Patch Update - patch is now with Activision for testing

[*Ringo*]

Good news indeed, time to dig out my copy of RTW & get some practice in! Fortunately GTA: San Andreas has kept me busy since christmas but it's no substitute!

*Ringo*

[ranpiz]

HOI2 had a significant balance patch out before i was even able to find the game here in the USA. when i win the nobel prize for gaming i'm going to visit them in stockholm.

[Basileus]

thats good news, i just started playing again mostly total realism mod but im realy looking forward to this

[Kraxis]

I'm surprised... Indeed I am, nobody has yet complained that The Shogun mentions

the end of January at very the latest

*gasp*

Anyway, this is good news. Now I only hope it will address my issues.

[sunsmountain]

The same QA control that passed Rome Total War in the first place, the same QA that passed Vampire: Bloodlines, also riddled with bugs?

My trust in Activision QA control is at an all time low, and i think the division should be disbanded and that beta-testers should be allowed to do Quality Assurance, which is not as hard as QA wants you to believe.
QA people may or may not be gamers, and in any case only get 2 weeks time (which is a lot of pressure time to discover the bugs in. How many time did you need to notice all the bugs?).

Now CA has made it clear since day 1 that Rome:TW should be accessible and 'easy to play' for all gamers, not just MTW fans. QA people probably DO represent people who are not necessarily fan of the TW genre, and can give a good test bed to test the 'easy for all gamers to play' criterion.

However, they are not the people who should be removing the bugs for everybody, as this highly critical process can only be done by highly critical people who would love to spend 2 weeks of their time to find as many as they possibly can. Dedication cannot be underestimated.

Remember, these people cost 2 weeks of salary and resources as well. If they cannot deliver bug-free or near bug-free products, i do not see their useful contribution to the process.

What I feel is that CA & Activision have allowed the 'easy to play for all gamers' criterion to be more important than the 'bug-free' criterion. They are now, after 5-6 months addressing this second part and lets all hope its not too late.

As i think about it, even the 5-6 months may not be enough to spot all the bugs the game may have, but it is enough time for the programmers to make a good patch.

I particularly HOPE they have ENABLED the MAP editors, or we'll have to make one ourselves.
And that they spent their time on the AI, not the graphics engine.

[rebelscum]

Still playing 1.1 with a few mods to relieve arrow lag. I just hope this is the patch to end all patches!

[Ar7]

Well I was right about the patch release time when I said it will be out in the end of January

I just hope they fix the bugs that make the game unplayable and better the AI, as for everything else, I am setting my hopes at the EB mod

[Wrangel]

I just hope this is the patch to end all patches!

Hardly, and i don't know if a "final" patch is always a good thing. That doesn't give the oportunity for tweaks in the future. Because there will always be glitches to deal with. And there is always separate opinions about what units that are unhistorical etc. But this will hopefully make the game playable as it was meant to be. And hopefully a lot harder.

[Mikeus Caesar]

When CA says they're going to test it, they are just going to stamp a seal of approval on it and forget it for two weeks.