H6 Patching Policy

[Avonu]

And doing stupid things, in previous instalments, is a petty offence compared to NOT DOING ANYTHING AT ALL. I am talking about the AI suddenly stop doing anything and just passing the turn, until some unknown trigger wakes it up. Not even H4, had such problems which was shipped unfinished.

HV has it. In first month AI is aggressive but when this time pass it sitting in own castle and is doing nothing.
Also in HV AI is cheating like hell - it never fight with neutral armies, just go near them and enemies are gone, not losses at all for AI. IIRC it also have a huge amount of resources income.

The problem with HV and HVI is that AI desing was last step in game creation instead of focusing on it all the time from begining. If these game were design around AI at first place, not graphics, then maybe we will have at least descent computer opponent.


Well, maybe I played too much in GalCiv so my vision of game AI is"corrupted" by these games.

[hellegennes]

I am not talking about sitting in the castle. When I say "stop doing anything", I literally mean it. I have played all the skirmish maps and sometimes this happens. For example it has a hero going for a mine in one turn, and stop responding after that, just passing its turn. Sometimes it wakes up after a few turns and resumes playing; some others you just have to exit the game and reload.

[Avonu]

I don't think it's AI fault. It looks for me more like problem with scripts, you know like when effect of Week of Festivals not end after it ends and like other scripts which are not working in campaign (unless you load game).
It's more like problems with game coding then AI coding.

[evilp]

Chinese version 1.2 patch is already out.. about 224M

[hellegennes]

@Avonu:

It could be. But that's a technicality, really. AI is part of the program, it's not like it is not connected to how scripts work. Otherwise it would suggest that the AI was programmed to just stop working for no reason. It's logical that there's something getting it stuck, but it doesn't mean this isn't an AI issue.



I personally think it's something much more random because I checked with weeks and it's not the cause of it. I don't know what it is.

[hellegennes]

Oh, I forgot to add that when there's more than 2 AI players, the third heavily underperforms to the point of doing almost nothing. And always one AI player is far better than the others. So, in a map with three AI players, it's really like:



1st AI: medium to good (depends on the map and how much cheating it allows)

2nd AI: mediocre

3rd AI: absolutely rubbish

[Avonu]

It's logical that there's something getting it stuck, but it doesn't mean this isn't an AI issue.

I see it more like game issue then AI issue but it depends from point of view.

[CloudRiderX]

Supposedly there are a lot of AI tweaks in the upcoming patch.

[ywhtptgtfo]

>I don't think it's AI fault. It looks for me more like problem with scripts, >you know like when effect of Week of Festivals not end after it ends and >like other scripts which are not working in campaign (unless you load >game).

>It's more like problems with game coding then AI coding.



It's both. And by the way, Heroes 5's A.I. does offer some challenge at the very least. And also, neutral stacks also have a tendency to "vanish" beside an A.I. hero in Heroes 2 and 3.

[Coyote]

@krs

"It is unheard of a game to have these kind of MAJOR GAME-BREAKING BUGS 2 MONTHS after release. Every company with some interest in its game and player base would have addressed things like LUCK, griffin dive, conflux within the FIRST WEEK!"



You are not playing computer games very often lately, are you?

Somehow it feels like this kind of 'release policy' is becoming kind of a habit. The days of working games on release day are probably gone forever...

[CloudRiderX]

I honestly think that most of the problems were caused by some kind of compatibility issue between Ubi's Conflux and the game. I mean, the issues are so varied, widespread, and seemingly random that there doesn't seem to be an easily discernable root cause. It's perfectly feasible to think that Black Hole had the game relatively polished and then Ubi crapped all over it with the connectivity features.

[hellegennes]

No, there are a lot of major bugs which are common to everyone. Like luck not working.



I remember when Heroes 2 came out. Not even the slightest bug. Sure it was kinda simpler, but not that much. Everything worked perfectly and I am not even aware of any patch for it. Not to mention it had the best soundtrack for a game, ever (if not also the best soundtrack ever, when compared to films).

[RollingWave]

No, there are a lot of major bugs which are common to everyone. Like luck not working.



I remember when Heroes 2 came out. Not even the slightest bug. Sure it was kinda simpler, but not that much. Everything worked perfectly and I am not even aware of any patch for it. Not to mention it had the best soundtrack for a game, ever (if not also the best soundtrack ever, when compared to films).

Yeah, but back in those days not everyone had this thing called the Internet

Though I do agree that H2 music was by far the best ever (and artistically the most consistent, though H6 is pretty good artistically too in terms of unit looks and map looks), I'd fully support if they just take the whole track over to H6 or H7 or something. it's one of the very few games where the music remains very vivid in my memory despite not having played it in ages . (the only other games where I think music impressed me anything close as much was Homeworld)

[hellegennes]

You have right pointing out the Internet, because that's today's excuse for shipping incomplete games ("don't worry, we will provide you with a(loads of) patch(es). However, patches did exist back in that era. The means for shipping them were mainly computer magazines, which included demos and patches in their CDs (floppy disks before the mid-90's).



To be honest, I don't mind patches at all. But it's another thing to correct problems which might have escaped your attention and a whole new thing to publish the game INCOMPLETE. I can even understand shipping less content in order to sell more expansion packs, due to the higher cost of producing a game. But at least publish the damn game in a finished state.



At the very least, write a bloody apology to your customers, for selling them only promises of a finished game. A sincere apology would do. But no, not even that.



Anyway, sorry for my grumble.

[parcaleste]

... At the very least, write a bloody apology to your customers, for selling them only promises of a finished game. A sincere apology would do...

NOT!


When you do something intentionally "a sincere apology would do" absolutely nothing, except displaying the face of your hypocrisy toward the customers, to the customers.

Hiding your face FOR MONTHS after releasing your "product" will show to the masses nothing but insolency.

[Avonu]

Two weeks.
Two weeks to fix something what was broken in previous patch. It should be fix (and patch 1.2.1 should be released) next day or two after new bug with player profiles was detected. Even if you must test it, it should take more then few days. And Holidays are not excuse.
It is that hard to find and eliminate one bug with is connected to Conflux not to game itself?

[klaymen]

Two weeks to fix something what was broken in previous patch.

It seems that Black Hole wants to achieve Nival's incompetency level.

[Avonu]

I am not sure it was Black Hole fault. Maybe proper patch was already done one second day, maybe not.
From what I gathered, patching process is so long because test patches are send to Ubisoft divisions in other countries (game languages and versions checks) and after no problems are reported, the patch is released worldwide.
But if any of these divisions has problem with patch/take too long to check, the patch is delayed.
Anyway it shouldn't take so long time to test for this hotfix.

[Kristo]

I remember when Heroes 2 came out. Not even the slightest bug. Sure it was kinda simpler, but not that much. Everything worked perfectly and I am not even aware of any patch for it.

There were a few patches, actually, but if you bought H2 Gold or the GOG edition they're probably baked in. Still, it was quite playable in its 1.0 state, unlike more recent games...

[klaymen]

I am not sure it was Black Hole fault.

IMO insufficient testing is developer's fault. Either do it properly or don't wonder why are people upset.

There were a few patches, actually, but if you bought H2 Gold or the GOG edition they're probably baked in. Still, it was quite playable in its 1.0 state, unlike more recent games...

Why bother with proper testing when you can release half-assed game and customers will do betatest for you?