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Thread: Creative Assembly Business Practice Discussion Thread (Rome II)

  1. #1
    Legio's Avatar EMPRESS OF ALL THINGS
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    Default Creative Assembly Business Practice Discussion Thread (Rome II)

    In order to facilitate reasonable, intelligent discourse and keep the forums clean, Moderation Staff have decided to create a single thread where all user concerns about Creative Assembly's business practices vis–ŕ–vis Total War: Rome II can be discussed. Please keep discussion civil; the Terms of Service, as always, remain in full force. Moderation Staff reserves the right to merge any threads or posts relating to the topic into this thread and to cull any posts deemed unnecessary. Questions and concerns about Moderation practices should be directed to a Moderator or Administrator, or posted in the Moderation Commentary Thread.



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    Last edited by Legio; October 17, 2013 at 05:14 AM.

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    Jonoleth Irenicus's Avatar Tiro
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    Default This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-24554511

    If it ain't ready - don't release it.

    Pay attention CA / Sega.

    Your competitors do it better.

  3. #3

    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Releasing a polished product is so much better than damage control and weekly patches. You would think anyone in business or with general common sense would know that a job worth doing is worth doing right...

    Great article and relation to current mess with RTW2

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  4. #4

    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Well it's actually what a publisher is prepared to do, I think most developers would take the extra time if it were possible.

  5. #5

    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    I wouldn't mind if they released the game early and just flat out said, "hey we didn't have time to finish these features and we'll patch/DLC them in"

    At this point I'm not sure if they're going to finish the game or if they think this is actually a quality release

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    Inhuman One's Avatar Comes Limitis
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    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Publishers are still the cancer of the gaming industry.

    It proved fatal to many good companies, and it will prove to be fatal to many more.

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    Jonoleth Irenicus's Avatar Tiro
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    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Quote Originally Posted by archone View Post
    I wouldn't mind if they released the game early and just flat out said, "hey we didn't have time to finish these features and we'll patch/DLC them in"
    To their credit, this is pretty much what Paradox do.

    Their games are not always polished (HOI series), but they patch them and improve them and make it quite easy for MODs to change just about anything.

    Then of course they also go ahead and release gems like CK 2.

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    craziii's Avatar Protector Domesticus
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    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    um, they are delayed to make 2014 revenue for ubisoft look good. op, you bought into it too easily.
    fear is helluva drug
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
    “The only rule that ever made sense to me I learned from a history, not an economics, professor at Wharton. "Fear," he used to say, "fear is the most valuable commodity in the universe." That blew me away. "Turn on the TV," he'd say. "What are you seeing? People selling their products? No. People selling the fear of you having to live without their products." freakin' A, was he right. Fear of aging, fear of loneliness, fear of poverty, fear of failure. Fear is the most basic emotion we have. Fear is primal. Fear sells.” WWZ

    Have you had your daily dose of fear yet? craziii
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

  9. #9

    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Ubisoft is both the developer and publisher here. Had CA been their own publisher would Rome 2 have been released? We don't now. But Ubisoft don't have that third party hovering over them.

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    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    Thread opened.

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    HigoChumbo's Avatar Definitely not Jom.
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    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    To be honest they have been doing the same since 06 no matter what we do... so my combative spirit has pretty much faded already.

    The only thing we can do is to stop buying their games (at least at release) and wait till they cost less than 10€ in steam or something. The drawback is that this would bring them even closer to the non-informed, easy to please casual audiences (which pretty much summarizes as console players these days) who will pre-order the game for 70 bucks just by watching some cool cgi trailer... but hey... it seems it's going to happen anyways, hardcore fanbase involved or not.



    What we should do is to gather all the lies they intentionally come up with while advertising the game pre-release in one place, so at least we remember and stop falling for it everytime. For instance, i might be wrong, but i seem to recall they promised a multiplayer campaign at release for Medieval 2, which we didn't see until Kingdoms and was just in form of a pretty lackluster 2-player hotseat mode.

    To be honest I have lost all my respect for them, it's the Blizzard thing all over again (btw, not a single Blizzard game bought since The Burning Crusade, even when i got absolutelly hyped when i saw the first Diablo 3 gameplay. I am proud and sad in equal parts about this. Whith Shiny Entertainment long gone, Massive Entertainment doing console action games, Blizzard printing bills and now this, it seems the list of game companies I respect grows alarmingly shorter every day).
    Last edited by HigoChumbo; October 17, 2013 at 06:00 AM.

  12. #12

    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    Quote Originally Posted by nicolasete View Post
    To be honest they have been doing the same since 06 no matter what we do... so my combative spirit has pretty much faded already.

    The only thing we can do is to stop buying their games (at least at release) and wait till they cost less than 10€ in steam or something. The drawback is that this would bring them even closer to the non-informed, easy to please casual audiences (which pretty much summarizes as console players these days) who will pre-order the game for 70 bucks just by watching some cool cgi trailer... but hey... it seems it's going to happen anyways, hardcore fanbase involved or not.



    What we should do is to gather all the lies they intentionally come up with while advertising the game pre-release in one place, so at least we remember and stop falling for it everytime. For instance, i might be wrong, but i seem to recall they promised a multiplayer campaign at release for Medieval 2, which we didn't see until Kingdoms and was just in form of a pretty lackluster 2-player hotseat mode.

    To be honest I have lost all my respect for them, it's the Blizzard thing all over again (btw, not a single Blizzard game bought since The Burning Crusade, even when i got absolutelly hyped when i saw the first Diablo 3 gameplay. I am proud and sad in equal parts about this. Whith Shiny Entertainment long gone, Massive Entertainment doing console action games, Blizzard printing bills and now this, it seems the list of game companies I respect grows alarmingly shorter every day).
    I only hope Bethesda isn't going down the same path with ESO.... ((

    My favourite studios used to be Westwood, Bullfrog, Blizzard, Creating Assemply and Bethesda....

    It's really saddening to see what has become of them for I held their old titles as a dear part of me growing up.
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    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    Quote Originally Posted by nicolasete View Post
    What we should do is to gather all the lies they intentionally come up with while advertising the game pre-release in one place
    Has anyone made a list of promises compared with the reality of the actual game? Calm and documented by sources? I would like to see such a list for reference.
    The game development business is one of bottomless greed, pitiless cruelty, venal treachery, rampant competition, low politics and boundless personal ambition. New game series are rising, and others are starting their long slide into obscurity and defeat.

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    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    Double post
    The game development business is one of bottomless greed, pitiless cruelty, venal treachery, rampant competition, low politics and boundless personal ambition. New game series are rising, and others are starting their long slide into obscurity and defeat.

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    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    Quote Originally Posted by SirRobin View Post
    Has anyone made a list of promises compared with the reality of the actual game? Calm and documented by sources? I would like to see such a list for reference.
    http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...ted&highlight=

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  16. #16

    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    CA is a developer - not a publisher. They don't get to make the decision on when a game is released, that's SEGA. If SEGA says the game has to be out by a date, it has to be out by that date - they can get an extension, but that's only if they can prove the time is needed.

    Rome 2 probably performed fine on their test machines, the problem came up when it was released officially and it didn't run fine on customer's computers.

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    Humble Warrior's Avatar Vicarius Provinciae
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    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    The thing is, it makes sense to hold back and even lose some money until it`s tested and actually suitable for release. If released finished and working well, your Devs will gain a good reputation, copies will fly off the shelves from good word-of-mouth plus HONEST advertising and that spills over to PROFIT for the Publishing house.

    It is good to earn profit honestly through GOOD WORKS, than to earn profit through deception. Remember that, CA\SEGA.

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    Jonoleth Irenicus's Avatar Tiro
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    Default Re: CA Business Practice Complaint Thread

    CA / Sega sold a game at full price that by their own admission will require at least 7 patches to fix the most severe issues, never mind the game being stripped of content and features that gave it depth & last ability, never mind the release day DLC issue either.

    No more pre-orders.


    If only Zero Punctuation did strategy games ...

  19. #19

    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Quote Originally Posted by Humble Warrior View Post
    The thing is, it makes sense to hold back and even lose some money until it`s tested and actually suitable for release. If released finished and working well, your Devs will gain a good reputation, copies will fly off the shelves from good word-of-mouth plus HONEST advertising and that spills over to PROFIT for the Publishing house.

    It is good to earn profit honestly through GOOD WORKS, than to earn profit through deception. Remember that, CA\SEGA.
    Certainly it makes sense to hold back a buggy release - if any bugs show up in your testing. Computers are complex machines with a mindbogglingly huge amount of variables in setup and the way the customer handles them. It isn't possible to feasibly test how your product runs on all these setups. CA's test machines certainly worked, or suffered few important issues, and as a result their data could only reach the conclusion of the game running fine on any setup.

    Of course, the launch clearly shows that this wasn't at all correct. CA could perhaps stand to consider having some test machines with more unusual configs, or maybe actually trying to have an actual beta release of their product to select customers to actually see how they run on a variety of setups.

    Or, if you want, you can just assume CA is corrupt and greedy and they just don't care to do testing. Whatever floats your boat.

  20. #20
    Jonoleth Irenicus's Avatar Tiro
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    Default Re: This is what a great Developer is prepared to do ...

    Quote Originally Posted by krisslanza View Post
    Certainly it makes sense to hold back a buggy release - if any bugs show up in your testing. Computers are complex machines with a mindbogglingly huge amount of variables in setup and the way the customer handles them. It isn't possible to feasibly test how your product runs on all these setups. CA's test machines certainly worked, or suffered few important issues, and as a result their data could only reach the conclusion of the game running fine on any setup.

    Of course, the launch clearly shows that this wasn't at all correct. CA could perhaps stand to consider having some test machines with more unusual configs, or maybe actually trying to have an actual beta release of their product to select customers to actually see how they run on a variety of setups.

    Or, if you want, you can just assume CA is corrupt and greedy and they just don't care to do testing. Whatever floats your boat.
    How about all the gameplay and AI issues ?

    Do you think they came up on the in house machines or are problems like uber-powerful transport fleets something that only happens on external customer machines ?

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