The Official ETW Criticism Thread

[TheFirstONeill]

A place for your constructive criticism of ETW.

Link to Orginal 202 page thread is HERE.

[Abspara]

Ah, version 3.0


Well, for starters I'm disappointed that CA has chosen to stop development of any major patches. Mr. Mike Simpson admitted that he was too embarassed to give this game to his friends until patch 1.4, six months after release. Essentially that tells me CA felt this game only needed one patch to bring it up to "give to friends" status, meanwhile we, the public, had to wait six months and several patches to reach that same level of respect, oh and of course pay for it as well.

CA, you are no longer the CA that made fun games. You are now SEGA Europe which instead focuses on deadlines and short term profit. Please reconsider abandoning this game and fix this game. Patch 1.4 was a step in the right direction, but you're not done. You know it.

I used to be a fan and respected the games you produced, but lately you've changed. For the worse.

[Player989random]

"I amma let you finish" but everytime the criticism thread overtakes the praise thread, it gets canned.

Why did that guy say CA made brain dead AI due to Americans? As small a sleight that may be, it is an even worse excuse. Say you ran out of time, not that your customers need simple Computer counter parts.

[TheFirstONeill]

"I amma let you finish" but everytime the criticism thread overtakes the praise thread, it gets canned.

I can assure you this is not an attempt to stifle any criticism. Like I say we are currently trying to restore the thread. I have linked the original 202 page thread in the OP.

[Thorn]

I can assure you this is not an attempt to stifle any criticism. Like I say we are currently trying to restore the thread. I have linked the original 202 page thread in the OP.

Well i think most of us will be aslo happy if you "reset" the praise one, i think it will be easier than restoring the old criticism one..

[Abspara]

Well i think most of us will be aslo happy if you "reset" the praise one, i think it will be easier than restoring the old criticism one..

Theres No need to restore something deleted by any stretch, but, it does seem a bit lopsided that the complaints thread has been subject to several deletes / locks while the praise thread goes unscathed. If what is voiced in that thread is so hard to manage, perhaps it should just fade away all together.

Please don't get me wrong I'm not trying to be a "armchair mod" and I mean no disrespect, but it just seems unbalanced when complaint threads keep getting deleted and locked while the praise thread is untouched. I'm sure you have your reasons but it confuses me.

I think now is a good time to start off on a clean slate. New complaint thread and new praise thread.

[CBCRonin]

Theres No need to restore something deleted by any stretch, but, it does seem a bit lopsided that the complaints thread has been subject to several deletes / locks while the praise thread goes unscathed. If what is voiced in that thread is so hard to manage, perhaps it should just fade away all together.

Please don't get me wrong I'm not trying to be a "armchair mod" and I mean no disrespect, but it just seems unbalanced when complaint threads keep getting deleted and locked while the praise thread is untouched. I'm sure you have your reasons but it confuses me.

I think now is a good time to start off on a clean slate. New complaint thread and new praise thread.

Must be due to all of the "bad vibes" in the criticism thread (causing problems in the web code?); the first became "too long and unwieldly" to survive and now the second has become "too long and unwieldly" to continue.

Do "good vibes" in the praise thread keep it more stable?
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What is most upsetting to me is this:

Dear TWC members,

we all share a certain affection for the TW series and this website is mostly populated by people that work hard on different levels from modding to moderating, from informing us to maintaining the servers with the simple purpose to enhance our experience from the games and share our experience. And all that on a purely voluntary basis without any reward apart from the pleasure taken in a job well done.

So, it is sad and disappointing when members are constantly subjected to abuse by posters who have crossed the not so fine line between constructive criticism and unadulterated bashing. We aim to keep an open mind and an open forum for all opinions; however the type of mindless attacks towards the staff, the members and the representatives of the game's producers, that are witnessed every time a new game in the series is about to be published, will not be tolerated and the ToS will be strictly enforced.

Please help us to keep all this fun and simple.

Thank you,
Garb.

Now, many times it is those of us who offer valid concerns or constructive criticism who are targetted for abuse. We are accused of whining or told to suck it up, as this is the way things are now in the gaming industry (by individuals who are not even in the industry).

We are told we are casual gamers, that we are seperate from the "real" community, or that we are the reason the product is flawed (by those in the industry/company); yet, those like myself have been behind CA since Shogun.
-----------------------------
All of this is very disappointing.

[Plumo]

This is looking like censorship. Well, there are constructive criticism in Ideas topics and requests by the community, but it seems like SEGA decided not to sponsor a new patch. They have tried to do "just" enough for the community to think about purchasing N:TW. Not more...

[Clayton Gold]

Theres No need to restore something deleted by any stretch, but, it does seem a bit lopsided that the complaints thread has been subject to several deletes / locks while the praise thread goes unscathed. If what is voiced in that thread is so hard to manage, perhaps it should just fade away all together.

Please don't get me wrong I'm not trying to be a "armchair mod" and I mean no disrespect, but it just seems unbalanced when complaint threads keep getting deleted and locked while the praise thread is untouched. I'm sure you have your reasons but it confuses me.

I think now is a good time to start off on a clean slate. New complaint thread and new praise thread.

X2

It is rather dubious when one particular thread gets "reset" for "housecleaning" as soon as it reaches the same post-count as its sibling.

Either way, with ETW in its current condition, albeit better than before, but far from finished - this thread will continue. It is our only outlet to hopefully get some fixes, as the official forums do not acknowledge anything except praise.

After reading Mr. Simpson's "67%" blog, I am feeling that CA now has a similar mindset.

[Player989random]

I find it funny that when they made a new Criticism thread, in the three months of it's existance, it got 504 posts (I know it passed the praise one anyway), while the praise thread got a mere 70.

Total Criticisms: ~6000
Total Praises: 504

Should tell CA what their 90% rating means.

[TheFirstONeill]

Ok you have been given a day for your conspiracy theories regarding the reset of the thread. The explaination can be found in the Q&S. From this point forward that subject is off topic to this thread, and as such post regarding it will be deleted.

[Ahlerich]

wow

ptretty much. but the game still sucks and autoresolve seems to be broken now. no mod tools yet. no more patches. ai doesnt really matter thats non existant for a while now. anyways what did the patches really improve? i guess its stable now and naval invasions work. anything else?

[Koolhan37]

Nothing for it then, but to overtake the Praise Thread again!

Once more unto the breach dear friends, once more....! ETC.

But seriously, I just posted this in another thread and it jogged my memory of something that really annoys me about ETW, and is made worse by previous experience with TW games.

The Auto-Resolve.

One would think, that they would finally get it right. This was not to be, it can be as finicky as ever, sometimes worse, than previous titles. I was playing the original MTW the other day, and auto-resolves seemed to work great(except for the odd siege). If you had overwhelming numbers and a better general, expect a rout. Even numbers and a better general, expect to come out ahead with some casualties. etc. etc.

Ships battles are the worst too, which is doubly painful, because spending 15 minutes chasing down a single sloop, well......not really fun.

[John F. Kennedy]

Wow cleaned it out again I see? What's this the third time? Sheesh.

Anyway, here's my rant: The Warpath Menu is one thing, but it's tolerable. Now having Warpath music in my scenario battles....

CA go get a goddamn job and do something already instead of screw around and let stupid problems like this pass through. It makes me think that if water was the game, and you looking and fixing bugs before release were the filter, you'd have a basketball hoop.

Fix this crap already, c'mon is it really that hard? How did you screw this up in the first place? Why is there a giant orange square on my minister menu? Why are my technology tabs playing musical chairs? Why isn't this a stable game yet? Why CA, why?

I know you're not incompetent, you've released 4 major games in the past that were simple masterpieces at times, there is no excuse as to why the quality of your games and service should drop this low.

[Player989random]

Wait CA just announced releasing something new?

Not new per se, just releasing a feature they promised a while ago.

The online multiplayer campaign.

Which reminds me

You announce two Expansions and make a few units, but in the time doing that we could have gotten the MP about 2 months ago, why make stuff(N:TW/Warpath) we didn't want CA? We just want what was promised.

[Plumo]

Indeed. Praise can never be a bad thing. And I think CA deserves a lot of praise for their games.

My point is that criticism is more useful for a company than praise, because you can learn a lot from the community. In fact we have all been 'beta'-testing the final product and our criticism should come in handy for CA. But if I were them I wouldn't be surprised that they 've upset the community...

[VOP2288]

I know this is probably a subject brought up many times in this forum but it finally hit me....CA is really shafting its fanbase with all this DLC crap and just how Empire was/is being distributed in general.

• First, just how they distributed the game itself...the regular edition, the special edition, and other editions that were offered on Amazon, Game, and Best Buy. The regular one came plain and simple, the special edition one came with 6 or so additional units, and the other three were offered with one unique unit each. What's wrong with this? Well, honestly the fact that I bought the regular edition and thus cannot have access to any of these additional units really bums me out. This applies to all editions too...if you buy one version you can never get the additional units on the other. Honestly, at least release all the special ed. and Amazon, Best Buy, and Game units as DLC or something.

• Secondly, what's this Warpath nonsense....I have not bought it but from what I understand it merely allows you to play as 4 or so Native nations...but not in a Grand Campaign fashion. WTF?! These nations should've been playable from the get go!

• The BUGS...CHRIST...the BUGS! Why did they ship this game with so many bugs?! It seems no matter how many patches they release the game is still pretty unstable...it was more or less unplayable on release but now the little bastards just creep up at the worst moments (however, I have not updated Empire through Steam since late August due to the fact that my college network does not allow a Steam connection)

• Steam - really? While I'm on the middle ground on what I consider Steam to be (good or bad) I still think that making Empire Steam dependent was ridiculous. It's one thing if you buy it OFF Steam...it's another to make the physical copy dependent on that application as well.

[Alpha_Omega666©]

The majority of user complaints lie between their chair and the keyboard.

Seriously, in all the time I've witnessed complaints about "this game wont work; it sucks!" or "Why havent [X Developer] fixed it yet!?" I've come to find that more than %80 of all the people complaining that a game is "broken" is only because they're either A) playing it on an incompatible machine or B) trying to play integrated or on some form of a portable device I.E. non-gaming laptop.

I truly do not believe anymore that people understand their system specs, let alone many, if much at all to even consider significant in any way, veteran users understanding that met-requirements will never be enough, so.

I've had ETW since the beginning and have only ever experienced the CTD's in my time using/playing. After the patch that was literally meant to fix that problem, it has since thereof been so: fixed, entirely.

My rig (I in no way intend to brag about this):
MSI 790FX-GD70
Phenom II X4 955black
4gb Corsair Dom 1333 DDR3
HD1 1tb WD Black 7200rpm
HD2 (gaming only;install paths) 300gb WD Raptor 10k rpm
Radeon 4870 X2
Vista32

I have never had missing textures, weird crashes, odd missing pictures, AI problems, slowdowns, reboots, sound issues or any other in game issues of the sort since the latest patch, and even so - with each recurring patch I've only gotten more solid stability therein.

Rendering is meant to be, as such, properly rendered in is native state. Augmenting or diminishing in any way this principle can construe the output result. In other words: Playing at lower settings than recommended can, though ever so minuscule in form, inhibit the softwares' stability.

~~~~~~

I must say, I do agree though: CA has missed out on delivering several significant things they have promised; and please, don't mistake it for anything else: If a game company/developer publicly states a piece of software to be implimented at a later date, that means, by law (advertisment), it is a promise.

I'll wait for MP Campaign for Empire: Total War and will not settle it for any other PR than Empire: Total War - regardless of DLC. If it doesn't come, I will never buy another CA or Sega owned property in my life.

There's my promise. I hope they seal the end of the deal with theirs.

[Rave]

• Well, honestly the fact that I bought the regular edition and thus cannot have access to any of these additional units really bums me out. This applies to all editions too...if you buy one version you can never get the additional units on the other. Honestly, at least release all the special ed. and Amazon, Best Buy, and Game units as DLC or something.

They did release it as DLC.

[ManKinD]

The majority of user complaints lie between their chair and the keyboard.

Seriously, in all the time I've witnessed complaints about "this game wont work; it sucks!" or "Why havent [X Developer] fixed it yet!?" I've come to find that more than %80 of all the people complaining that a game is "broken" is only because they're either A) playing it on an incompatible machine or B) trying to play integrated or on some form of a portable device I.E. non-gaming laptop.

Ive got a pretty outdated rig and the game now works as it should - no probs there - my prob is more with the censorship issue when members posts are deleted or buried because the TWC dont AGREE, or CA tells them to take it off because it could ruin their reputation. Why waste your time posting or contributing on this site if it is going to be run like a soviet state. Wow that makes sence - Im out of here - when the TWC censor reads this can you please suspend my account. Cheers

ManKinD out!