CA: What we're up to (12.10.2011)

Hi all,

This week’s update from behind the scenes at The Creative Assembly comes to you with a Golden Joystick inspired theme. We’ve been really pushing hard in the last few days to drum up as much support as possible. As you’re no doubt aware, we’re up for two awards: Best Strategy Game and Ultimate Game of the Year. We’re really pleased to be nominated, because these are the people’s awards, voted for by the paying public. They mean a lot to us.

Following on from last week’s tease, we’re also running an exclusive competition to win a visit to The Creative Assembly. Unfortunately this is only open to UK residents (it’s a legal thing), but if you’d like to help spread the word, do check out the link to find out the different ways you can help.

Elsewhere in CA, we’ve been working on the hotfixes that you’ve seen deployed following our patch. What do you think of this approach of small, regular patches? Do you prefer it to the big patches which bring lots of fixes?

We’re running a poll to find out what you think, as it’d be really interesting to know. To take part, just vote in the thread and add your comments below.

With that, I’ll hand over to you guys for this week. We’re looking forward to reading your comments.

Have a great week.

CraigTW
The Creative Assembly

I and possibly many of us don't really know much about the long process required to bring a patch to the players..
Validation, testing, long expensive processes.. not like with an indie dev. that can release patches always and be in touch with the players directly.
Which is much better for both the dev. and the players (who don't ever mind a buggy product when they feel they're an active part of its development).

But yeah, quick steady patching is better.


Please fix the Sou Incite Rebellion ability so that it spawns only 3-4 units rather than whole samurai armies, it's a gross exploit.
thanks!

+1 for regular, but smaller patches.

I voted for larger patches. In actual fact I would prefer smaller regular patches but every time the game is patched Steam makes me reinstall all 20Gb of the game. I have 15Gb from the DVD but the other 5Gb takes ages.

Craig - pretty sure in an earlier thread you mentioned this was being worked on with Steam - are there any files I could send you that would be helpful? Because whatever fix that's been applied certainly doesn't work on my Steam client.

Btw for the folks who haven't found it yet, here are the Golden Joystick voting pages:

Best Strategy
http://www.goldenjoystick.com/awards/best-strategy
Game of the Year
http://www.goldenjoystick.com/ultima...l-war-shogun-2

@robinzx
obama is a good president but bush has a nice jacket?

Originally Posted by hooma

@robinzx
obama is a good president but bush has a nice jacket?

off topic much?

Definitely think that smaller regular patches are better overall; think it gives more potential for you guys to tweak things, based on ongoing feedback from the fans, until you find a sweet spot. Plus it means that any serious problems which come to light have the potential to be fixed faster.

Only possible downside I see is if the smaller, more-regular patches didn't attempt to fix issues which are more complicated from the coders' points of view, but I don't see why that should necessarily be the case.

and thanks for offering the community a chance to vote on this Craig, nice one

Speaking of patches, Craig, do you know if the issue where archers' screens weren't always acting as barriers (i.e. troops were able to march straight through them) has been fixed?
It was certainly a problem before the ROTS patch but I've not had much chance to play, let alone test stuff like this, since. I did skim the patch notes but couldn't spot anything about it.
TIA for any clarification you can give.

Originally Posted by robinzx

off topic much?

was only a metapher for ur off-topic.. nobody has asked about ur problems with steam. and u voted like a i mentioned in the metapher.. not for whats the best in your opinion u voted against ur problems for ur feelings.. it seems even in forums are enough ppl from the stupid mass that dont think.

do u has more liked sarah palin cause her shoes?

Originally Posted by hooma

was only a metapher for ur off-topic.. nobody has asked about ur problems with steam. and u voted like a i mentioned in the metapher.. not for whats the best in your opinion u voted against ur problems for ur feelings.. it seems even in forums are enough ppl from the stupid mass that dont think.

do u has more liked sarah palin cause her shoes?

It was more directed at Craig because the issue happened before, so wanted to raise it again as things didn't improve. I voted for large patches because for practical purposes it would suit me better as a workaround to my problem, but since I actually felt the other way I felt the need to explain.

I vote smaller fixes

Originally Posted by hooma

was only a metapher for ur off-topic.. nobody has asked about ur problems with steam. and u voted like a i mentioned in the metapher.. not for whats the best in your opinion u voted against ur problems for ur feelings.. it seems even in forums are enough ppl from the stupid mass that dont think.

do u has more liked sarah palin cause her shoes?

I hope English is not your first language. If it is, then I am sorry our school system failed you so horribly. I have no idea what you were trying to say. No idea at all...

smaller , more regular.

You guys would really get rep in my book if you would also release some anniversary patches for the older games, for example rome total war 2.0 (adding 1.6 and 1.9 funtionaility and AI improvements of alexander1.9 and BI1.6 to the vanilla campaign and for the mods to be able to use), but i dont want to wait for rome to get 10 years old 7 year birthday is fine

Blizzard still releases patches for diablo 2 and resets its ladder (next reset oktober 25th) , thats what sets them apart in my book, even if its just a handfull of people in their spare time. it would be the best pr move you can do in this day and age of dlc and modding isseus.

p.s my retainer is still stuck on one even dow i have 3 slots on my lvl 4 avatar

double post

Voted (the first option).

Patches/Content that is free yet needed! Love the baby steps with the DLC and patches. I give you a big props for that, lets kick the tires and light the fires and unleash the content beast!

I would prefer larger patches, which fix almost all bugs/issues. They shouldn't be adding anything new, just fixing the current versions, so that there are no new problems..

P.S You should also do a official poll about this topic: Should CA implement the possibility of resetting hero units?

I say both, some fixes can be released in small amounts, like what these hotfixes did, while other gameplay changing elements should be released in a bigger patch. Maybe assign 2 teams to patch the game, one for small fixes and one for big fixes that require lots of testing.

I would say smaller, more regular hotfixes. Imo it lets you, the developers, keep your fingers well and truly on the pulse, and also i think S2TW is past the stage of massive, gamechanging patches now, its the small refinement needed to make it as close to perfect, balanced and enjoyable as possible, which can be achieved by minor fixes, immediate and indepth feedback.

The heavy duty work is done, now its time for tinkering.

(Im guessing feedback from this would be 50/50 split though, i already saw your facebook page, and majority there have voted for larger patches whereas here majority seem to be going for smaller)

No, not smaller regular patches. Good, large patches every 1-3 months that are well tested to avoid recurrent frustration of:

`This game isn`t ready, please try again later.` Which NONE of us who paid for the game should ever have to contend with.

Of course if our patches could be OPTIONAL, then it wouldn`t be such a big problem. But of course with FORCED-STEAM we don`t have that choice unless we physically unplug Steam from the internet, do we? That`s just to avoid the Patch as long as possible, as I`ve done.

And everyone knows that the `don`t download` option doesn`t work anyway.

But no, CA love their mummy Steam and don`t want to hear that bit do they?

Well, I`ll keep saying and I`ll say alone if need be.

I`m just glad I have less than 4 games on Steam and play only one (STW2) as the frustration facter would go through the roof.

`Never keep all your eggs in one basket`.

Everytime i read

What we're up to

, i always think i'll read:

we are now working on Total War: Rome 2

but its not