Hmm maybe a tad harsh there!
I think maybe some are just pretty happy, and some fussy.
Printable View
Hmm maybe a tad harsh there!
I think maybe some are just pretty happy, and some fussy.
i personally say that because i LOVE the game , i just dont understand how after all the playtesting and months of production they havent saw that enormous AI faults ...thats all
If you are talking about patches - as we are - then you are quite wrong.Quote:
Originally Posted by absents
The patched MTW/VI was significantly improved over MTW 1.0 and RTW 1.5/1.6 is significantly improved over RTW 1.0 (if you doubt me, ask the EB or RTR teams why they are porting to 1.5 from 1.2).
I've never read anyone arguing otherwise or wanting to play with a v1.0 TW game rather than the final patched version.
Well I agree with frantz and econ.
I am fussy myself...but I dont think that is a bad thing really. I don't expect miracles either. Maybe well all got to expect too much...
It has to be said (and with respect to CA), clearly they are not a charity but a commercial games developer. The days of Paul woakes, and Geoff Crammond are likely over. This is a serious business, with much larger outlays for companies, pretty obvious that this time of year was the target for sales..(nothing wrong there)..
Point being deadline hits...product must be out. I am sure they knew about the numerous issues....
Is this acceptable? Well it isnt ideal is it...from a end user point of view.
If M2TW is any indication of how you run a "serious business", I expect CA bankrupt soon enough.
Become a software developer on a massively complex project with unmissable deadlines looming and financial constraints on how many people you can employ and how much time you can spend testing and you will begin to understand.Quote:
Originally Posted by Frantz
Must... not... feed... troll... must... resist... urge... to... ridicule...Quote:
Originally Posted by absents
Well I do hope a patch appears soon, but I'm still entertained quite a bit by this game. The bugs that some people mention are actually features. Some of the features may indeed need balancing, but that's something that could be (and should be) done by volunteer modders. True bugs should be fixed.
Personally I love games that can be modified a lot and those are the games I spend money on. Infinite replayabillity, or at least, a lot more value for your buck then most non-moddable games.
I would really love to see a game producer create only an engine and provide all the tools to create a game and put that on sale. This would maybe require a really large legal team, putting to trial any who try to make a profit of your engine.
Then as a demonstration make and sell a game using that engine.
This would really improve the world of gaming a lot and keep a lot of people from screaming.
"If you don't like it, change it."
And then you could.
Dingo
As the thread shows, fanboyism is the biggest crutch of the series. People see what they want to believe is there.
when you have a Ferrari is hard to accept a bruise on the cockpit .... over my polo i dont notice them !!
With mtw2 we have a Ferrari for sure ....
its also true that peoples complain over many irrilevant things BUT if something critical have to be addressed is not shame to point at it , after all is us that spend the money .
I have to admitt to understanding both camps here...
I understand that software development is a long and complex process that involves as many comprimises as it does cool new features...
But it does not take much playing (particularly on the battlefield) to see the enemy do something odd...
I too feel that the game was as finished as possible for the release date and it is gratifying to see them putting so much effort into the first patch. The first note we saw on the Total War forums mentioned that they we pretty much done with the patch and it was going to QA, well maybe QA is doing it's thing now without the pressure of a release date (i.e. finding issues and sending it back to the devs). Personally I remain optimistic and I look forward to this first patch.
What Shogun posted is not what I'd call news. Wikiman already said there would be further news in 2 weeks approximately 2 weeks ago! All Shogun has done is repeated that statement and the sycophantic fanboys go delerious for a few days giving CA some more time. If I was being cynical I'd say it was simply a stalling tactic, and it's worked. They now have till next week to come up with something, whatever that may be. As I count it that means the proposed release day patch, a promise that suckered me into purchasing the game, has now become at best a 4 week patch, possibly longer, since in true CA form nothing concrete has been stated. In fact, it's entirely possible that the patch won't even be out next week... most likely it'll just be more "news"...
I've played the game only 4 days before the niggles bothered me enough to shelve the game. The passive AI, the inability of the some units to actually inflict damage on cavalry, the buggy siege AI, the massive lag during certain sieges, the pathfinding frustrations, etc, etc.
Jambo is true , there are bugs but come on there are 1000 other fantastic things that make you play and play again .... yours is a point of view a bit too negative and not objective , sad to say that ... shelve the game ? come on ...
That's because the AI faults was created right before the game went gold.Quote:
Originally Posted by Frantz
They tried to make the AI more aggressive on the battlefield but discovered after the game went gold that the AI was now instead extremely passive and once the game has gone gold you can't touch it unless with a patch.
If you played the pre-beta demo unscripted you can see that there is no trace of a passive AI and that the AI uses it's troops like a pro.
Good use of flanking, no suicidal generals, finding weak spots in your line etc.
I myself got beaten countless times by the AI in the pre-beta demo, it was that good.
Now CA has already fixed that huge AI bug and Palamedes thought they would release that patch on day 1 but I can guess that SEGA wanted CA to make a large patch instead that will fix any other bug that will be reported.
And hopefully that patch is soon finished.
After all Wikiman did not say that we would have it in two weeks.
He just said that would have it if testing went smoothly which if the patch is indeed delayed then it didn't go smoothly.
I have to agree with TB666...that is my experience also. The demo was much more in yer face attacking, and using it would seem anyhow some reasoning and strategy.
Currently in the retail game it is IMO very passive and a bit feeble being honest. Every trick I try just seems to work most of the time. Flanking cavalry attacks dont get countered..or even a response until you have engaged a unit.
I have even moved whole armies right up next to an enemy..and they just stand there...nothing...this happens too often, though not all the time. People complained rome was buggy when it was out..meet the new champ!
It does spoil the game a fair bit...you cannot say what we are playing now, is really what it should be. I am not at the point where I am shelving the game, but on the other hand ist impressions count...and I am not blown away as I was with the other total war games..(and they had their faults)
So we shall see what the real game is when the patch/patches are out..until then we are really paying playtesters for an almost beta game in some respects.
thank you TB666 , now i feel better :)
The AI actually counters what you do, at least from what I have seen.Quote:
Originally Posted by Barry Fitzgerald
Missile troops go off first to lure you in. However, if you send out a unit to lure them in they take the bait and charge in en masse.
Interestingly enough they kept a few troops in the back. When I tried to get my knights and swordsmen to flank they actually deployed and charged these troops to hold them off. They eventually failed but the fact is that the AI attempted to counter my moves.
In siege battles, I usually spread out my troops to spread out the AI's own troops but eventually the AI will realize which is the most dangerous and will redeploy their troops to stop it.
no nameless ... the AI 90% of time will shoot is arrows even with 1 unit of peasants while you have 10 genoese crossbowmen units ... when he have finished his arrows ( and his army is at 30% streght ) MAYBE he will charge you .... that have no excuses ...is just plain stupid
Maybe I am having a freaky campaign or something..but to my eyes the AI is deeply flawed. This isnt something I expected, I was looking for real improvements over RTW..but so far on medium rome was the better game flaws and all (patched up)..true the AI did dumb things...some suicide generals..and sometimes seigers would stay there and take fire when they failed to get in...
but...least it tried..and sometimes I got thrashed to bits, it did respond to arrow fire mostly..not sit there, and it did counter attack too...and it pulled some nice moves. I am not suggesting it was great..but what we have in this MTW2, at present is pretty weedy.
I have won 150 battles and lost 5. I never had that total domination in rome ever. In fact the 5 I did lose were mostly down to the enemy having vastly superior units compared to my weedy ones, and a combination of being outnumbered also..even then they walked away with most of their army destroyed..and a slim victory.
AI is dumb dumb dumb..not helped by the campaign problems also...
It can be fixed for sure...let us hope...but it aint good at present...least not in the game I am playing
Read my post bud.Quote:
Originally Posted by Frantz
This is off from what I have experienced so far.
I also stated that if you lure the AI, they will come.
I was running more experiments and decided to play cat and mouse and the AI immediately took the bait and charged en masse with the missile troops in the back firing.
You can "activate" the AI sure enough but that's usually only with melee troops.
Ranged units generally don't snap the AI out of it's passive mode.
Oh how I miss the pre-beta AI.
I miss how it attacked your line and at the same time sent 2-3 units on the flanks to go behind your lines and attack your ranged units.
It was a beautiful manouver by the AI :2thumbsup:
1000...Quote:
Originally Posted by Frantz
Negative. Objective. I feel I'm being very objective. I'm not saying I hate the game or CA, or that it's terrible. What I am saying is that in its current form I finding it hard to immerse myself in the experience. Everytime I play out a tactical battle I feel I'm exploiting the system. Play with archers and the passive AI won't attack, play a siege defence and the AI falls short in so many ways it's an automatic victory. Sure, the odd battle works really well and the thrill returns, but this isn't me being negative, it's me being realistic. It's just not enjoyable. I play games to be mentally and dexterously challenged and if it doesn't do this, then I play another.
Thinking about how MTW and RTW were patched I think we can expect nothing for a couple of months and then a big patch ... which will also ship with an expansion pack :wink:
I think the games great and for passive AI problems ... attack if you really find it a problem. I find it's about 50/50 if the AI will be passive or not - in situations where I feel they should be, and I've seen intelligent AI e.g. on bridge crossing was firing into the defending AI and they did nothing for a while as I was moving my troops across and having taken casualties (and started outnumbered) retreated from the field.
I'd rather have a [i]more[i/] aggressive AI but not so much so that we get the suicidal generals or cavalry miles ahead of the main body of the army so you can just pick them off.
Well said Jambo! My thought exactly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
When I read that CA was only going to give "news" of the patch shortly, I could only sigh with disappointment. This tells me that the patch is not going to be available anytime soon. After all, why release news if the patch is just around the corner? I doubt CA will even give a specific release date in this 'news'. I suspect this patch won't be released until Jan 2007.
Now, you can argue that this delay is great. They will fix more bugs. Thats one way of looking at it. My thinking is however that this game was not adequately tested, is riddled with bugs, and it is sitting on my shelf. The lag on the sieges is so bad that I have to autoresolve these or reboot the PC and my system is state of the art SLI. Its sad to say but I can't play this game without getting frustrated by the bugs.
Weird really, I think I am playing the same game as some of you, yet I am still enjoying it.
There are a few things that are niggly, the AI passivity, the micro-mangement of agents (something which has always been in the TW series from the start), the way assassins and merchants take sooooo long to become useful and able to take on the opposition (again all that micro-management). The un-intuitive way your agents and generals have to be actively searched for. How often have been so deeply into the game and click on a city to find 5-6 generals? Some of the units seem a bit iffy on their stats (billmen anyone?).
But none of these things are game stoppers to. They are all down to my personal preferences and idionsyncracies. All these things have bugged me from the start with the series. Well, all save the AI passivity. I am confident CA will rectify this. I think it is the result of over conservative setting after the play testing, maybe they felt that unlike the (few) players who come to these forums (who all seem to be VH/VH:yes: ) the run of the mill player out there would be too challenged by an overly agressive AI.
The fact remains, that I have had hours of fun already and by the sounds of it it should be getting better - all for £25, not bad IMHO.
I take it you've never experienced the show-stopping lag sometimes encountered during siege defences? Well, if you have it's a gamebreaker as you have to quit the battle. Having said all that, I do enjoy it when it works - it just falls short too often at the moment to keep me interested. I'm sure the patch will do wonders when it arrives, but what worries me is that M2TW is the only game I've ever shelved within 4 days of purchase. My other recent purchases, BF2142 and Civ IV, were far more playable and challenging straight out the box.
Agent micromanagement is a cumbersome chore, but like you say it's no gamebreaker and I can live with that. It's funny, I also remember occasions of clicking on cities and thinking, man, where did all those generals come from...!!
I don't have the game myself but I know somebody who got a brand new high end system with best pretty much everythin' and a fata$$ LCD sceen ontop just for this game. after playin' it for less than a week he just shelved it and downloaded Chivalry to play RTW until the patch comes out.Quote:
Originally Posted by Barry Fitzgerald
the guy was like really hyped 'bout the game and now he tells me it's only good for eye candy and even then RTW still looks better now that he can run it on max settings too lol
I bought a new PC specially for this game as well and Im happy. And your friend is clearly mad if he really thinks that Rome looks better. :inquisitive:Quote:
Originally Posted by redriver
Upgrade your hardware or disable high quality textures and Shader 2, this is not a bug, it's you insufficient hardware and the fact that you chose your settings too high.:juggle2:Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
Since I got a new graphicscard, I had no unplayable lag on high settings...:2thumbsup:
And no, I would not call the game a beta, I think it's awesome, but that does not prevent me from expecting a patch for the passive AI bug and some other minor bugs.:yes:
Are you sure about this? Is there not a bug that is caused when the AI tries to shove all his men into a siege tower or something?Quote:
Originally Posted by Husar
Also, what is this whole Shader 1 and 2 business about? What is the difference?
DaveyBaby, Sorry fella, but that irritated me. We, the consumer, shouldn't/don't need to understand! We want a product that works! Or at least by now have some kind of 1st patch that is starting to address problems raised to keep the interest going.Quote:
Originally Posted by Daveybaby
If I buy a car that gets delivered without a steering wheel and tyres I'm gonna be a bit miffed and I aint gonna become a mechanic to understand why!
It's a business I agree, however they have sold a product with problems! (and no offence to CA, quite a few!) And who decides the release date? Isn't it them and SEGA?