quote: There are a lot of questions and speculation on the Apolyton message boards about Call to Power II, so we have decided to issue the following statement to clear some of them up. When we began the design process on Call to Power II, we spent a good deal of time querying our Call to Power owners about what changes or additions they wanted to see in a sequel. Of course, there were thousands of suggestions from formal research surveys, informal message board posts, and one-on-one chats with gamers. But the majority of the requests centered around the following areas: diplomacy, combat, interface, customizability, and empire management. Our team set out to make a sequel that would address all of these features, yet would still remain true to the gameplay from the first game. We intentionally kept the graphics engine mostly the same because we felt that our graphics were, and still are, the best offered in a turn-based empire building game. We kept the setting the same because we felt that an actual historical basis would have more appeal than a fantastic or science-fiction setting. Many of the programming changes to Call to Power II may not be readily visible to the user, but in reality, most of the major engines were rewritten to accept the changes to the diplomatic, combat and empire management systems. Opening up the extensive customizability options required a level of complex code changes as well. As in all software development projects, some features from Call to Power were dropped or cut as the project unfolded, including PBEM and Hot Seat. We have been reviewing the posts by various forum members calling for additional patches to make the AI more challenging for them, to add PBEM and Hotseat back in, and various other requests. These requests, which sound simple, are actually long, complex feature additions that would require up to 3-4 months of programming and testing time. This is not feasible, as the Call to Power II team is moving on to other projects. So there will be no additional patches, enhancements or scenarios coming from Activision. Additionally, there are no immediate plans to make an expansion or sequel. None of these decisions were taken lightly, however, we feel that in the end, we have delivered a game that met the design goals of the project: an empire-building game that delivers new diplomatic features, more realistic combat, better empire management options, a new interface, and a customizable gaming engine to extend the life of the game. We thank all of you for your dedicated support and enthusiasm over the last four years. We look forward to seeing the results of the various mods and scenarios that the community is working on. Activision

I guess this means goodbye.
I would personally like to thank the CTP1/2 team members for their cooperation and help over the last years, from the last days of TFGC2S(and the first of Apolyton) until today.

I don't own a lot of computer games, but this surely must represent some new kind of low in terms of post-release support. Activision didn't really even release one patch, but more like half a patch. Their first patch was billed as a rush job to take care of some serious multiplayer problems only, with a more complete patch to come later.

The sad thing is, the game has so much going for it, with its virtually unlimited potential to change and add things to the game. I think once Wes is done with his mod, and other people finish mods and scenarios, this game is going to blow away any civ-type game that's come before (Wes is doing the work Activision should have done in the first place, BTW). But such mods will always be hobbled by serious bugs in the game that no amount of text file editing can ever fix, cos we can't go there.

If Activision is too cheap to properly follow through on this game, they should at least have the balls to release some or all of the coding to allow others to make the fixes they should have done. Even without having any inside clues, someone already had to make an unoffical patch to fix some things Activision should have done in CTP1. If Activision were to do this, it could only boost sales, since eventually a working game could be made out of this. If not, then its just adding insult to insult.

I'm actually not so pissed off as I should be, cos I've had a good lead that this was coming for some time now, from someone inside Activision. And from all the changes I've been making to my Alexander scenario, I get more and more excited, as I start to realize the potential this game provides to those who take the time to make the changes. So I'm not just gonna walk away from the game at this point anyways, like I'm sure many are (Civ3 is still a long time off, unfortunately). But I can completely understand those who do. Maybe I'm just a sucker or a glutton for punishment.

Harlan

PS- Its true computer games are all about money for the companies that make them, but Activision could have made SO much more money if they spent more time to make a good game. Look at the Age of Empires series as a cash cow for a company that follows through properly (too bad for me I don't like RTS). Obviously sales for CTP2 were disappointing (thus leading to this announcement), because people were burned already by the poor follow through and incomplete nature of CTP1. Duh. I guess Activsion is a shoot em up type company that doesn't understand this genre.

"We politely thank you for giving us your money. We believe we've made a high quality product for all to enjoy. We'll leave the rest to you, we're outta here!"

This is a real opportunity lost.

I must agree with this and feel sad...

I hope Firaxis does not make the same mistake and I'll wait for them to make a good game...

Maybe some mods will help but I feel Activision abandonned us after we bought the game and I for one will never buy any more civ games coming from them!

I've been pretty satisfied with CTP2. Few bugs in the regular game, probably the most stable game I have (SMAC may have that title, I haven't played it in a while), though CTP2 is very slow on the larger maps after a certain number of turns, capability to make more changes than I will ever have time for. The Alex scenario was great but as released had a lot of problems. The others could have been much better in my opinion.

I've only found a few bugs with the regular game though I haven't played as much as I would like to so I'm probably not aware of all of them. True bugs should be fixed. It's just the right thing to do, even if it costs them some money. When I buy software, I expect it to work properly. Okay, you can stop laughing now. I know things can slip though, but if you're aware of bugs, you fix them. Design issues are another matter. A design change that pleases me may not please the next person. So I can live with no future design changes. To say they won't fix the bugs really makes me angry.

I finally got my saved scenario games to load. I'm not even sure how. There are many who still cannot load saved scenarios. There goes their ability to customize the game through scenarios or play scenarios others have created unless they leave CTP2 running for a few days.

I hope they will at least provide someone to answer questions and help us help ourselves.

If this is the final word from Activision (meaning no help, period), they can count me out as a paying customer if they ever decide to make an expansion or sequel.

They believe that they made a quality game: well, from all the work that the mod community is doing, I would have to say that they didn't!

They say they met their design goals: They don't mention AI so I guess it was never a design goal in the first place! Second, it is true that the diplomacy has more options so they did meet that goal however since the AI never uses diplomacy, it is an absolute failure.

The only redeeming aspect is that they did indeed make a great interface, and they did implement some cool empire management features. But one huge flaw remains: the AI never uses diplomacy and doesn't fight wars!!!

I have one thing to say:

Ctp'ers, come over to the civ3 side. It won't dissapoint you.

I'm running CTP II under Virtual PC 4.0 on a Mac PowerBook G3 400. VPC simulates an Intel Pentium II running on the Triton chipset with an MR BIOS. The major limitations are that the simulated machine runs at about 200-250 MHz, and the simulated video card is the S3 Trio 32/64 PCI video card with 4 MB of emulated VRAM. In other words, minimalistic but vanilla-flavored. CTP II with the 1.11 patch still crashes frequently, apparently due to memory management problems. I have autosave turned on, but still...

Remember the Victory at Sea fiasco, where the game was released with limited testing and then orphaned? It looks like Activision is repeating that.

Cheers,

Harry Erwin

I'm sure it doesn't matter to them too much, but I'll be sure to write a letter to AAFES about activision's lack of consumer support. I'm sure they won't pull the games from the shelf, but it'll make me feel better.

I'm sure it doesn't matter to them too much, but I'll be sure to write a letter to AAFES about activision's lack of consumer support. I'm sure they won't pull the games from the shelf, but it'll make me feel better.

I knew CTP2 was a sick puppy the moment i heard about the save game bug and the dozen of other issues. That's why i waited until now to make my decision about buying this game. No need to tell you my final decision right?

All in all, Activision had really two basic choices, treat this sick puppy (many patches) or kill it. I guess in both choices the puppy is no longer sick

Still this kinda reminds me of the Birth of the Federation fiasco (yet another game with great potential) about a year and a couple of months ago. It's a pity that too many gaming companies view this kind of decisions as a fair business practice. I can't seem to get the "fair" part in it, on the paying customer side anyway.

So i guess our hopes and dreams fall on CivIII shoulders now. I hope this one succeeds.

quote: Originally posted by Nazgul on 01-20-2001 01:49 PM So i guess our hopes and dreams fall on CivIII shoulders now. I hope this one succeeds.

Never put all your eggs in one basket, Nazgul. The civ community has one ultimate ace up its sleeves: FreeCiv!

Sure, Freeciv improves in small incremental steps but those steps come along way in the end (take a look in the Freeciv forum or www.freeciv.org).

half ass job doing acivition employees..I hope you are proud of yourselves...and sins of the father..you kids are gunna learn this behavior from yu and turn out the same way..unless you lie to them and say "daddy worked hard today and brought positive change to the world"...which is another problem entirly..

bah I'll never by a product from you nor will any of my friends..I'll be sure to see to that...

1. Look at valve. They fully supported HalfLife and spent many a month creating the free addon of Team Fortress Classic for it. In fact this was a very awsome mod. Along with that from the original halflife they added multiplayer support, and tons of customization ability. HalfLife has also been followed up with many patches and fixes. How long do you think it took them to create this?

2. Sierra created a free EXPANSION PACK for its great game of Ground Control. This aint no little scenario folkes.

Activision MARKETS and SELLS a MULTIPLAYER compatible game - CTP2 - which turns out NOT to be Multiplayer compatable AT ALL. We gripe, we complain, we report the problems/bugs....and their answer? Tough Titties, we're through with this game and we're moveing on to other horizons.

I've just gone through my "collection" of computer games, and guess what? I actually own 22 different games by Activision!!!

Well NO MORE.

Activision, you ROYALLY SCREWED the customers that have in the past flocked to the Activision name - I realize that I have been one of your flock...until now.

How do you expect to get away with this type of criminal activity - False advertisement for one? You are not actually expecting your sales revenues to increase in the near future?!?!

Mark my word Activision, Firaxis/Hasbro is taking note. Let's see how well they will treat their customers with the eventual release of CIV3...I have every confidence that we will not be treated the same them!!

So, on a last note, let's all move on over to the APOLYTON CIV3 Site forum, since the CTP2 is just a waste of time!

PS: Apolyton, you have done a great job cutting through the BS and for that I'm thankful and will remain a avid follower of your site

Ciao!

"It's official: Activision sucks!"

but still they are dumping us after only two months we payed good money for this game and expect some support

quote: Originally posted by Darkknight on 01-20-2001 07:49 PM i'd just like to mention you can have PBEM and Hotseat if you want as said by noone from activision There's a secret hidden in english/uidata/layouts/spnewgame.ldl. If you search for two buttons whose ypix value are -490, and take the - sign off, two much requested features will become visible on the main screen.

It may be there and it may or may not work properly. I see no reason for myself or anyone else to 'barf' up $50 for a game that "officially" does not have the options (PBEM/Hot Seat, or other such items) they want. I and others do appreciate your efforts to reminds us of these hidden features that Ogre posted sevearl weeks back.
Thanks, but they are not support by Activision, so may not work properly. Therefor, I will save my money for something better.

This is typical of todays big business monguls. Sell you crap, pretend to be concerned, then 'piss on you' and claim they don't have the time to correct THEIR mistakes. It's plain and simple, they do not give a s__t about their customers. Therefor, they shouldn't have any customers. We should all join together and BOYCOTT all of their crap!

One thing I can be happy about. I DIDN'T WASTE MY MONEY ON THIS LOUSY GAME. IT DIDN'T HAVE WHAT I WANTED (Hot Seat), so I didn't waste cash on it in hopes that this thoughtless company would ever upgrade the game with the required patches. I saw through their EXCUSSES from the get go.

Going to go finish a game of SMAX now. HAHA!! GET IT?! FINISH... LOL!!

To activision, as the song says "kiss this!!!!!!"

And what are you going to do about it?

I suggest we all abandon this "popcicle stand" of a game called CTP2 and one and all move on over to the Apolyton CIVIII site!!!

Mark my word that Firaxis/Hasbro has followed and has taken note of what has happened to us by Activison...I don't believe Firaxis/Hasbro (Sid Meier) will treat us as "used toilet paper"

CHARGE!!!!

It will now stay that way.

If you are going to contact the company, snail mail is the best way to do it. Don't flame, just state how disappointed you are that the company has failed to provide a functioning game. And let them know that you will never buy another game from them. Also throw in that you will let your friends know how Activision has withdrawn support for a game that is still on the shelves in stores, and they should think twice before ever buying a game from them.

From looking at the above response Activision, it is pretty obvious that nothing will change the situation. All we can do right now is hope that the company has problems in the future selling new games.
And that other game companies can point to this decision as the reason why. Maybe somebody else will learn from Activision's mistake.