Full FeedEnough with the patches
I would like to touch on a topic that seems to be popping up constantly. I’m talking about game developers patching up games like there’s no tomorrow. Most recently, games such as LittleBigPlanet, SOCOM Confrontation, Fable 2, and Castle Crashers have been victims of a crucial gameplay element being either broken or excluded from launch. The good thing about technology and consoles in this generation is the ability of adding or fixing content through the use of a simple patch. However, just because developers have this ability doesn’t mean they should abuse it.
In the past, games didn’t have the luxury of being fixed after their release, and it forced developers to bring out the best product possible. For all we know E.T. for the Atari could have been the best game of all time, if patches were possible back then. The way I see it, developers have one shot at making a good impression after a game is released. If it happens to be broken, no patch will get the bad taste out of our mouths.
Just look at Lair, for example. Lair was an original idea that focused on fire breathing dragons that we could ride. That idea is almost as flawless as putting zombies in a game. The biggest flaw that Lair had was its horrible motion controls. Like most PS3 games back then, and some now, the sixaxis controls felt tacked on and ultimately impossible to use. Several months later a patch was released for Lair that lets us use the analog sticks in lieu of motion controls. This corrected what was seen as Lair‘s biggest shortcoming, but it didn’t get re-reviewed by many and its name still lives in infamy.
SOCOM Confrontation‘s online multiplayer mode was virtually broken from day one. How its developers and play testers didn’t catch this is anyone’s guess. Chances are, SCEA knew and released it anyway to keep the release date intact because it knew a patch would fix everything.
These examples are not the only cases where patches are used to fix game breaking elements. These are just the ones that stand out in my mind. I don’t mean to say that developers are getting lazy by any means, if anything they work harder now than ever before. I only ask to let these games cook a little longer before we pay $60 for a product that doesn’t deliver on all the aspects that were promised months in advance.
Read [Wired] Also Read [FileFront] Also Read [PS3 Fanboy] Also Read [Gamertell] Also Read [Castle Crashers - Development Blog]
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If you would like to wait for the game to be finished, then buy it six months after it is released when it will be fully patched, and often selling for half the price!
on October 30, 2008 at 02:45 AM - LINKOh poor little lamb having to spend 10 minutes downloading a naughty annoying iddle patch that is only released to enhance sweeties liddle gameing experience : ( or fix something that is broken.
Deadlines are set if it’s nearly there we have to release if not the game is shelved and either way the developer hardly ever wins maybe we should wait and work on a title for 8 years so we can eliminate any problems?
We also are hitting new ground with unknowns and these often take sooooooo much time to iron out or maybe we should all stick to the same tired old formula and engines so you can play the original game on 18 different discs just with a different name and a pretty hat change now and again.
Jeez.
on October 30, 2008 at 03:21 AM - LINK