A quick browsing of this forum and I have noticed alot of people calling out people who have genuine concerns about this game (See the Custom Games/Lack of Regional Connection Search/1-50 Ranking threads) for being “impatient”. The idea that 343i deserve a break and that they are working as quick as they can to resolve these matters.
Just a quick question…does that really fly for you? Are you really happy with a, quite frankly, obviously incomplete game being launched? It beggars belief that this has become an acceptable standard.
We, as consumers, brought this product on the understanding it would be functional from day one. It isn’t. Now, I can tolerate balance changes and added content but I can not tolerate simple broken mechanics. It should not need to be fixed. What makes this even more maddening was all the pre-launch hype about how this was the most polished Halo experience to date and that they had recieved a “blank cheque” from Microsoft to make it…where did that money go?!
Perhaps the biggest example of this is File Share. It’s a working mechanic that has been in three previous games. How can it not work now? How does something going from functioning (Rather brilliantly, to be honest) to needing months to repair? Is it more features? No. It actually has less, from the looks of it.
Then you have everything else that they are adding and are asking the community to be patient with. No ranking system with game. Wait til January. Not happy with Custom Game Options; tough, not even an indication they’re looking in to it.
All of these things existed in PREVIOUS (Read: OLDER) games. They should be in this one as a standard. Sequels should add features, not remove them.
I seriously don’t understand how people can say “Give them time”. We have. We gave them 5 years. We’ve given them nothing but time, and now money, to make this the game it should be.
Really; my biggest point was…why no beta? All of these problems qould have been exposed…you can not launch a game this big these days without an open beta (IMO).
Curious to see what other people think? Do you think they need more time? Or as perplexed as I am that that seems to be a valid argument?
True but as far as I can tell they were fixed much quicker than we are even getting a response from 343i here. I think that’s part of the frustration, too, their seeming inability to communicate with the community that they rose up on the backs off.
I want to give them time, I do, but it just seems that their priorities are so out of skelter it’s unreal. At the risk of re-hashing arguments all we get is PR nightmare after PR nightmare with no assurance as to how and when things will be fixed.
“Sometime in January” is not a valid response when you have a community as loud as we are clammouring for fixes. It’s a slap in the face to people who are trying to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Say we do get this TU in January which fixes everything…when do we get the TU that fixes everything that one broke; I am still reading/hearing about people whose game has become literally “Unplayable” because of the latest TU and no support for them.
A TU should not be an excuse to launch a broken, incomplete, game.
> True but as far as I can tell they were fixed much quicker than we are even getting a response from 343i here.
No they weren’t fixed quicker, Halo 2 got its patch a half a year later, dont forget it came out with a ton of glitches (some of those glitches remained and it became acceptable to use them), and it required 5 melees to kill someone before it was patched.
Bungie didnt even patch dmr bloom in Reach, 343 had to do it when they took over.
either they WERE fixed earlier, or they weren’t. there isnt “as far as I can tell”, you mean “I don’t know”.
Halo 2 was also a game on the original Xbox. Advancements in computer technology and the XBL infrastructure should make patches quicker and also much more effective. They have released Two(?) TU’s already and none of them have fixed some of our biggest complaints. Obviously they can roll out the TU’s quickly.
As for the Melee…that’s not a broken feature of the game but a balance issue, which, as I say, I can live with. I appreciate that a Sandbox as vast as this will need tweaking, so I can give them the time to get that nailed (Though, arguably a Beta would have fixed that but that’s another argument).
I am talking about fundamental mechanics that are missing or simply not working.
> True but as far as I can tell they were fixed much quicker than we are even getting a response from 343i here. I think that’s part of the frustration, too, their seeming inability to communicate with the community that they rose up on the backs off.
>
> I want to give them time, I do, but it just seems that their priorities are so out of skelter it’s unreal. At the risk of re-hashing arguments all we get is PR nightmare after PR nightmare with no assurance as to how and when things will be fixed.
>
> “Sometime in January” is not a valid response when you have a community as loud as we are clammouring for fixes. It’s a slap in the face to people who are trying to give them the benefit of the doubt.
>
> Say we do get this TU in January which fixes everything…when do we get the TU that fixes everything that one broke; I am still reading/hearing about people whose game has become literally “Unplayable” because of the latest TU and no support for them.
>
> A TU should not be an excuse to launch a broken, incomplete, game.
Halo 3 released its first game fixing TU in February of 2008. Thats about a 5 month period. If anything, 343 is rushing this TU for the players and that is a bad idea. They should take longer.
> Perhaps the biggest example of this is File Share. It’s a working mechanic that has been in three previous games. How can it not work now? How does something going from functioning (Rather brilliantly, to be honest) to needing months to repair? Is it more features? No. It actually has less, from the looks of it.
As an australian, my main issue and the one I’m most passionate about is the lack of good connection search. Without one it completely cripples australian/new zealand players and other remote countries’ ability to play matchmaking and have fun.
I gave them a week to put it in, asking politely for it. Further attempts to draw attention to issue were met with 2 bans.
It’s highly insulting that I paid $130 USD for this game, only to be pushed away and have to see that the studio is receiving pedicures (first week community post) in working hours, and that the PR face of the product (bs angel) is going on a holiday, severing our communication line with the company. I imagine this will be used as an excuse to lower the amount of work being done.
> Halo 2 was also a game on the original Xbox. Advancements in computer technology and the XBL infrastructure should make patches quicker and also much more effective. They have released Two(?) TU’s already and none of them have fixed some of our biggest complaints. Obviously they can roll out the TU’s quickly.
>
> As for the Melee…that’s not a broken feature of the game but a balance issue, which, as I say, I can live with. I appreciate that a Sandbox as vast as this will need tweaking, so I can give them the time to get that nailed (Though, arguably a Beta would have fixed that but that’s another argument).
>
> I am talking about fundamental mechanics that are missing or simply not working.
Yes, you are right about the first part, but something you need to take into account is that as that technology came in, it took more resources to do and therefore title updates rose in cost. Getting out a TU costs about $400,000 (it was either that or 40,000; still a little unsure.
> > Halo 2 was also a game on the original Xbox. Advancements in computer technology and the XBL infrastructure should make patches quicker and also much more effective. They have released Two(?) TU’s already and none of them have fixed some of our biggest complaints. Obviously they can roll out the TU’s quickly.
> >
> > As for the Melee…that’s not a broken feature of the game but a balance issue, which, as I say, I can live with. I appreciate that a Sandbox as vast as this will need tweaking, so I can give them the time to get that nailed (Though, arguably a Beta would have fixed that but that’s another argument).
> >
> > I am talking about fundamental mechanics that are missing or simply not working.
>
> Yes, you are right about the first part, but something you need to take into account is that as that technology came in, it took more resources to do and therefore title updates rose in cost. Getting out a TU costs about $400,000 (it was either that or 40,000; still a little unsure.
343 dont have to pay for TU’s. They are an MS studio, wholey owned by MS. It would be idiotic for MS to charge itself for a TU. So that is not an issue at all for H4, and not germain to the lack of patching for H4.
If you make a game and it has critical flaw, you patch it asap or you wont have a customer base. While H4 doesnt have absolute showtoppers, it does have plenty of extremely serious issues that need patching asap.
^ It’s $40k, and it’s on 343i’s head to spend that money because of their own bad choices. I fully expect them to spend that money as many times over as it takes for my Halo 4 to do what it says what it would do on the tin.
> 343 dont have to pay for TU’s. They are an MS studio, wholey owned by MS. It would be idiotic for MS to charge itself for a TU. So that is not an issue at all for H4, and not germain to the lack of patching for H4.
You literally have no idea how any business works, do you?
Entities charge themselves all the time. Cost centers? Internal service centers? No? Moving on.
Just because MS owns 343i, doesn’t mean they have an unlimited budget. That’s naive if anything was.
The game should be prefected from the start. They were building H4 when reach came out (from what they were saying in interviews). point blank period.
Lets us an example, you build a car, you rush the heck out of it even though you had like 2 years to make it and you release with faulty brake pad and people coplain and you say nothing.
Totally unprofessional, that is why all the top tier programmers go and do coding for government. Heck Israel made a worm that killed all of Iran’s government computers (they had to buy new computers can fix the bug, hence slow down on nuclear enrichment).
My point is they are hiring people with no experience and no expertise, for example,the created director’s expertise: I play alot of video games (when asked how to work for 343 he commented in an interview have programming degree). MLGbravo became matchmaking advisor, he only has highschool education.
Completely unacceptable, I pay for a product, I want 100% finalized copy not TU after TU.
> > 343 dont have to pay for TU’s. They are an MS studio, wholey owned by MS. It would be idiotic for MS to charge itself for a TU. So that is not an issue at all for H4, and not germain to the lack of patching for H4.
>
> You literally have no idea how any business works, do you?
>
> 1) Entities charge themselves all the time. Cost centers? Internal service centers? No? Moving on.
>
> 2) Just because MS owns 343i, doesn’t mean they have an unlimited budget. That’s naive if anything was.
Yes I do know how buisness works. Budgets, overheads, profit margins, staffing costs, equipment costs etc.
MS has already budgeted 343 for the TU’s, or else they would not be in the works. The work has been payed for by MS, at the behest of MS. Its a known fact that MS development studios get a “free pass” on the cost of TU’s and get them expidited over non-MS studio TU’s. Its already happened with the Forza franchise, as Turn 10 are a wholey owned MS studio and dont pay for TU’s and get them pushed ahead of other TU for testing. Affiliated studios still have to pay as do all other publishers.
> Yes I do know how buisness works. Budgets, overheads, profit margins, staffing costs, equipment costs etc.
>
> MS has already budgeted 343 for the TU’s, or else they would not be in the works. The work has been payed for by MS, at the behest of MS. Its a known fact that MS development studios get a “free pass” on the cost of TU’s and get them expidited over non-MS studio TU’s. Its already happened with the Forza franchise, as Turn 10 are a wholey owned MS studio and dont pay for TU’s and get them pushed ahead of other TU for testing. Affiliated studios still have to pay as do all other publishers.
So there’s no development time, no reason to perform any cost-benefit on creating and testing a TU, and the work is already done? Awesome! Why haven’t they made this game super perfect then?!
343i is a business out to get our money out of our pockets and into the hands of the developers. They are not a gaming company out to satisfy the needs and wants of us gamers. The DLC quite frankly I know for a fact they had already made it, removed it from the game, and released as DLC.
Thats just really dirty, I will not buy the next halo unless there is something that will impress me.
Alot of people dont seem to be giving 343 time. Yesterday was the first time the game failed to get 100k online players at any point during the day.
The industry has alot of AAA games coming out in q1 2013. Most are single player but the population could take a hit to GTA V and Gears Judgment etc.
Rushing out DLC, which was sub par, glitchy and at a time people wanted to core game fixing before built upon just shows the direction this game is heading.
> So there’s no development time, no reason to perform any cost-benefit on creating and testing a TU, and the work is already done? Awesome! Why haven’t they made this game super perfect then?!
MS has contracted and paid upfront for the TU’s in the games support budget. Part of that outlay has a deduction for the TU cost from the initial payment. MS do not charge its own studios for the TU’s testing cost as they are already covered and deducted from the support budget MS has set out.
If further TU’s are required above and beyond the intial support budgeting, 343 can ask for budget to be increased to cover the cost of development of the TU. Again the testing cost would be automatically deducted from the outlay of the additional TU budgeting.
