OMG!!! Computer Gaming World review

[eisey~]

hey bud, sorry but i dont think you can make such broad proclamations. there is a unique situation in everyones case, no one computer is the same, no connection is the same. so lets all just settle down and have a spot of tea.

[Mad Bomber]

Originally posted by Dimension
Last week, PTW locked my machine during a delayed write and corrupted my hard drive. It destroyed my SYSTEM32 directory (making the machine unbootable) and my Documents and Settings folder (destroying my financial records and a large project I was working on, both of which had changed a lot since I backed them up two weeks ago). This really isn't acceptable behavior for retail software.

Dimension:

I would be blaming someone for destroying your hard drive, but it would not be infograms, firaxis, or microsoft. The damage done to your files is more than just a coincidence. Someone targeted these files to be destroyed. I am no expert, but I would bet that your computer was infected, and the virus or worm caused your computer to crash. The fact that you have to disable any firewalls in order to play PTW makes this the most likely possibility.

[Father Beast]

Originally posted by notyoueither


Sorry bud, you made this personal a long time ago with me. Now you do the same with someone who has been quite civil. You don't seem to be able to do anything else. You give strength to the arguement that there are very few ways to deal with trolls.

Fascinating quote, considering the source

[cavemanf16]

You guys are forgetting some things about MP though. I've got PTW, but because I use a very simple firewall to protect my Windows computer against virus', trojans, crackers, etc., PTW is so far unusable until I find the time to create some more advanced routing rules for my firewall.

Now you may be thinking I'm just lazy; surely I must have had to configure my firewall to allow other multiplayer games to connect. Wrong. CounterStrike and other games work just fine with my Cable connection protected by firewall, WITHOUT any advanced firewall routing. Firaxis chose a very poor method of implementing networking into PTW.

As it stands now, I'm waiting for another patch to come out just to solve some of the single player glaringly obvious bugs that there are. As another poster mentioned above, many companies these days have thrown out the Quality Assurance department for expediency's sake. That's bad, and so far I personally have had a far less than stellar experience with PTW.

[Cartouche Bee]

Originally posted by cavemanf16
You guys are forgetting some things about MP though. I've got PTW, but because I use a very simple firewall to protect my Windows computer against virus', trojans, crackers, etc., PTW is so far unusable until I find the time to create some more advanced routing rules for my firewall.

Now you may be thinking I'm just lazy; surely I must have had to configure my firewall to allow other multiplayer games to connect. Wrong. CounterStrike and other games work just fine with my Cable connection protected by firewall, WITHOUT any advanced firewall routing. Firaxis chose a very poor method of implementing networking into PTW.

As it stands now, I'm waiting for another patch to come out just to solve some of the single player glaringly obvious bugs that there are. As another poster mentioned above, many companies these days have thrown out the Quality Assurance department for expediency's sake. That's bad, and so far I personally have had a far less than stellar experience with PTW.

Are you using Linux for your firewall?

[yin26]

Somebody wake me up when the Gold Edition is released. Thanks.

--Yin

[WarpStorm]

Originally posted by cavemanf16
Firaxis chose a very poor method of implementing networking into PTW.

The funny thing is that is the method that Microsoft wants everyone to use since it's basically just DirectPlay (with the ports for GameSpy if you choose to use it).

[igloo_boy]

If you'd look closely at the "Reviews" page in every CGW, you might notice...

How Do We Rate? We review only finished games - no betas, no patches

So CGW rated PTW out of the box, unpatched. And the decision was, it a$$ sucked. PTW was released in a sorry state and suffered accordingly in its review. Personally, reviews like this are why I buy CGW. I want a review to tell me what I'm GETTING for my money, not the theoretical potential of a game if it gets patched. Besides, you can't honestly expect CGW to wait for the 1.29f patch before they review a game.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by igloo_boy
If you'd look closely at the "Reviews" page in every CGW, you might notice...

So CGW rated PTW out of the box, unpatched. And the decision was, it a$$ sucked. PTW was released in a sorry state and suffered accordingly in its review. Personally, reviews like this are why I buy CGW. I want a review to tell me what I'm GETTING for my money, not the theoretical potential of a game if it gets patched. Besides, you can't honestly expect CGW to wait for the 1.29f patch before they review a game.

You do have a point, but IMHO any reviewer should review the game "as is" at the moment he is reviewing it. What good is he doing to the reader otherwise? If CGW published a review on the very day PtW hit shelves, it would have been okay, but if they waited so long, it does not make any sense to me to review 1.01. A notice saying "patch needed, otherwise MP sucks" would be okay, but completely ignoring the latest patch simply does not seem reasonable to me.

[WarpStorm]

Interestingly, Computer Games Magazine waited a month and reviewed it in the 1.14f patched state. They gave it a 3 star rating and were very fair (IMHO) on the srengths and weaknesses of PTW. The strengths they listed were the massive improvements to single play. The weaknesses they listed were the bugginess and MP. They claimed that after patching MP was a little laggy, but quite playable. Their problem with it was that all Civ games take too long to play to be the multi-player experience they are looking for without changing the fundamental nature of Civ.

[I Am Jeff]

PC Gamer gave it a 68% score and only a 1/2 page review. (Note Civ III got a 92%).

One thing the reviewer said is that, "I've come to the conclusion that this game was just meant to be single-player."

He also says, "In the end, these additions are what we'd normally expect from a patch, not a $30 retail product. The fact that Civ III's online game was nearly unplayable before being patched is inexcusable, and even now further improvements need to be made to deal with the lag (scrolling and changing info screens are still very slow) and the crummy code (lost connections are common, and full-bore system crashes still occur)."

In the last paragraph he says, "I personaly think Civ III is a near-perfect single player game, and it seems only to suffer for the multiplayer element. BUt if you must 'play the world,' you might want to wait and 'play the patch.' "

I think Bert Salkmoor sums it up well. Single player is good, but multi is not. Plus the fact that PTW is not a $30 expansion, but instead should have been a patch.

[WarpStorm]

I just never understand the philosophy that any new content should be free. The new civs and single player additions and tweaks alone probably cost Firaxis at least a quarter of a million dollars to make (this is a guess based on the rate for programmers and artists in the US and the general overhead costs of running a business). This is not counting the MP at all.

Why should they give that away for free?

[Tiberius]

I also don't understand where does this "it should be free" idea come from. Do you recently go into stores and say to the salesperson: "I won't buy this because this should be free" ???!! What kind of philosophy is that? Why are you so angry then when poor people from poor countries use pirated software/games when many people from your own rich America want free software

Edited an embarrasing typo.

[MC Hawking]

Re: OMG!!! Computer Gaming World review

1 star? that's insane

[Azeem]

I never play multiplayer (because I'd have to deal with cheaters, backstabbers, and hotheaded people that take something as simple as a game too personally) and play only single player. After some very bad experiences playing online, I avoid online gaming.

I think PtW's single play is absolutely great (although I prefer modding it myself to make the game even more enjoyable). Although it has many flaws, I think PtW deserves at least 4 stars for single play. I'd give Civ3 only 3.5 stars though, since it was extremely buggy on my computer.

BTW, some of you people really need to calm down and stop taking things personally. I've seen worse on the old Black&White and Diablo II forums, though. This is a GAME not real life. Get out of the virtual world and come back to the real world, OK?