128 réponses à ce sujet

[Malanek]

Lyssistr wrote...

Malanek999 wrote...

Because they can't guarantee a patch is solid. If people are happy with what they have you do not want to force them to upgrade into something that might give them a worse gaming experience.

Despite popular belief, patches are meant to improve gaming experience.

I'm not disputing this at all. No one intentionally releases a bug. But intention has nothing to do with it, they happen. The last two DA:O patches have in some ways been regressions. The game was much more stable after the second patch. Bioware shouldn't be forcing people onto the new patch when the user can make that decision for themself.

Modifié par Malanek999, 04 août 2010 - 03:06 .

[wolfwarp]

Vicious wrote...

Everyone on internet forums hate Bioware, Blizzard, and Bethesda.

Their games however make huge gobs of money and recieve critical and commercial appeal.

Internet forums rock.

The word "everyone" maybe a bit bias. I do agree that not all games from some of these companies deserve a critical rating.

[Saibh]

Lyssistr wrote...

wolfwarp wrote...

I am an avid PC gamer, played quite a number of PC games in different genre. Dragon Age remains as one of the lousiest experience because of the recent patches, although it is indeed a good game. This is unfortunate.

I sincerely hope the following changes in the franchise.

1. Patch up the game fast. Rather than keep on releasing DLCs while taking 4 months to release yet another bad patch.

2. Auto push the patches to the PC game client.

3. Auto send the error reports generated after each crash to BioWare team for immediate investigation. It is not efficient to ask gamers to copy and paste and supply ino manually via the PC support forum.

The above are the standard features from Blizzard games like WoW and SC 2.

I'll add, 

4. Make a store, where after registering your game, be it retail or digital download key, you can download it as many times as you want. Has proven quite convenient for Diablo II, Warcraft III and WoW. Blizz's store is also cross-OS, if you buy a mac, you download the mac version, if then you buy a PC you have access to PC version and so on.

Again. Online game--if they force you to have one particular registered account, then it ensures you don't repeatedly download it onto your friends' computers and give everyone a copy of the same game for free.

[Lyssistr]

Maverick827 wrote...
Sorry, "all things considered" was a bit vague.  Saibh already said it: this is what MMOs do because thy have to, Blizzard isn't really much better than most, given this as well as their income, in patching errors (in fact, I would say they are worse when it comes to patching content in the sense of class balances and fixes).

 I haven't played another mmo, apart from a very tiny bit of everquest, however comparing patching in games separated >5 yrs is not meaningful (WoW still wins). However, I've played quite a few non-mmo games, many of them with online co-op and I haven't found any of them to be as frequently patches as WoW.

 I can't say who is best per income dollar, but overall, Blizz is best at patching.

 Fixes are fine, now class balancing is complex, you have pve, pvp and arenas, it's fairly impossible to balance every class perfectly around all three gameplay aspects. Truth is all classes are good, despite popular belief in official forums. Overall, I think it's fairly good and people tell me it's even better these days -yes, I've quit-. Anyhow class balancing in WoW is a never ending topic and not quite relevant to DA2, if you want to discuss it more, I'm happy to be more specific in PMs.

[Sable Rhapsody]

Lyssistr wrote...

 Fixes are fine, now class balancing is complex, you have pve, pvp and arenas, it's fairly impossible to balance every class perfectly around all three gameplay aspects. Truth is all classes are good, despite popular belief in official forums. Overall, I think it's fairly good and people tell me it's even better these days -yes, I've quit-. Anyhow class balancing in WoW is a never ending topic and not quite relevant to DA2, if you want to discuss it more, I'm happy to be more specific in PMs.

I've always wondered a bit about the obsession with class balancing in single-player campaigns.  It makes perfect sense for an MMO to fret about balance--in fact, it's one of my prime worries for TOR simply because previous BioWare games have had balance problems.  But I think in a single-player game, it's not a concern unless it's truly horrible.  There were balance problems in ME2--the Widow comes to mind--but it didn't make certain companions or classes a must-have to play the game.  Unlike in DA:O, where the mage was so egregiously out of balance compared to the other classes that you literally had to have one to finish the game, at least on PC.

[Lyssistr]

Saibh wrote...

Again. Online game--if they force you to have one particular registered account, then it ensures you don't repeatedly download it onto your friends' computers and give everyone a copy of the same game for free.

 Not quite, e.g. Diablo I is available from their store, in principle you could do what you say (iirc only lan multi in D1). Also some of these (Warcraft RTS games, Diablo hack & slash and Starcraft RTS) have pretty long and cool single player campaigns. Yet, you can re-download as many times as you like, but you can do that anyhow with most forms of digital stores.

 This can potentially be misused e.g. in Steam you can download all games at a friends computer, force Steam to start in offline mode and change your password. but I think their point for making this kind of store is that, they want paying customers to have as much convenience as possible. People who won't to pay, will get their games illegally anyhow, depriving paying customers from a shop of this style is only making things less convenient for those who payed.

 

Modifié par Lyssistr, 04 août 2010 - 03:26 .

[Lyssistr]

Sable Rhapsody wrote...

Lyssistr wrote...

 Fixes are fine, now class balancing is complex, you have pve, pvp and arenas, it's fairly impossible to balance every class perfectly around all three gameplay aspects. Truth is all classes are good, despite popular belief in official forums. Overall, I think it's fairly good and people tell me it's even better these days -yes, I've quit-. Anyhow class balancing in WoW is a never ending topic and not quite relevant to DA2, if you want to discuss it more, I'm happy to be more specific in PMs.

I've always wondered a bit about the obsession with class balancing in single-player campaigns.  It makes perfect sense for an MMO to fret about balance--in fact, it's one of my prime worries for TOR simply because previous BioWare games have had balance problems.  But I think in a single-player game, it's not a concern unless it's truly horrible.  There were balance problems in ME2--the Widow comes to mind--but it didn't make certain companions or classes a must-have to play the game.  Unlike in DA:O, where the mage was so egregiously out of balance compared to the other classes that you literally had to have one to finish the game, at least on PC.

don't want to get off-topic, -this is a nice thread with some cool points- I'II PM u.

[Lyssistr]

Malanek999 wrote...
I'm not disputing this at all. No one intentionally releases a bug. But intention has nothing to do with it, they happen. The last two DA:O patches have in some ways been regressions. The game was much more stable after the second patch. Bioware shouldn't be forcing people onto the new patch when the user can make that decision for themself.

Again, in WoW you can roll back patches, if you don't want the latest patch in a single player game, just roll back.

[wolfwarp]

Malanek999 wrote...

Lyssistr wrote...

Malanek999 wrote...

Because they can't guarantee a patch is solid. If people are happy with what they have you do not want to force them to upgrade into something that might give them a worse gaming experience.

Despite popular belief, patches are meant to improve gaming experience.

I'm not disputing this at all. No one intentionally releases a bug. But intention has nothing to do with it, they happen. The last two DA:O patches have in some ways been regressions. The game was much more stable after the second patch. Bioware shouldn't be forcing people onto the new patch when the user can make that decision for themself.

While I agree that no one intentionally releases a bug, the quality of the past two patches as well as the time taken to create them is less than ideal. And rolling back to 1.02 is only an option if you wish to cut yourself out from Awakening onwards.

You are aware that patch 1.03 is forced upon many of us who wish to progress with the expansion and DLCs, yes?

[Saibh]

Lyssistr wrote...

Saibh wrote...

Again. Online game--if they force you to have one particular registered account, then it ensures you don't repeatedly download it onto your friends' computers and give everyone a copy of the same game for free.

 Not quite, e.g. Diablo I is available from their store, in principle you could do what you say (iirc only lan multi in D1). Also some of these (Warcraft RTS games, Diablo hack & slash and Starcraft RTS) have pretty long and cool single player campaigns. Yet, you can re-download as many times as you like, but you can do that anyhow with most forms of digital stores.

 This can potentially be misused e.g. in Steam you can download all games at a friends computer, force Steam to start in offline mode and change your password. but I think their point for making this kind of store is that, they want paying customers to have as much convenience as possible. People who won't to pay, will get their games illegally anyhow, depriving paying customers from a shop of this style is only making things less convenient for those who payed.

 

I'm loathe to argue this point with you, since I know you know more about Blizzard than I do, but I have to disagree that they should allow eternal downloading. It's incredibly easy to exploit something like that, and I really really don't think it would solve the piracy crisis, or really affect it in any way.

[Malanek]

wolfwarp wrote...
While I agree that no one intentionally releases a bug, the quality of the past two patches as well as the time taken to create them is less than ideal. And rolling back to 1.02 is only an option if you wish to cut yourself out from Awakening onwards.

You are aware that patch 1.03 is forced upon many of us who wish to progress with the expansion and DLCs, yes?

Yes, I am completely aware of it and that is the only reason I haven't rolled back to 1.02. The point is bugs do come out in new patches and I would not normally patch immediately if I had a choice about it and was happy with the version I had.

[wolfwarp]

Maverick827 wrote...

Lyssistr wrote...

Maverick827 wrote...

While I agree that BioWare should focus more on fixing errors than pumping out DLC (especially considering many errors are simply typos on one line of code), I was not aware that Blizzard invented the concept of patching.
I would also disagree that (after years of playing WoW) they are especially great in this department, all things considered.

I think their patching is the best I've seen. Nothing's perfect and "perfect" is not necessarily what you or I want to see. Overall, I can't think of a game whose patches are as frequent & good as WoW.

Sorry, "all things considered" was a bit vague.  Saibh already said it: this is what MMOs do because thy have to, Blizzard isn't really much better than most, given this as well as their income, in patching errors (in fact, I would say they are worse when it comes to patching content in the sense of class balances and fixes).

Well, I am not sure if you are aware the fact that once a bug is reported in the WoW forum, the fix comes within days if not hours. I have personally waited 4 months+ for patch 1.04, was used to checking the forum for patch release everyday. And still, patch 1.04 is not great.

As for class balancing, everyone has an opinion, be it as pvp or pve. Most want an I WIN button. But these patches are not bug fixes.

Modifié par wolfwarp, 04 août 2010 - 04:10 .

[Lyssistr]

Saibh wrote...

I'm loathe to argue this point with you, since I know you know more about Blizzard than I do, but I have to disagree that they should allow eternal downloading. It's incredibly easy to exploit something like that, and I really really don't think it would solve the piracy crisis, or really affect it in any way.

 An online store is not about solving the piracy crisis, it's about convenience for proper customers. If the store didn't exist at all, it would be as easy to find Blizz's games illegally -and yes even WoW which is an mmo can get pirated and pirate servers do exist-.

 The point of the store is to make things convenient to those that actually paid the game. People that can pay, and any adult in a developed country can afford one game (s)he really likes, will do it without second thoughts if they know they'll be "rewarded" for doing so.

 Anyhow this is about piracy and not directly related to Bioware offering more services, still I haven't seen any evidence for an online store pushing piracy high. My personal experience is that I think less when buying a Blizz game because I can re-download it whenever I want from wherever I want, as many times I want, even if I lose my DVD (you need to keep your keys tho, e.g. in google docs).

[WilliamShatner]

Ariella wrote...

Just to point out that the DLC allows for a budget for DAO to continue patching, much like subscriptions do for WoW. Thing is WoW has a 11 million or so player base paying 15 bucks a month while the DLCs range between 5-7 dollars, plus whatever cut Sony and MS get for the console market.

Patching (ie, after release support) is part of the software development life cycle and should be budgeted for within the scope of the initial product.

[Fishy]

Unless bioware pull off a steam or a battle.net.
I realy doubt it

They're to focused with console and DLC

[Lyssistr]

Suprez30 wrote...

Unless bioware pull off a steam or a battle.net.
I realy doubt it

They're to focused with console and DLC

Bioware is exactly the kind of company that can pull a steam or a battle.net. Valve or Blizzard are not on a different order of magnitude, Bio is a heavyweight in PC gaming and is the only one of my 3 favorite companies not having their own store so far (EA store doesn't count).

and also... doesn't make native Mac games 

[KingDan97]

The issue that you evidently don't grasp is that PC players are no longer the only players. If you get frequent updates then they want them. They won't except that the Microsoft infrastructure on the Xbox doesn't support it, so either Bioware is equal on patches to all their fanbases or they deal with a sh*tstorm so far as gaming media goes.

[Fishy]

Lyssistr wrote...

Suprez30 wrote...

Unless bioware pull off a steam or a battle.net.
I realy doubt it

They're to focused with console and DLC

Bioware is exactly the kind of company that can pull a steam or a battle.net. Valve or Blizzard are not on a different order of magnitude, Bio is a heavyweight in PC gaming and is the only one of my 3 favorite companies not having their own store so far (EA store doesn't count).

and also... doesn't make native Mac games 

Not the same market . Valve and Blizzard are focused on multiplayer since the neanderthal age of PC gaming.
Bioware it's mostly  focused on single player .. Okay maybe not anymore with starwars but hey .. we will see
(evil laugh)

[Lyssistr]

Suprez30 wrote...

Not the same market . Valve and Blizzard are focused on multiplayer since the neanderthal age of PC gaming.
Bioware it's mostly  focused on single player .. Okay maybe not anymore with starwars but hey .. we will see
(evil laugh)

I for one, would be very happy to see Bioware add multi-coop to their games. I read many posts saying that going coop would betray "true rpgs" and stuff. However, these posters seem to forget that BG/BGII had multi and both were pretty strong RPGs.

[DespiertaLosNinos]

#5 of what Bioware should learn from Blizzard: Take 8-10 years to make a sequel.

[Saibh]

Lyssistr wrote...

Suprez30 wrote...

Not the same market . Valve and Blizzard are focused on multiplayer since the neanderthal age of PC gaming.
Bioware it's mostly  focused on single player .. Okay maybe not anymore with starwars but hey .. we will see
(evil laugh)

I for one, would be very happy to see Bioware add multi-coop to their games. I read many posts saying that going coop would betray "true rpgs" and stuff. However, these posters seem to forget that BG/BGII had multi and both were pretty strong RPGs.

The problem with co-op for single player RPGs is that it just doesn't fit anywhere. When it's included, it's included to appease people and widen the demographic. Like Bioshock 2. It doesn't add to the experience of the RPG, and only serves to take time and money away from the things we actually care about.

[Stoomkal]

Vicious wrote...

Everyone on internet forums hate Bioware, Blizzard, and Bethesda.

Their games however make huge gobs of money and recieve critical and commercial appeal.

Internet forums rock.

...

Well... that is odd.

I bought a copy of "Fallout 3" because every internet game review gave it a "9" or higher. Once I played it I found I had 3-5 crashes per day... on a console.

I have actually kept this disk, because I regard F3 as the ultimate example of incomplete software. It is practically a drink coaster.

If I had gone to an internet message board, then *everyone* would have told me that you cannot buy a Bethesda game without multiple crashes per day... great.

... and...

If we are talking about Bioware and how they implement patches, then remember this: Baldur's Gate, KotoR and Mass Effect had very, very limited patches. They only make one or two patches per game, and have a corporate system that wants to get all issues sorted in one big go... it is awful.

It means you have to put up with issues longer because they really want to release a patch at the last possible minute. It fixes more problems, but leaves many issues.

As others have said, I have waited *four months* for a patch to make Bioware software even playable... and whlie I was waiting, they have tried to sell me three different DLCs...

I think this is bad.

[Lyssistr]

Saibh wrote...

The problem with co-op for single player RPGs is that it just doesn't fit anywhere. When it's included, it's included to appease people and widen the demographic. Like Bioshock 2. It doesn't add to the experience of the RPG, and only serves to take time and money away from the things we actually care about.

 I haven't played Bioshock 2, so I'll have to go with BG/BG II as an example. It was the same game basically, you could just play it with friends, besides the usual solo play. It didn't really remove anything from the game, I admit that turn based is not the best platform for multi, but still playing with friends made up for that.

[Bryy_Miller]

Riona45 wrote...

Blumbum wrote...

Except Blizzard is garbage and a shell of a company compared to what it use to be. Unfortunately Bioware is going down the same road.

Aren't you just a beam of sunshine.

Didn't anyone tell you that every game company instantly becomes the bane of the earth once it is bought by a larger game company?

[Riona45]

Bryy_Miller wrote...

Didn't anyone tell you that every game company instantly becomes the bane of the earth once it is bought by a larger game company?

Actually yes, I did get that impression.  But I couldn't resist making my response.