MP was never a priority for previous TW games and Rome is no exception. It was critical that the SP game be stable and free of any 'show stopping' and/or eggregious bugs before the game went gold. In that regard Rome shipped in excellent condition.
Most of the MP issues people have been complaining about were probably identified during the beta test but there wasn't any time to fix them. Shipping the SP game in as stable condition as possible took priority and I have no doubts that Activision was adamant that Rome meet its promised shipping date. This patch must have been in the making as soon as the gold candidate was approved and shipped off for production.
Now I hope we have get a fat, juicy patch that addresses all the other issues by the end of November.
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