Has anyone been to totalwar.com recently

[Old Celt]

Greetings sik1977,

I just couldn't stand the official dot com's mods and their overbearing wholesale editing of anything they simply didn't like as opposed to a proper policy based on forum rules, etc. They use the Nazi strategy to deal with any questions they would rather not answer: silence the person asking.

I know the bug exists. It is easy to prove it. Again, I am hopeful that Sega will get control of the gasbags who treat the RTW customer base so contemptuously. We deserve respect. If we present an issue and can back it up, we deserve intelligent sincere responses. When will they realize they are stronger with their best informed customers supporting them then they are with those people highly annoyed at them?

[starkhorn]

This is awful, truly awful. I can't understand how they are claiming that this isn't a bug. Almost as bad as when MikeB tried to blame the problem on the RTR mod.

That's it. RTW and CA are history as far as I'm concerned.

Cheers all......it's been a fun few years whilst total war lasted.

Cheers
Starkhorn

[demon rob]

Game Over.

Damn it.

So what can we play?

And no, we cant go back to MTW, its been done to death. Wait for Civ4 I guess?


ps: Don't the mods at the .com and the programmers at CA play the game? Can't they see that the AI does nothing? Some hadn't even seen the coastline bug! (and yes its a totally minor bug no matter what whatsisname thinks, dont put resources into fixing that).

[Attalus]

You can play Silent Hunter 3!!...although like most games these days it too was released early..with a few bugs. Not game killers though.

The mods at the .com ARE a bit PRICKly. Do you really think a 'code of silence' policy exists? Smacks of conspiracy theory to me...but it does appear to be the case.

Like our elderly celt, I fail to see why one organisation (be it SEGA, CA or Activision) doesn't just answer the frikken questions. Surely they have some sort of PR plan.

Maybe they guys they hired to do the PR job just suxor at PR?

I'd like to se something like this.

CA staff: 'Nah...sorry, no more patches. Activision pwnz the rights and Sega doesn't want to shell out for no return, so no patch. Sorry...HOWEVER, we ARE making an expansion with Sega/Activison and that's definatley going to fix the bugs...you know...the things you (the customer) really really hate AND add a whole ton of extra stuff...like sea battles (better than the ones Eidos are doing for Imperial Glory). Anyway...just wait till you see the next incarnation of Total War....it's gonna be AWESOME!! And the best part...100% BUG FREE!! We GARANTEE it. It's the NEW CA/Sega policy!! No bugs....'

You get the picture. SELL your stuff CA. Take the money from Sega/Activision/Microsoft/Al Queda or whoever...fire your current PR imbeciles and SELL your stuff. Pre-test and Post test...remember?

[Bhruic]

This is just nuts. When I saw MikeB post, I got really annoyed with CA. But then I saw some of the CA posts about the whole console issue, and it seemed like there was a faction within CA that actually "got it". But now we've got another CA employee proving not only that he doesn't have a f*cking clue about his own game, but also that he considers we customers to be idiots.

I can't believe one of them compared their situation to Blizzard at one point. A company that is still putting out patches for games like Starcraft. If Blizzard owned the TW series, we'd likely still see patches for STW and MTW, let alone for RTW.

Bh

[player1]

That really weird.

Why is only time that CA post, that it's when they are denying that some bugs exists?
And what's more funny is that bugs were tested and well documented in the forums. With tests that anybody can try at home and get conclusions.

I'm shocked!


EDIT:
We really need to start lobbying for public beta testing team for expansion, or maybe even public beta patches. This has gone too far.

[Benny Moore]

The worst part of this is that they don't need us fanatacs, hardcore or not. They will not lose money due to their behavior. There will always be sales, no matter how short of a time people play the game after buying it.

I wouldn't be surprised if Creative Assembly didn't take after the likes of 1C and stop releasing playable demonstrations. 1C is afraid that if people get to try before they buy, they will not buy! Mark my words.

[Batangueno]

Greetings Old Celt,

I am assuming you are Gwumpke over at .COM. I am the .COM moderator that happened to be there at the time.

The AI Loadgame Bug thread at OT was meant to be a thread for gathering constructive input from patrons regarding the “bug”. There are respected patrons that needed the thread for their analysis of the problem. We do not want the constructive posts to be buried by rants and other off-topic posts. It was not a thread for ranting or venting someone’s anger or frustration.

Being the official Forum of CA, the .COM has been bearing the brunt of uncivil posts. We have to be very strict – whether we like it or not – to keep the sanity of the place. We have been called Nazis before and worse. Those are the kind of crap that we receive on a daily basis in return for volunteering our time to take care of the Forums.

We are not CA employees but patrons volunteering to take care of the Forums for other patrons. We know as much information as any patron. Nothing more.

You post stood out as being from someone who just entered the discussion and I felt that it was a rant and not constructive and on-topic.

Hopefully, you’ll understand. It was nothing personal.

Bat


PS. I feel that the .COM and .ORG are part of one TW community. That’s why I’m here. But to the moderators of .ORG, if you feel that I should not be here and you think it is a conflict of interest, please let me know and I will leave. Thank you.

[Benny Moore]

I expect that this will really surprise you, but I am on your side on this. Rome: Total War moderators are fairly reasonable. I've only had an issue with one or two over the distinction between using power for personal reasons and using power to perform duties. If anyone thinks that these moderators are fascist in behavior, I suggest that he should stop over to the official Operation Flashpoint forum. I see more locked threads than not over there.

[SirGrotius]

This reminds me of some horrible bug that existed when Viking Invasion came out. I can't remember what the bug was, but it really crippled the game until the next patch came out. I think CA makes its money off of initial sales--time spent patching after the fact is less profitable than time spent developing the next game (or official expansion). Sad situation for the customers, but we're not organized enough to boycott and if we did, we'd probably just push all companies to the console which is a lamentable medium.

[teecee]

@ Bhruic,

You know, if CA won't fix the AI siege bug, maybe you could do some more of that magic that you're so famous for. The work you did on "that other product" was nothing short of genius! Not only is it playable almost exclusively because of your modifications, it's STILL tons of fun.

I would be glad to do some grunt work for you, playtesting, etc... if you decide to delve into the depths of this one.

tc

ps - It's good to see a familiar face.

[sik1977]

I see some more of the .com patrons have just joined here. Welcome teecee, Bat and Qvintvs (Benny Moore surely).

I am rather surprised that Bat actually joined and posted to explain himself. Anyhow, good to see you Bat, I know you have a tough job at the .com forum, and you usually moderate the Loadgame AI Bug thread, which is a difficult one to say the least.

I hope TorqUK reads the two+ pages of posts already generated by his naive post (to say the least) in Loadgame AI Bug thread. I don't think he will admit anything, be it existence of this bug or CA's plans of fixing/ignoring it. I don't want to say this in the .com forums as I don't wish to further depress the patrons there. TorqUK's ignorant post is depressing enough for now.

P.s' Bat, stop siding with fanboys at .com.... hehe... sorry couldn't resist a little tease.

[Red Harvest]

Bat does a pretty balanced job overall. That is my 2 cents.

Let's give TorqUK some credit. He didn't have to try to address this and killing the messenger is not going to get us anywhere. I'm glad he posted his thoughts, but it also shows that CA is not really all that concerned with some of the bigger issues at the moment, or at least don't see them as problems.

By definition: If the customers see these as big problems, then they are.

[Batangueno]

Hey Sik1977, good to see you here too.

Actually, the things that happened in the loadgame thread and my registering with .ORG was just a coincidence. Then by chance I saw how Old Celt felt about what I did, so I thought I'll give him a little from my side.

Aurelius' post where he indicated at Duck's pond that he was 2 short of making his 10th post here reminded me to register. You see I lurked for about 2 years at .COM before actually registering. I felt that I should not do that here.

I also wanted to follow Eradosan's contributions here at .ORG.

...Nah. The fanboys don't need any help. They can take care of their own. Besides it won't be good if I take sides. :)

[Batangueno]

Thanks for your 2 cents Red Harvest. :)

[Bhruic]

Let's give TorqUK some credit. He didn't have to try to address this and killing the messenger is not going to get us anywhere.

So in your opinion it is better to have someone respond with an incorrect assessment of the situation, while simultaneously telling you that you just don't understand what is going on, than to have them not post at all?

Can't agree with you on that one. If you are going to take the effort to post something, then make sure you know what you are talking about. Spouting off crap that is demonstratably false does nothing to inspire confidence in what you are saying, or your company as a whole. In a case like this, it is relatively simple to test the accuracy of what people have been saying. Not putting that effort in also does little to inspire confidence. In effect, you have left yourself and your company in a worse position than they were in before you said anything.

Bh

[tai4ji2x]

and voila, now we have a typical lawyerly contribution to the.com thread by our "oh-so-beloved" killemall54, who here in this post perfectly exemplifies why most laypeople refer to lawyers as "slimeballs":

Bugs, by definition, stop the game. In STW we had a click on a ninja problem where if you clicked on the ninja, the game froze, you lost data and crashed to desktop. Same thing with MTW with boats. In RTW there is a glitch that you can accidentally trap a fleet in a river mouth like the STW unit trapped in a corner of a river during a bridge battle.

THERE IS NO LOAD GAME AI SIEGE GAME BUG, Test all you want but none of you have controlled for all the variables. Several CA people discussed this issue with us moderators and we came to the conclusion that (me speaking, like UFO-ologists bent on believing in aliens despite reports to the contrary) those convinced of the bug would continue to believe in the bug despite logic and evidence to the contrary. Our private discussions are well confirmed by your own statements.

Some posts here point out the AI neither attacks or defends during a siege where it has zero chance of winning. When the AI attacks me and wins a siege it generally has far superior forces and proper forces. Sometimes I have massacred an AI attacker when it did not have the proper mix of forces to siege me. The AI often has less money than us as the game progresses. It makes sense it would lift a siege in preparation for moving out to another target in response to a threat. Then when you reload, you change the variables because you reloaded in response to your own situation to take advantage of your perceptions. No wonder the AI backs off its siege.

None of us has the whole AI decision tree and reading the repetitive and unenlightening posts contained herein, none of the critics have applied the proper methodology to support the proof of an alleged bug. All the logic is merely inductive. And all contain the inductive leap. The argument is then from false premises.

Your sacred bug does not crash the game. It does not turn into machine language or hang as a glitch like ships and units caught between tiles. The bug you claim to see has no visible attributes of its existence. ERGO, THERE IS NO BUG.

Also this a very strange animal that only occurs when YOU CHOOSE to reload, and not like a real bug that FORCES YOU to reload. When you make the choice, the BUG is YOU not the GAME.

[Browning]

"only when you choose to reload - so it is your problem"
This [----insert your beloved dirty word here----] moron just insists we should do nothing but play RTW 24hs a day? This speaks volumes of how close to reality the staff of CA is.

[Red Harvest]

K54's definition of a bug is laughable. I've never heard that definition of a bug before, ever. Any time a program does something unintended, it can be classified as a bug (it might not necessarily be, but it could be.) I can assure you that the majority of bugs I've worked on would not halt the app. Ones that stop the app are the easiest ones to ID.

K54 needs to put down the crack pipe.

[Browning]

K54's definition of a bug is laughable. I've never heard that definition of a bug before, ever. Any time a program does something unintended, it can be classified as a bug (it might not necessarily be, but it could be.) I can assure you that the majority of bugs I've worked on would not halt the app. Ones that stop the app are the easiest ones to ID.

K54 needs to put down the crack pipe.

Roger that. I wonder what the reaction of my boss would be if I responded to his requests in that way.

"Yes, the fin surface temperature is wrong by 10 K, but it does not halt the program, sir, I am not going to correct it."

[Bhruic]

Nice. I'll have to frame that as "the most idiotic reply from a forum moderator ever". What an ass. No clue what a "bug" is, no clue what this "bug" is, and no clue about how this part of the game works. He might as well get "I'm an idiot" tattooed on his forehead.

Funny how all of his "evidence to the contrary" actually points to the bug's existence.

Bh

[AussieGiant]

Two things seem to stick out for me and I am referring to the .COM thread that is the main topic of this thread.

The first concerning thing is...

WHAT exactly is CA’s communication policy? I mean here we have a CA staffer with 7 posts to his name coming onto the .COM forum and basically dropping a bomb on a topic that by all rights needs a far more comprehensive answer than the one given. I say this only because of the amount of time invested by the Forum members in the debate. How he determined what contribution he was making by saying what he did would now be a discussion at his EXIT INTERVIEW with the company if I was a manager of CA!!

I mean they clearly DON'T take it in turns to answer questions!! What are they doing?? Flipping a coin? Posting only when there is a full moon? Waiting for spring? WHAT!! Clearly it is a public forum for anyone to join but if I was CA Management I would be strictly controlling any and all access of my staff to this site due to what it represents to the company.

This particular CA staffer over at the COM seems to be in his early 20's and certainly not qualified to officially answer a question of this level. I am saying this because I am starting to regard his post as only "One Point of View" inside CA on this issue.

The second is rather hard to ignore. TAKE DIMEBAGHOE'S very bloody basic test parameters and DO IT!! I mean it either turns out similar to what he is saying or it doesn't. THERE IS very little room to manoeuvre due to the extreme nature of his results. I'm not going to go into my own observations as it clearly will add nothing to the massive amount of work already done. In the end this is a very SIMPLE thing to test. How to fix it is the complex part.

BUT, one thing I have noted in my time managing multiple software systems (I'm non-technical) is that when you have this amount of discussion and quantitative evidence then there IS a bloody fire somewhere and just because YOU (see CA) can't find it, doesn't mean to say it doesn't exist!!

To have this CA "clown" drop his 2 cents worth like he did, would have gotten his hand nailed to the boardroom table with a steak knife by me personally if he was on my project.

This obviously is not directed at any of you gentlemen and I appreciate this forum for the sensible and rational environment if has. I just had to leave the reservation for a moment. I also appreciate the .COM "uberwacht" moderators for taking the time to come over here and have a discussion with these board members.

Have a good day or evening gentlemen.

[AussieGiant]

Oh and I forgot to say something...(can you believe that?? )

I had a great time play over Easter. But you know what happened?

I was determined to finish my first and ONLY Long Imperial Campaign with the Julii, which I have been playing since November last year.

There I was never reloading out of respect for the Load Game bug...and what happened??

I'm glad you asked...

I came back from making my 5th cup of coffee and the god damn bloody sound effect loop bug happened!!! Guess what the only fix is?? You guys know of course. Save the game quit the application and reload!!!

NICE little set of circumstances wouldn't you say!! It happened 3 times over a 4 day Easter extravaganza of ROME TOTAL %#$%^ and of course it happened once when I was fighting over ROME itself in the year 50BC and the Scipii were beseiging me!! They left of course because they had "OTHER" priorities. None of course that I could fathom, but then I'm just a slack jawed moron as far as 7 post CA "piss head" is concerned.

[Browning]

Oh and I forgot to say something...(can you believe that?? )

I had a great time play over Easter. But you know what happened?

(...)
I came back from making my 5th cup of coffee and the god damn bloody sound effect loop bug happened!!! Guess what the only fix is?? You guys know of course. Save the game quit the application and reload!!!
(...)

The only fix to that problem is... to turn the music off.

I was playing RTW over Easter while listening to "Messias" by Händel. The quasi-latin songs of RTW just do not campare to that...

[AussieGiant]

The only fix to that problem is... to turn the music off.

I was playing RTW over Easter while listening to "Messias" by Händel. The quasi-latin songs of RTW just do not campare to that...

Well that is very cultural of you Browning. I have never thought of doing that. Don't you lose some feeling for the battles when you can't hear what is happening?

I played a battle with the loop going and it was very off putting. I realised I used many of the audio sounds and queue's for how the battle was going.

[Browning]

Oh you mean, during a VERY LONG session, not only the music gets choppy, but the sound effects also?

I am with you, I don't imagine playing a battle without sound effects.

Clarification: by saying "Playing over Easter" I meant "doing my 3 hrs sessions, which is 2hrs longer than I can usually afford".

[AussieGiant]

Browning I think we have "crossed our wires" a bit

I mean I played the game for 6 hours... then left to get "another" coffee and came back with the sound looping through one particular section. Like an order in the battle map or background music in the stat map. It just started looping...not static or chopping just the same sound over and over again.

1 to 3 hour sessions are kinda short for me

[starkhorn]

Will there be an expansion?
Do we care about the quality of our games?

Yes. Deeply.
I can't think of any other reason for the amount of time and work we put in to producing our games.
We would all rather make great games than work in a dull 9-5 office or produce "run of the mill clones".
I, as do many here, smile ruefully when certain people suggest we don't care or that monkey typists could do better. Perhaps this comes about from a misunderstanding of just how many and how complex the mechanisms we put in place are, to get the game to a playable state, let alone the polished state we like to aim for.
As we live in a real world, we have to deal with some limitations in terms of money and manpower and thus also in terms of time. The result is that we can miss stuff or get it wrong And for this we are very sorry.

Ok so if you really care about the quality of your games then how about requesting to your boss that a patch is released to finalise the last issues created or left over from patch 1.2.

If your boss or whoever says no, then how about asking that you fix the bug in your spare time and release an unofficial patch.

The main issues that I'm talking about are

(1) Why is the AI no longer as agressive in v1.2 as it was in v1.0 ? I'm only really able to play 1 or 2 turns per session, but the AI doesn't seem to be doing anything agressive against me whilst in v1.0 I was fighting for my life in the early stages. No or little regions seems to ever change hands.

(2) Why are fewer ships being built in v1.2 as opposed to v1.0 ?

(3) After uninstalling RTW and then attempting to reinstall RTW v1.2 patch, it's impossible to re-install patch v1.2 as it thinks that it's already installed.

If you really except us to believe that your care then prove it but so far the actions from CA suggest otherwise.

Ignoring posts about potential issues, making no statements about patches and finally having a CA staff member on .com forum stating that a seige loadgame bug is not a bug but indeed a "feature" (or that the AI is simply thick), all suggest to me a company that doesn't care about the quality of it's games and more especially that it doesn't care about the customers who bought said games.

So come on CA, prove that you really care and prove it. But why come along and make posts saying that customers are silly for thinking that you don't care about the quality of your games when your actions (or rather lack of actions) suggest otherwise.

Cheers
Starkhorn

[tai4ji2x]

Funny how all of his "evidence to the contrary" actually points to the bug's existence.

Bh

my guess is that he'd claim that your claims about his claims only points to the validity of his original claims.







i think his characterization of us as UFO-sightings fanatics is quite indicative of his underlying and pervasive attitude of condescencion towards the community.

[starkhorn]

From TheShogun over a .com.

"Guys this thread has just about run it's course before it's heads down flame alley, so I moved the thread to rants and raves. "

So they've moved the 12 page thread over to Rants and Raves now which basically means that they are no longer taken this issue seriously (not that they ever did seem to take it seriously) and that they 100% truly believe that this issue is a not a bug.

I had hoped that the CA Staff member who made the comment was only speaking for himself and that CA would come out and say something else....how naive of me.

Basically it proves once again that they are just trying to sweep this under the carpet and ignore everyone.

Bravo CA for your customer service and feedback.

Cheers
Starkhorn