they've done it again

Mmmm, looks like that's Neo, in a previous version of Matrix.

I quite enjoyed the demo. No better, no worse than the original RTW.

I thought the BI demo was weak. I like how RTR slowed down the movement of troops. After performing clavary charges in RTR, the BI demo felt like NASCAR.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chester

While I'm upset with CA's fantasy approach, I'm far more furious with their blatant disregard for the gaming community. Their lack (and often late) patches topped off with the inability to mod features or putting restraints on moddable feature (faction size, unit size, diplomacy etc).

This game was released in 2004, it's the later half of 2005 and all we've seen is two patches. Converserly, Blizzard entertainment just released the eleventh patch for diablo 2 (17 for Warcraft 3), it consists of new goodies and a new challenge for players to fight. Diablo 2 is no longer making money for blizzard. The fact that they are still improving and adding features to this old title just goes to show how much they appreiciate their fan base.

Ya, CA made the engine. Fact is it's mired with flaws which they ignore for long periods of time (still pending). The old "shut up they made the game so you can't complain" line is a bit diffcult to swallow since they CAN upgrade the game, they just choose not too.

---

I share your pain, CA's behavior of late has been just short of impolite. That said, I do think you are a little unfair to them here. They are nowhere near as big or established as Blizzard so they cannot keep up the same level of support. Also, Blizzard can QA its own patches whereas CA needs the help of the publisher for that. For M:TW and R:TW, they were stuck with Activision, who only allowed one patch per game. Perhaps Sega does better: the fact that there may be a 1.3 patch for R:TW vanilla indicates Sega is better disposed towards customer support. Perhaps.

All but the simplest of games are very complex and issues can be burried deep in the engine. It requires many man-hours to correct them and even more to find them. Just think how long it took for the primary/secondary or charge issues to be uncovered. Blizzard rellies on a large and dedicated fanbase for balancing and spotting bugs; CA, for whatever reason does not. Again, this maybe related to publisher's constraints and/or manpower issues.

Relations between CA and the fanbase took a nose-dive after R:TW's release and I think CA's stance was a major cause for this. That said, the community did get a lot more aggresive after the release of the R:TW demo, so I sometimes pity the developers who still take time to post here. At othertimes, when I just played a particulary frustrating battle, I want to go after them with a club ~D .

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chester

While I'm upset with CA's fantasy approach, I'm far more furious with their blatant disregard for the gaming community. Their lack (and often late) patches topped off with the inability to mod features or putting restraints on moddable feature (faction size, unit size, diplomacy etc).

This game was released in 2004, it's the later half of 2005 and all we've seen is two patches. Converserly, Blizzard entertainment just released the eleventh patch for diablo 2 (17 for Warcraft 3), it consists of new goodies and a new challenge for players to fight. Diablo 2 is no longer making money for blizzard. The fact that they are still improving and adding features to this old title just goes to show how much they appreiciate their fan base.

Ya, CA made the engine. Fact is it's mired with flaws which they ignore for long periods of time (still pending). The old "shut up they made the game so you can't complain" line is a bit diffcult to swallow since they CAN upgrade the game, they just choose not too.

I would like to see other companies tackle this engine and improve on it. CA needs some competition to show them that their fan base does not come cheap. We demand the best. The motto "we give the best" does not hold true at the moment down at CA. "we give you a really good engine, then allow a number of issues to interfere with your enjoyment of the game, have fun"

The same goes for the developers of Cossacks. That game is filled with bugs, but patches are about as frequent as being struck with lighting. As it stand the developers have no competition. People are stuck with that game since it's the only game that really depecits Napoleonic warfare. Ditto with RTW.

CA falls short of greatness in my books. I've downloaded almost every single modification just to see if any of them tackle the problems i have. Of course they don't, since it's all hardcoded. I find the new skins and maps a good distraction for short while. Then the old issues began to appear. Very annoying.

---

I totally agree with you!!

I saw the interview with one of CA developers (the one where he says there are only a dozen history freaks that want historic realism) and I think he was deliberatly trying to put all the weight of the complaints on this historical issue. From reading his interview you would never guess what CA lacked in minimal support with this game.

I mean, it's their game...if they want to make it Fantasy Total War it is their right, but the point is not that.

I think you forgot to mention that not only they totally failed to give this game proper support, but also there were some very weird inconsistencies(sp?) with the videos, screenshots and features advertised before the release of the game and what we really got. Some of the things that were missing than are now being advertised as features for BI???? This was the first time I ever felt this kind of cheated by a game company. ( I don't buy EA games ~;) )

All this coming from a company I had in high regards (together with Paradox and the old people from Impressions) after all they game me two awesome games in STW and MTW. But their behavior with RTW is really not something to be proud of and it makes me think twice before ever buying a game from them again.

kayapó

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ludens

I share your pain, CA's behavior of late has been just short of impolite. That said, I do think you are a little unfair to them here. They are nowhere near as big or established as Blizzard so they cannot keep up the same level of support. Also, Blizzard can QA its own patches whereas CA needs the help of the publisher for that. For M:TW and R:TW, they were stuck with Activision, who only allowed one patch per game. Perhaps Sega does better: the fact that there may be a 1.3 patch for R:TW vanilla indicates Sega is better disposed towards customer support. Perhaps.

---

I think you touched the point. They were very unpolite and disregardful for their fan base. But the size of the company does not matter. The 1.2 patch was soo buggy that any company would have been ashamed to release it like that. But not only they released it but also it was their FINAL patch.
Yes Blizzard might be bigger but Paradox isn't. Impressions isn't either. Paradox for example uses their fan base to ful capacity. I mean, who needs QA when you can release a public beta and have the people that matter balance out the bugs and gameplay.
I think it is all a matter of good relationship with it's fans and CA, for some reason, failed this time around.
This thing about Activision not letting them do another patch sounds weird. I think Activision woudn't finance another patch. But they were free to patch up if they wanted to. I never heard of a game left full of bugs by a developer because the publisher didn't let them patch it.

Well, call me naive but I still think CA will come out with a descent explanation for everything (that's all it takes).

As an example: After releasing Crusader Kings, Paradox had to start working with HOI2 right away, as that was the money making title that keeped them afloat. So CK got less atention in the beggining. That didn't generate any problems as they were always very correct and straight forward about it. And also gave CK atention whenever they had a chance.

kayapó

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kayapó

The 1.2 patch was soo buggy that any company would have been ashamed to release it like that. But not only they released it but also it was their FINAL patch.
Yes Blizzard might be bigger but Paradox isn't. Impressions isn't either. Paradox for example uses their fan base to ful capacity. I mean, who needs QA when you can release a public beta and have the people that matter balance out the bugs and gameplay.

---

Buggy? As far as I know the 1.2 was not buggy at all. There were a few glitches, yes, but most major patches have these. The patch definitely improved things for me and a lot of other patrons, so it wasn't buggy.

While you have a point, a public beta is a risky venture, because of illegal copies and idea-stealing, and the publisher might object to it. Since Activision does not seem to care much for patching, it is likely that they would forbid an open beta as well. Also, to sort out all the issues or even keep track of the flurry of reports created by a public beta requires a lot of manpower. I agree however, that CA should make more use of their fan base.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kayapó

I think you touched the point. They were very unpolite and disregardful for their fan base. But the size of the company does not matter.
I think it is all a matter of good relationship with it's fans and CA, for some reason, failed this time around.
I think Activision woudn't finance another patch. But they were free to patch up if they wanted to. I never heard of a game left full of bugs by a developer because the publisher didn't let them patch it.

---

Size does matter a lot when it comes to how much issues (read: bugs) they can adress in a given time period.

Activision has a bad reputation when it comes to support, or so I understand, but R:TW certainly is not a buggy game. Yes, there are plenty of issues, but this is not the same as buggy. However, CA probably cannot go without a publisher to release a big patch. QA is necessary to prevent buggy patches and small developers, like CA, do not have the resources to do this. Blizzard has, but Blizzard does not qualify as a small developer.

In other words, Activision has to do this, and they have a one-patch policy. CA could make another patch, but without QA there is a distinct risk that it will make things worse.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kayapó

Well, call me naive but I still think CA will come out with a descent explanation for everything (that's all it takes).

As an example: After releasing Crusader Kings, Paradox had to start working with HOI2 right away, as that was the money making title that keeped them afloat. So CK got less atention in the beggining. That didn't generate any problems as they were always very correct and straight forward about it. And also gave CK atention whenever they had a chance.

---

Yes, more openness from CA to the fan base would definitely help.

I think we both agree that CA's attitude towards its fans is not what should be. Perhaps they were provoked by their fans' hostility, but R:TW seems to be designed for a different market share, and if CA expected us to accept this, they were very wrong.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Geoffrey S

I quite enjoyed the demo.

---

blesphemer! stone him! stone teh heretic!
http://www.scholia.net/images/The%20...%20Stephen.gif

~:joker: nah...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jerby

blesphemer! stone him! stone teh heretic!
http://www.scholia.net/images/The%20...%20Stephen.gif

~:joker: nah...

---

Oh, man... if that wasn't so huge I would put that in my signature. That was classic.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ludens

Buggy? As far as I know the 1.2 was not buggy at all. There were a few glitches, yes, but most major patches have these. The patch definitely improved things for me and a lot of other patrons, so it wasn't buggy.

---

I just meant that 1.2 has some bugs that were very obvious. They might not be huge bugs that compromise stability. But the fact that not even the difficulty settings work properly is very telling.

As I said I am sure CA has reasons. Why do I think that? Because they have in the past given me two awesome games that are in my all time favorites list, and they're both very near the top.

Yes hostility might have been the case, at least it seems that they're pointing in this direction. But what did they expect? It was their decision to make RTW a more "open for all ages and types of players" so I say they should have been prepared.

I'm an academic, and I know very well the feeling of someone openly bashing the work that sometimes took all your adult life. But I don't use that as an excuse to close myself down in my room.

When I said size doesn't matter I meant that you don't have to be big to be polite and open to criticism. I guess we agree on this.

Anyway CA has credit with me. STW and MTW gave me much more than the few dollars that end up going to the developer.

kayapó

I think it's important to keep in mind too that while RTW isn't what we were hoping for or what we were maybe expecting...when you compare it to the Real time strategy game competition (almost a year ago) it's actually quite good.

yes, but expectations always get higher, don't they? There's always a higher mountain to climb beyond the present one, and so on, and so on...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kayapó

I just meant that 1.2 has some bugs that were very obvious. They might not be huge bugs that compromise stability. But the fact that not even the difficulty settings work properly is very telling.

---

We may be meaning different things with "buggy". A bug used to be a major error, so I only call a game or patch buggy if it really does not work as it ought. Neither R:TW 1.1 nor R:TW 1.2 was buggy by these standards.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by kayapó

As I said I am sure CA has reasons. Why do I think that? Because they have in the past given me two awesome games that are in my all time favorites list, and they're both very near the top.

Yes hostility might have been the case, at least it seems that they're pointing in this direction. But what did they expect? It was their decision to make RTW a more "open for all ages and types of players" so I say they should have been prepared.

(....)

When I said size doesn't matter I meant that you don't have to be big to be polite and open to criticism. I guess we agree on this.

---

I agree with everything you say here. R:TW is a good game, but its launch was a PR-disaster towards the hard-core fans of the series.

Does this mean I am not going to buy BI? No, not neccesarily.
Will I complain about BI too? Probably.
Will that stop me from buying TW4? I don't think so ~D .

It's all a matter of perspective. ~:smoking: