are exactly alike.




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    Member Member MalibuMan's Avatar
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    I know it's dangerous to go on only one game... but Valve anyone?

    Yes they have been sort of attached to other games since but they haven't really had another game that's definitively theirs. And that one game is pretty damn polished if you ask me...

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    Unpatched Member hrvojej's Avatar
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    I always thought that, unlike the other things they make, good old Microsoft was shipping polished and bug-free games. At least those I played were very user-friendly and devoid of technical issues.
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    Some people get by with a whole lot more - A. Eldritch

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    Tree Killer Senior Member Beirut's Avatar
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    Vey true about MS.

    Combat Flight Simulator 1, for example, I played it for hundreds and hundreds of hours and never had a lock-up or CTD. Quite something.

    And then along came CFS3, that CTD, bug-ridden piece of s***. Ruined an excellent reputation.
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    Member Member MalibuMan's Avatar
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    But is that because M$ have the good sense to get other people to write their games for them, and they just publish them?

  13. #13
    I wanna be a real boy! Member chunkynut's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (MalibuMan @ May 10 2004,08:56)]But is that because M$ have the good sense to get other people to write their games for them, and they just publish them?
    Not sure but I've been impressed by MS games and i think that might be just because i've used their other software.

    There are loads of titles spread across every genre so i think they must publish others' games.

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    Tovenaar Senior Member The Wizard's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (Cazbol @ May 09 2004,22:24)]I guess I'll vote for Blizzard because I haven't seen any bugs in the two games of theirs that I've played. There can be no perfect balance unless all sides are exactly alike.
    Well, really, if you've played the early patches of WC3 vanilla on BNet, compared to the latest patches, it is a whole lot more balanced now. It takes balanced armies of combined units, strategy, and micro to win, not mass huntress or mass casters...

    Frozen Throne was better balanced, but they forgot the Beastmaster, which some players abused to rank 1 on the Europe realm. 5 patches on and it's still not totally balanced...

    Still, better than 1.04 vanilla WC3.



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    Isn't she pretty in pink? Member Rosacrux's Avatar
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    Taking out the (rather persistent, in their infinity engine games) memory leak bug, I'd nominate Bioware. No game-breaking bugs and what they release is indeed the final product, with only minor tweaks needed to achieve perfection.

    If you pitch them against 3DO (R.I.P.) who would release a bloody unplayable game (HOMM3&4) and patch it to the death (or, rather, to life) or to Firaxis (Civ3) or Paradox or EA, they faire extremely well.

    Blizzard has got a good reputation but I don't like their games so I wouldn't know for sure.

    Very good after sales support: Paradox, (late) 3DO: they wouldn't stop patching the original no matter what.
    CHIEF HISTORIAN

  16. #16

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    SSI of those games in the good ole' days when 286 and 386 CPU rulz.
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    Member Member RisingSun's Avatar
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    Paradox...

    Haha, gotcha I'd say Blizzard.

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    karoshi Senior Member solypsist's Avatar
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    I don't think I've ever patched a game by Sierra. and most patches were simply enhancements and did not actually do anything to game control.

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    master of the pwniverse Member Fragony's Avatar
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    I think epic and ID deserve to be on the list as well. The unreal and quake games are very solid products.

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    Member Member MalibuMan's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (solypsist @ May 11 2004,23:37)]I don't think I've ever patched a game by Sierra. and most patches were simply enhancements and did not actually do anything to game control.
    Isn't Sierra a publisher rather than a developer? E.g. IIRC HL was developed by Valve, published by Sierra.

  21. #21

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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (solypsist @ May 11 2004,23:37)]I don't think I've ever patched a game by Sierra. and most patches were simply enhancements and did not actually do anything to game control.
    Sierra isn't a developer. It's a publisher.

    Stardock is the best company that I've seen. Period.

    they developed (and published) Galactic Civilizations. I never got into it but I respected the company because they created 10+ patches (I think it was 20 but I am not 100% sure)on that game which was very stable out of the box. Any company that will do that many patches is good in my book.

    Oh, and they released a bonus pack the day the game came out. And a free expansion
    “A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship But it is not this day, an hour of wolves and shattered shields when the age of men comes crashing down, but it is not this day This day we fight” – Aragorn, King of Gondor

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    karoshi Senior Member solypsist's Avatar
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    oh. well then they publish damn good flawless games

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    Tovenaar Senior Member The Wizard's Avatar
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    well, were the king's quest and such adventure games so full of flaws then?
    "It ain't where you're from / it's where you're at."

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  24. #24

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    Exactly

    About two years ago, I found myself playing King's Quest VIII. To be fair, the game truly excels in two areas: atmosphere and music. Combined, these elements of the game made it incredibly immersive, and I do find myself wishing that other games would catch my imagination likewise.

    But it also had some horrible flaws. Like the unavoidable freeze that occurred when you performed a certain necessary task. As I see it, this effectively proves that the game was tested not even once prior to its release, and only after the disgruntled gamers made themselves heard did Sierra realise there was a problem.

    The graphics also suffered from countless glitches, although I do recall laughing loud and long on numerous occasions when I accidentally (most of the time, anyway) positioned Connor such that his body was completely dissected by a wall or floor rendering. I'm sure that wasn't the reception Sierra intended.

    Certainly that game had a lot of potential, but, like almost all games today, was released in an unfinished state.

    A.

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    Nec Pluribus Impar Member SwordsMaster's Avatar
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    I would say Pyro Studios. I havent heard of any bug in any of theur games...
    Managing perceptions goes hand in hand with managing expectations - Masamune

    Pie is merely the power of the state intruding into the private lives of the working class. - Beirut

  26. #26

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    I've never heard of them at all
    “A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship But it is not this day, an hour of wolves and shattered shields when the age of men comes crashing down, but it is not this day This day we fight” – Aragorn, King of Gondor

    -=Allies & Axis Total War=-

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    Isn't she pretty in pink? Member Rosacrux's Avatar
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    Regarding Sierra (hey kiddies, Sierra was the developer, with gazillions of super-succesful games - mostly adventures) I never played adventures so I wouldn't know about those, but I've played a couple of their strategy games and they were in deeeep shite, bug-wise speaking.

    Especially the very-promising-but-never-really-up-to-its-expectactions-and-promises Lords of Magic (a HOMM rip-off) was bloody unplayable out of the box. After 3 or 4 patches it became a great game, but it had already a lousy reputation so it went down the drain anyway...

    ...oh, the memories

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    Nec Pluribus Impar Member SwordsMaster's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (nightcrawlerblue @ May 27 2004,23:31)]I've never heard of them at all
    The guys who made the Commandos games and Praetorians.
    Managing perceptions goes hand in hand with managing expectations - Masamune

    Pie is merely the power of the state intruding into the private lives of the working class. - Beirut

  29. #29

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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (Rosacrux @ May 28 2004,08:36)]they were in deeeep shite, bug-wise speaking.
    Watch the language
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  30. #30
    The Abominable Senior Member Hexxagon Champion Monk's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (solypsist @ May 12 2004,15:20)]oh. well then they publish damn good flawless games
    Then clearly you never picked up the bug ridden crap of Tribes 2. What could have been one of the best online shooters of it's day, it was ruined because it was put on the market in its Beta state nearly unplayable. You wouldn't play 30 minutes without having a UE (in other words a huge error that crashed your PC) Sierra published this piece of crap then tried to make everything ok by released 6 patches which never fully fixed the game. Even though it was almost unplayable there was a community within the game that lasted about a year and a half before people got tired of waiting for the game to be completed. I think back in 03 they released a 90mb patch that supposedly fixed the game...but it didn't. It was rare indeed if you even played for more than an hour without a UE. (at least in my and most of the people i knew's experience)

    Sierra is now and forevermore on my list of publishers/developers i will never buy games from again, that is unless they actually decide to let the developers finish the games they publish.

    *sigh* i still remember the agony and untold frustration that game caused me.




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