Patch Next week

[jeff3f]

While flaming may be immature, it's certainly a heartfelt response.

Firaxis does deserve some derision for this release--although it's a good game, many people are getting no joy. Bugs of this magnitude should probably have been found and dealt with prior to launch. It's sloppy. It doesn't usually happen for other A-level titles.

Firaxis probably wanted this out before the holiday shopping season--and I can't completely fault them for that. But they were gambling (and won) that Civ would get bulletproof reviews on the gaming sites. None of the early reviews mentioned (or I didn't notice a prominent tsk tsk for) crashing and instability. That's kind of come out after the game was released.

[Sabre2th]

Originally posted by jeff3f
While flaming may be immature, it's certainly a heartfelt response.

Firaxis does deserve some derision for this release--although it's a good game, many people are getting no joy. Bugs of this magnitude should probably have been found and dealt with prior to launch. It's sloppy. It doesn't usually happen for other A-level titles.

Firaxis probably wanted this out before the holiday shopping season--and I can't completely fault them for that. But they were gambling (and won) that Civ would get bulletproof reviews on the gaming sites. None of the early reviews mentioned (or I didn't notice a prominent tsk tsk for) crashing and instability. That's kind of come out after the game was released.

It wasn't Firaxis's decision. The publisher really controls the release date...

[jeff3f]

Originally posted by Sabre2th

It wasn't Firaxis's decision. The publisher really controls the release date...

No argument that a publisher can harm a game release--witness KotOR2's ending (or lack thereof).

But the problem for Firaxis is that Firaxis is getting the heat from this, and now they're busting humps to get patches out. When Firaxis releases its next product, we'll all remember how Civ was bungled a bit. But when the publisher next releases a title, who will think about their handling of Civ? Will anyone?

Also, it sounds like there was time for extensive tweaking/beta testing; were they really rushed?

I've decided to shelve the game for 1-2 months, and revisit it then. I hope that both drivers and patches will have changed things.

[Stromprophet]

I am bumping this thread back up.

What ever happened to this "patch"?

Civfanatics had announced that there would be one and it has been a long time since I posted this.

Oh well, but I mean the game is getting close to one month after release and still nothing.

[Repairman_Jack]

IRT Jeff:
Weird. I thought I was the only one who thought that KOTOR2's ending was botched horribly. It was like they gave up during the last five hours of gameplay and just tacked on an ending. A very, very buggy ending.

And I'm also supportive of your shelving method of gameplay. Everyone's getting their panties in a bunch, when all they need to do is find something to play for a month or two and everything gets ironed out. That's the way with pretty much every game I play on the PC. Name a game that DOESN'T have such game stopping bugs when it comes out.

[kakupacal]

Originally posted by Repairman_Jack Name a game that DOESN'T have such game stopping bugs when it comes out.

Um... How about Freedom Force vs. The Third Reich.

That game has been out for about 7 months and has never needed a patch to this point.

(and is a damned fine game to boot)

[sidnitz]

Originally posted by Repairman_Jack
IRT Jeff:
Weird. I thought I was the only one who thought that KOTOR2's ending was botched horribly. It was like they gave up during the last five hours of gameplay and just tacked on an ending. A very, very buggy ending.

.... Name a game that DOESN'T have such game stopping bugs when it comes out.

Completely O/T but check out Obsidian's KotOR2 forum sometime... There are plenty of us who found the ending completely incoherent and unfinished This was a big disappointment, as I thought the rest of the game was very well done. I haven't been there recently, but there was actually a fan mod project (called Restoration IIRC) to piece together the "real" ending (or an ending anyways) from snipets found in unused program resources... They might have it done by now.

I think KotOR2 suffered from the same problem Civ 4 is suffering from, Publishers pushing release dates ahead to try and cement a hold on holiday game sales at the expense of quality assurance....

As far as games that work out of the box, maybe I've just been very lucky in the past, but I have been able to get a majority of games I've installed running on the release version, most of them without any driver juggling. Not that they're all bug free, but at least I could finish the game.

[jeff3f]

What's an extra month of "shelf time" when I have the next few years to play civ4?

Am I happy about it? Not really, but it could be worse--the Duke Nukem team could have been in charge of Civ 4 (meaning that they'd take 8 years to get it out the door).

Heck, Civ4 will outlive my current computer--I'm sure I'll still be playing it when I upgrade in 2006 or 2007...

[CivNonFreak]

Originally posted by Civfreak1970
I told you all it was coming 1 week ago and no one lissened! Now I guess you wont believe me when I tell you the Aliens are ariving tommorrow either right?

Nope. And you said it would be this week... which is rapidly running out. However, if it comes out this week, Freak, I will acknowledge you were correct.