The Daily Update at the Com

**Sheogorath** · 04-23-2009, 05:09

Are they going to fix the corruption issue?

**Daveybaby** · 04-23-2009, 15:45

some of which may make it into gameplay upgrade four

Wow. Nice to see this level of ongoing support. Good stuff.

**Barkhorn1x** · 04-23-2009, 17:36

Latest update.

April 23rd

Final version of the gameplay upgrade patch is being distributed to the beta testers shortly, the complete executable build has just been finished here at CA and is going live to them in the next few hours, all being well.

The new naval group behaviour and collision avoidance logic is all in, and the new naval combat group UI is also up and running. The dreaded 'Indian pathfinding campaign save' corrupt bug was isolated and fixed, removing one of the big save game corruption issues.
We've removed the zone of control for navies blockaded inside ports and also changed the shader model 2 fixes for shadows on the campaign map. This is in addition to the raft of crash and stability fixes which have been added.

A fuller changelist will be available in the actual release, naturally.

Thank you all for your patience, we're almost there with this one.

Kind regards,
Kieran

Looks like the patch will be released next week then.

**Barkhorn1x** · 04-23-2009, 17:38

Originally Posted by Sheogorath

Are they going to fix the corruption issue?

What is the specific issue ?

**TinCow** · 04-23-2009, 17:40

I have to say, it's remarkable how far these small daily updates go towards appeasing the fanbase. Knowing what's going on and that work is being done daily makes it a lot easier to be patient.

**Servius** · 04-23-2009, 20:32

Originally Posted by TinCow

I have to say, it's remarkable how far these small daily updates go towards appeasing the fanbase. Knowing what's going on and that work is being done daily makes it a lot easier to be patient.

I agree wholeheartedly. Even when Kieran talks about bugs I personally haven't experienced, or aspects of the game I skip by auto-resolving naval battles or whatever, it still makes me quite happy and considerably more patient. As always, the truth is in the tasting, but having a consistent connection to a dev/rep on what going on day to day and how things are progressing at a macro level is very comforting.

I'm pretty sure I'd be less disappointed in and mad at Relic (regarding Dawn of War 2) if they had this type and level of interaction.

**Sheogorath** · 04-23-2009, 18:06

Originally Posted by Barkhorn1x

What is the specific issue ?

The savegame corruption. Y'know, savegames vanishing. It's really quite annoying.

**Barkhorn1x** · 04-23-2009, 21:13

Originally Posted by Sheogorath

The savegame corruption. Y'know, savegames vanishing. It's really quite annoying.

Don't know about disappearing savegames. Never really heard of that one. The claim is that the next patch will fix a 'raft of bugs' and I can imagine that savegame corruption in the sense that a savegame fails to load will be addressed.

You will have to wait for the specific patch fix list from CA.

**TB666** · 04-23-2009, 22:27

Originally Posted by Barkhorn1x

Don't know about disappearing savegames. Never really heard of that one. The claim is that the next patch will fix a 'raft of bugs' and I can imagine that savegame corruption in the sense that a savegame fails to load will be addressed.

You will have to wait for the specific patch fix list from CA.

Well this sounds encouraging for those that suffer from corrupt save-games

The dreaded 'Indian pathfinding campaign save' corrupt bug was isolated and fixed, removing one of the big save game corruption issues.

**AussieGiant** · 04-24-2009, 08:01

"The dreaded 'Indian path finding campaign save' corrupt bug was isolated and fixed, removing one of the big save game corruption issues."

That's the bastard that destroyed my GB campaign after 24 hours of play!!!!

Yes TC, I also like the communication like we are seeing. It is reassuring and a good sign that someone with half a brain and some common sense is pulling the strings behind the scene's.

--------------

CA/Sega Boardroom:

Unnamed SEGA Marketing/PR suit: "So how should we go about appeasing the various message boards and all the frothing at the mouth that is going on about the state of the game?"

Questioning look is cast about the room by said pin stripe suit type.

Unnamed CA developer from the back of the room: "How about we just tell them what we are doing?"

Silence

Unnamed SEGA Marketing/PR suit: "That sounds like a great idea, and something I vaguely remember in Marketing 101.

Excellent suggestion!!

Someone get on that."

CA developers en mass look at each other in shocked silence.

Moments later a CA developer leaves the room and heads for his computer.

**johnhughthom** · 04-24-2009, 19:04

Todays update:

The final version of the patch has gone into beta community testing, and we're going to test it over the weekend. We had hoped to have it on general release tonight but it was felt there should be longer dedicated to international version testing.

There are over 70 bug fixes in this upgrade, plus a tonne of balance and feature tweaks.

Some of the key game breakers that were fixed include: Fixing the crash caused by AI capturing a ship after naval combat. Fixed the 'port selection' crash when selecting a port in North America as Great Britain, we fixed a crash on building capture notification, we fixed the 'stuttering loading bar' issue and the mid-battle crash related to audio. We fixed the garrison outisde playable area crash during land battles. We also fixed the crash caused by certain factions attempting to assasinate gentlemen inside a school. We also addressed the hang loading into battle problem.

We hope to have this gameplay upgrade out the early part of next week following the weekend's testing, meaning hopefully, you'll all see a marked improvement.

I'd also like to take this opportunity to talk about Naval invasions if I may. The technology behind naval invasions is actually really rather heavy and is still causing some issues. The gameplay upgrade will make naval invasions possible but they will be rare. The AI now has a proper mechanism for the planning involved and can execute that mechanism when required, however increasing its frequency is a balance issue we haven't been able to get fixed in time for this upgrade. So in short, naval invasions are now possible and may occur, but they will not be frequent, which means we have to up that likelihood.

As a ray of hope to those concerned with this issue, I've seen the work we're doing on the AI for the next patch coming on leaps and bounds. There are a large amount of significant performance fixes that we're working on for the upcoming upgrade, this included. The primary purpose of the gameplay upgrade that will be released next week is to fix the AI aggression issues, remove the vast majority of game breaking crashes and tweak the unit behaviour whilst laying groundwork for naval invasions.

Again, many thanks for your patience. Hopefully you'll all be discussing these changes next week.

Kind regards,
Kieran