390 réponses à ce sujet

[Frogman1975]

Abriael_CG wrote...

Frogman1975 wrote...

I'm not defending the release of buggy content. But it's been pretty well established in many other forum posts on this topic that the team working on DLC is in no way related to, or technically capable of working on, patches. Two different teams with different educations, professional backgrounds, and experience.

This is quite an oversimplification of the issue. While it's partly true (very partly), it's also true that professional game development isn't made of airtight compartments like some would like to believe. There are quite a lot of tasks that are very compatible and quite a lot of individuals that can be redirected to similar tasks in different teams.

Unless you're a writer or an artist (and writers and artists aren't for sure the only professionals involved in the creation of a fully working DLC, especially one that changes the mechanics of the game and introduces new ones like the silly Darkspawn DLC), if you're qualified to do only ONE thing, you won't go very far in professional game development. Flexibility is one of the most sought-upon qualifications in this industry.

Saying that Bioware couldn't redirect most of their development resources to working on the patch (if they didn't want to just generate more revenue) is, I'm afraid, a quite blind oversimplification. Just to make an easy example, all the new DLC we have to pay for need to be tested before being released, and testers are the most needed individuals to the (obviously overly small) team that's working on patching the game.

Well, yeah. Framers and finishers can both wield a hammer and drive a nail. Doesn't mean I want the young'un who was good enough to put my house under roof to use those same clumsy hammer skills to put down my hardwood floor. Or that I would pull my finishers off their project to come put a house under roof when we can pull anyone with basic hammer skills in to do that work.

Patches, if they aren't going to cause other conflicts with existing code, require finesse. Of course my explanation was a simplification (anyone who isn't in the BioWare offices is only offering an educated guess anyway), but it cuts to the essence of what folks have said in other forum posts.

That's it. I don't want to argue and beat a semantic horse. I'm not saying "drink this BW kool-aid and don't have an opinion." I'm just saying, I don't want the folks with limited coding experience working on the patch. I want the "master craftsmen" (to push my new carpentry analogy).

[PanosSmirnakos]

Zy-El wrote...

The game as-is works for MOST people.  That's the only point I wanted to make.

Of course the game works! We're not talking about a home made mod here which is broken and no one gives a s.... That's not the point! But DA:O is buggy. Awakening is super buggy. Have you ever played Awakening? Check out Qwinn's unofficial DA:O fixpack and the long list of quest & dialogue related bugs.

http://social.biowar...ussions#details

These Origins bugs are not gamebreaking, but they stop you to enjoy the game to its fullest pontential. 

Although Awakening is way shorter than Origins, I'm sure it has a longer list of bugs and they are more annoying. 

Being a blind Biowarian disciple / defender / zealot won't push Bioware to improve their products in the future, or fix the existing ones. The forthcoming patch is real because of ppl complaints and observations about the working state of the game.

[BrunoB1971]

Zy-El wrote...

BrunoB1971 wrote...

Zy-El wrote...
The MAJORITY of players can play this game and enjoy it.  How do I know that?  Sales figures don't lie.  If it were the other way around and most people could not enjoy this game, do you honestly think it would have made a profit or become #1 game of the year?  And if it was not profitable, why would Bioware continue to make DLC?  They know full well that players who don't have DA working, will not buy any DLC.  They've already taken this into consideration.  Therefore, DLC are profitable and therefore, DA is profitable.  Ergo, Dragon Age works for the majority of players.

So, you boycotting DA products has already been factored in.  You are non-sequitor as far as their marketing is concerned.

Wrong assumptions:

A lot of people DO NOT take the time to come here and complain, a lot of people dont want to be bothered with the process of coming here and complain or are just too plain lazy to do it and have moved on to other games.

Thus you will not be able to tell exactly how many people are able to play the game properly. Just because someone does not say anything means that the game is fine and the same thing goes for snob people who whine at the restaurant when their fork is not at the proper place on the table or complain about anything and everything. And ther are some peole who see ghosts everywhere and tend to overreact, I am sure that if everyone who bought a copy would actually come and chime in in this forum, it would be a "lot" busier than this.

Another aspect of the game selling a good bunch of copies is that EA has a lot of money to keep Dragon age in your face, trust me on this. ( dlc's are just one example) so no matter what even if it is broken people might and will buy it because they want to try it and if it does not work they will just shelve it.

The game here is to sell the base game ( origins)  that is what EA is after..if the can entice you enough to buy the game because you heard about a DLC months later then they have won. It is business and it keeps going round and round...they know that if you buy origins you are likely to buy the rest of the mods too.

so there you have it, the people who do no talk about anything and the people who talk about everything. It is up to Bioware to judge  who is right and who is wrong and slash in the middle and what is truth and rumours and myths about their game.

So far having been here almost form the start, most of what people have said is getting fixed right now...so that many people can't be wrong...and like an iceberg, the fans here are only the tip of the fanbase who bought the game. so no sales alone will not tell you that the game works fine or not.

nuff said

The game as-is works for MOST people.  That's the only point I wanted to make.

You may be entirely right and i may be wrong and vice versa, i respect your opinion.

But by the same token if bioware is fixing the game to that extent, it would mean that they have acknowledge that the game is in fact somewhat defective otherwise they would not patch the game just because i say the X part of the game has a bug.

The install base should be the same for everyone so everyone should technically and logically have the same problems....( and i say technically in broad sense here) i am not talking of the effects your hardware may have on your game but the software( everybody has the same game code)...

But some people chiming here "may" fail to mention that they might have "modded" their game with unofficial mods that fix problem or enhances the game therefore altering the original software...at that point you cannot claim that the game is fine if you have installed..let's say Qwinn's patch because his mod fixes some issues that are still in the original code of the game and are workaround the coding of the game.

So if you say that your game is fine and you are using mods, then you are not telling the entire story and are not helping anyone.

By the same token, if you are not using any mods at all then count your lucky stars and be happy that you have a nice ride so far...no offense...


nuff said...

[Zy-El]

I was able to play Origins and Awakening fine without any mods. Since then, I have installed Qwinn's fixpatch. I never said the game was perfect; it has bugs. I acknowledge that.

I believe that MOST people, even those without mods, can play this game. And that is why DA continues to be a success for Bioware and as a result of that success (and the feedback from players) this patch is coming to us.

[-Zippi-]

Zy-El wrote...

BrunoB1971 wrote...

Zy-El wrote...
The MAJORITY of players can play this game and enjoy it.  How do I know that?  Sales figures don't lie.  If it were the other way around and most people could not enjoy this game, do you honestly think it would have made a profit or become #1 game of the year?  And if it was not profitable, why would Bioware continue to make DLC?  They know full well that players who don't have DA working, will not buy any DLC.  They've already taken this into consideration.  Therefore, DLC are profitable and therefore, DA is profitable.  Ergo, Dragon Age works for the majority of players.

So, you boycotting DA products has already been factored in.  You are non-sequitor as far as their marketing is concerned.

Wrong assumptions:

A lot of people DO NOT take the time to come here and complain, a lot of people dont want to be bothered with the process of coming here and complain or are just too plain lazy to do it and have moved on to other games.

Thus you will not be able to tell exactly how many people are able to play the game properly. Just because someone does not say anything means that the game is fine and the same thing goes for snob people who whine at the restaurant when their fork is not at the proper place on the table or complain about anything and everything. And ther are some peole who see ghosts everywhere and tend to overreact, I am sure that if everyone who bought a copy would actually come and chime in in this forum, it would be a "lot" busier than this.

Another aspect of the game selling a good bunch of copies is that EA has a lot of money to keep Dragon age in your face, trust me on this. ( dlc's are just one example) so no matter what even if it is broken people might and will buy it because they want to try it and if it does not work they will just shelve it.

The game here is to sell the base game ( origins)  that is what EA is after..if the can entice you enough to buy the game because you heard about a DLC months later then they have won. It is business and it keeps going round and round...they know that if you buy origins you are likely to buy the rest of the mods too.

so there you have it, the people who do no talk about anything and the people who talk about everything. It is up to Bioware to judge  who is right and who is wrong and slash in the middle and what is truth and rumours and myths about their game.

So far having been here almost form the start, most of what people have said is getting fixed right now...so that many people can't be wrong...and like an iceberg, the fans here are only the tip of the fanbase who bought the game. so no sales alone will not tell you that the game works fine or not.

nuff said

The game as-is works for MOST people.  That's the only point I wanted to make.

I dont think it does, as everyone I know have crashing. Most of them only threw the game away and started playing something else though.

And even if it DID work for "MOST people", thats not good enough. It should work for everyone with a good enough PC.

And again: the game has a lot of horrible quest- and dialoguebugs that has to be fixed. EVERYONE have these bugs in the game. If you missed them, it was only luck.

Anyway; it looks like they are fixing it now which is great. Very happy to see that the Orzammar quest were included this time. Really hope we will se dialogefixes soon.

[Wicked 702]

The problem is that I didn't pay for a game I "can" play. Can is such a loose word unfortunately. Almost everyone here can play the game. Even if it crashes every 5 minutes you "can" play 5 minutes at a time.

We're essentially debating what level of "can" is reasonable. Many of us, me included, feel that we're not even close to where we need to be. It's a difference of opinion mostly.

[Abriael_CG]

Zy-El wrote...

I was able to play Origins and Awakening fine without any mods. Since then, I have installed Qwinn's fixpatch. I never said the game was perfect; it has bugs. I acknowledge that.
I believe that MOST people, even those without mods, can play this game. And that is why DA continues to be a success for Bioware and as a result of that success (and the feedback from players) this patch is coming to us.

behold the chant of faith! Are you related to the chantry perchance?

Anyone with any kind of of sense of realism, just by looking at the technical issues forums, would understand that sentences like "I believe that MOST people, even those without mods, can play this game" may be true only if you complete them with "while facing a lot of issues, crashes, problems and basically struggling to ignore all those kinds of things that make this an unfinished, unpolished and sub-par product quality wise, just for the sake of seeing the end". 
Unfortunately the Bioware defense force zaelots do nothing else than encouraging Bioware in believing that they can keep up releasing blatantly unfinished and unpolished products, and then trickling down "too little too late" support while getting even more undeserved revenue with DLCs, while many people can't even play the original game in decent conditions.

[Zy-El]

I said the game WORKS for most people - meaning that they can get through the game from beginning to end.  I did not say that the game is without bugs.  I did not say the game was perfect.  You're reading into my posts what you want to see in order to pick a fight.  Sounds like sour grapes - it irks you that the game actually works for someone else.
I'm glad they're working on a patch.  On that, we can agree . . . if nothing else. 

Modifié par Zy-El, 29 juin 2010 - 09:55 .

[MaxQuartiroli]

Zy-El wrote...

Wicked 702 wrote...
The problem is that I didn't pay for a game I "can" play. Can is such a loose word unfortunately. Almost everyone here can play the game. Even if it crashes every 5 minutes you "can" play 5 minutes at a time.
We're essentially debating what level of "can" is reasonable. Many of us, me included, feel that we're not even close to where we need to be. It's a difference of opinion mostly.

The word is "WORKS".  I didn't use the word "can". 

I said the game WORKS for most people - meaning that they can get through the game from beginning to end.  I did not say that the game is without bugs.  I did not say the game was perfect.  You're reading into my posts what you want to see in order to pick a fight.

I'm glad they're working on a patch.  On that, we can agree. 

I don't wanna pick a fight but I'd like to say that being able to play a game from the beginning to the end is not enough for to consider a game "working"...

I can be happy that my Origins story was right from the beginning to the end, but just because I was lucky.. and because the choices I made allowed me to build a story which didn't encounter any bug or inconsistency.. but it was just by chance

But I have heard of players romancing Zevran who didn't get the proper dialogues in the last part of the game
I have heard of poeple who killed Alistair or Loghain and suddenly they reappeared in their Awakening playtrough
I have heard of people who wasn't able to complete Velanna's quest 'cause it doesn't trigger
I have heard of people who wasn't able to complete Sigrun quest due to a bug...and I am one of them...

None of these things prevent you from finish the game.....and from see the end, but for some kind of player like me these are things that can ruin your entir game when they happen...

Modifié par MaxQuartiroli, 29 juin 2010 - 10:41 .

[ladydesire]

Abriael_CG wrote...


behold the chant of faith! Are you related to the chantry perchance?

Anyone with any kind of of sense of realism, just by looking at the technical issues forums, would understand that sentences like "I believe that MOST people, even those without mods, can play this game" may be true only if you complete them with "while facing a lot of issues, crashes, problems and basically struggling to ignore all those kinds of things that make this an unfinished, unpolished and sub-par product quality wise, just for the sake of seeing the end".

Thank you for your opinion; if I wasn't someone that read the forums and saw all the lists of bugs, I wouldn't have even know those things were supposed to be in the game; I'm sure that is true of a lot of players.
 

Unfortunately the Bioware defense force zaelots do nothing else than encouraging Bioware in believing that they can keep up releasing blatantly unfinished and unpolished products, and then trickling down "too little too late" support while getting even more undeserved revenue with DLCs, while many people can't even play the original game in decent conditions.

Our "zealotry" has very little to do with the quality of the games released by any developer; that is more something that the publisher has influence over. It's also false to assume that, without visible response, a developer is ignoring the lists of problems with the game to push out extra content and that if the developer wasn't producing that content, the staff working on it would be available to fix bugs. I may not have ever worked in the software industry, but I've seen what happens when a parent company believes one of its subsidiaries has "excess staff".

[Wicked 702]

I'm confused now. Not sure if any of these responses are meant to be directed at me...

However, my post was one of the more diplomatic ones I've ever written. If I wanted to start a fight, you'd know it.

[Zy-El]

MaxQuartiroli wrote...
I don't wanna pick a fight but I'd like to say that being able to play a game from the beginning to the end is not enough for to consider a game "working"...

I can be happy that my story was right from the beginning to the end, but just because I was lucky.. and because the choices I made allowed me to build a story which didn't encounter any bug or inconsistency.. but it was just by chance

But I have heard of players romancing Zevran who didn't get the proper dialogues in the last part of the game
I have heard of poeple who killed Alistair or Loghain and suddenly they reappeared in their Awakening playtrough
I have heard of people who wasn't able to complete Velanna's quest 'cause it doesn't trigger
I have heard of people who wasn't able to complete Sigrun quest due to a bug...

None of these things prevent you from finish the game.....and from see the end, but for some kind of player like me these are things that can ruin your entir game when they happen...

Your points are valid - I did notice some of these things but they did not impact my gaming experience as much as it did you.  Your issues are no less valid. 

I bought Awakening but refrained from installing it for over a month because of all the tales of woe I was reading on these forums.  Finally, I decided to bite the bullet and installed Awakening.  I was fully expecting to see "fire and brimstone" rain down on me when I started up DA.  But, as such, I was quite astonished that I was able to import my Origins character and start an Awakening campaign.  I recruited all the companions and had them go through the Joining.  Did all the major and side quests.  The only major bug I encountered was the repeating Mother death sequence and that only happen on my first play-through and not since.  For me, the game WORKED.

I don't think I'm alone in this experience. 

[Zy-El]

Wicked 702 wrote...
I'm confused now. Not sure if any of these responses are meant to be directed at me...
However, my post was one of the more diplomatic ones I've ever written. If I wanted to start a fight, you'd know it.

Maybe I just read you wrong.  I believe you.  Try to smile a little, eh? 

[Wicked 702]

Zy-El wrote...

Wicked 702 wrote...
I'm confused now. Not sure if any of these responses are meant to be directed at me...
However, my post was one of the more diplomatic ones I've ever written. If I wanted to start a fight, you'd know it.

Maybe I just read you wrong.  I believe you.  Try to smile a little, eh? 

My only regret is that the character creator for the Xbox version doesn't allow you to change the mouth expressions to something more suitable. A nice menacing scowl would really have given my avatar the perfect look.

[Abriael_CG]

ladydesire wrote...
Our "zealotry" has very little to do with the quality of the games released by any developer; that is more something that the publisher has influence over. It's also false to assume that, without visible response, a developer is ignoring the lists of problems with the game to push out extra content and that if the developer wasn't producing that content, the staff working on it would be available to fix bugs. I may not have ever worked in the software industry, but I've seen what happens when a parent company believes one of its subsidiaries has "excess staff".

Blaming the "publisher" or the "ebil suits of doom!" is one of the most common excuses, and one of the most reeking of denial and delusion. "It's EA's fault!". Sorry but no. The duty of a professional developer is to work within the publisher's bounds in order to provide a complete and enjoyable product. It's really that simple.
Bioware failed in that, and it's Bioware's responsibility alone. Many EA branded products get released with no major problems and patched in decent or even quick timeframes, so it's entirely possible, and DA's sad state is not EA's responsibility.

Fanboy zaelotry has a few results, and none of them positive. They normally manage nothing else than encouraging developers to think that no matter how bad they fail, they will still have support because "they're popular", they inflame further the people that suffer from legit issue with their mindless developer cheering, and ultimately they hinder the provlem solving process with their habit to minimize the problem, creating lots of unneed radio noise.
As a quite well known and popular game director said, there's nothing more detrimental for a game's quality and it's development than the fanboys.

[MaxQuartiroli]

Zy-El wrote...

Your points are valid - I did notice some of these things but they did not impact my gaming experience as much as it did you.  Your issues are no less valid. 

I bought Awakening but refrained from installing it for over a month because of all the tales of woe I was reading on these forums.  Finally, I decided to bite the bullet and installed Awakening.  I was fully expecting to see "fire and brimstone" rain down on me when I started up DA.  But, as such, I was quite astonished that I was able to import my Origins character and start an Awakening campaign.  I recruited all the companions and had them go through the Joining.  Did all the major and side quests.  The only major bug I encountered was the repeating Mother death sequence and that only happen on my first play-through and not since.  For me, the game WORKED.

I don't think I'm alone in this experience. 

I am sure you are not alone but I bet you are into a priviliged group of lucky people...

I am  for example one of the player that couldn't finish Sigrun quest 'cause there is a bug that occures if you complete a side quest in Amaranthine which prevent the quest from triggering..The end for Sigrun is really worse if you finish the game without completing her quest... Considering she is one of my favourite companions I was very angry about this thing... therefore I can say my game didn't work well.. Not "didn't work" but "didn't work WELL"...

Ok... on the second playtrough I knew this and I managed to avoid this, but it's not nice that you have to play your game always thinking about the order/way in which you have to do the things just to avoid some bugs.. It is so... unnatural and it breakes your immersion into the story... 

And even if I consider the story the most important thing into the game, I find it wasn't nice that for play Awakening (and also Origins after patch 1.03) I had to disable all sounds and video effects on a PC which has nearly double the required specs.. In that case my experience wasn't ruined but for the second time I cannot really say that my game worked well...

Modifié par MaxQuartiroli, 29 juin 2010 - 10:45 .

[Frogman1975]

I never use mods. My game has some bugs, but I've played through the entire original campaign twice and Awakening a little over halfway, but I stopped because I seemed to be hiiting one of those bugs I hear about toward the end of the game, with Sigrun's quest and so I'm waiting on a patch to finish. Just in case.

*edit*

Shoot. Just did some digging and apparently I have experienced the bug that both makes it impossible to get Sigrun's personal quest because I did Law and Order before I ever got her as a companion, and I won't be able to allow her to join the Wardens because of the order I did quests in. Dang. Looks like I'm going to have to start my Awakening campaign over again unless the patch fixes these things retroactively for "in-progress" games.

Modifié par Frogman1975, 29 juin 2010 - 11:48 .

[Frogman1975]

Wicked 702 wrote...

I'm confused now. Not sure if any of these responses are meant to be directed at me...
However, my post was one of the more diplomatic ones I've ever written. If I wanted to start a fight, you'd know it.

I'd guess she was talking about the guy who comes up with some way to quibble even when you agree with him.

Modifié par Frogman1975, 29 juin 2010 - 11:15 .

[Frogman1975]

So. I guess my question now is; the personal quests are going to be fixed in the patch. But does this apply retroactively to games in progress, or just to new games? (Will I have to start a new Awakening game to get the complete Sigrun experience?)

Modifié par Frogman1975, 29 juin 2010 - 11:49 .

[Gr8Horned1]

Good question Frogman1975......I'd like to know the answer to that myself.

[Wicked 702]

The same could also be asked about the corrupt saves bug on the 360. I'm sure there are some that would find that information very helpful.

[Darth_Trethon]

Man I really badly want the Sentinel Armor and Vigilance Sword textures fixed.....but the BioWare dev who posted on the forums that the issue will be fixed, Michael Lang, no longer has a BioWare badge on his Social Network account.....this is troubling because that means nobody who currently acknowledges the problem has a BioWare badge.



Additional fixes I'd like to see are:



1) The Dwarf origins not being able to keep the preorder and DLC items we start the game with. I WANT to play these origins but I never will until this is fixed.

2) The LCE exclusive helmet Bergen's Helmet also has broken textures and looks like the Templar helmet.



If all of the above would be fixed along with the announced fixes the 360 and PS3 versions of DAO would essentially be absolutely flawless.

[13Dannyboy13]

I really doubt that the corrupted saves can be salvaged on the 360, there's no telling how much of the data stored in the save is corrupted. I deleted all mine when I got the corruption, even got a few characters finished again, but gave up on the game when the expansion came out before a real patch, I don't really count 1.03 seeing as how it broke more than it fixed.

As for the argument about different teams doing patches and dlc, i think the issue is resources, not how many people are working on the different things. They have a limited amount of resources, and have until now chosen to focus on dlc. It's taken over eight months for this patch, which still has no release date, had they focused on fixes instead of dlc I think we could've seen this patch months ago, but in the end it's a business, and making money will always win out over anything else. Let's just hope this patch is their first step in gaining back some of the confidence that many long time fans have lost in them.

[BrunoB1971]

from what i understand about saves is that the accumulation of your stats would be included in the save file to make up your character. it is the sum of all you did so far in the game..it is highly unlikely that any patch would miraculously erase or properly re-trigger what you have missed due to bugs you encountered. I've never seen this so far anyways...

I would say that most people will have to restart from scratch..from origins to awakening and anywhere in between. That is why i am holding off at this time. Until i get a lot of positive feedback from people here there is no point of even touching the game until it is fixed even tough i crave to play the game. And if i was Bio, i would apologize for this but also not even attempt to correct or to fix corrupt or bugged saves because it would create too much of a raucus ...

Modifié par BrunoB1971, 30 juin 2010 - 01:07 .

[element eater]

hopefully they will take a good look at the list u put on page one and get as much of those done as possible

that quest updating issue is another particularly annoying bug iive encountered hope u get that one the patch list too

Modifié par element eater, 30 juin 2010 - 01:22 .