For the love of god, how could such a bugged game go gold?

[Gus]

Aah diddums. If you think this is bad, you should have seen Heroes IV at release. THAT needed several patches to get the AI working properly

Alright I've read that one too many times, how many patches did you download 'exactly'? I did one version 1.0 to 1.2, now I did buy both expansions and if you did not buy WoW you needed an additional patch. I suppose there was a 1.0 to 1.1, so that would be two, with the one with WoW that would be 3. We'll have that many by July with more promised to add features that should have been included in the release. There may have been others for H-IV, but I never needed any but the one I mentioned.

the thing is, do you prefer 3 patches, one every month over 3 months, or one big patch every 6 months ?

[axus]

I think this game in its current state is worth the money. Along with that, I'll say that my game crashed during a cutscene after beating the mission, which corrupted my campaign.sav file so if anyone can send me one up to Warlock Mission 5, please hook me up.

If you had stopped playing the game because of the bugs, then you got ripped off, but I bet everyone here has played every day they had time. The problem is an unsolvable one, if something is good enough for the money then people will buy it despite its defects. But there is a cost to the company, Nival isn't going to be a company of 100s of millions of dollars. Companies like Blizzard and Square that put out consistent, quality products will get the most business. But, making HOMM isn't a bad living...

[ThunderTitan]

Companies like Blizzard and Square that put out consistent, quality products will get the most business.

As a developer, yes, that's true. But it's the damn producers that get away with putting out weak crap after weak crap without going under if they get one of them to sell enough. Just look at EA.

[jeff]

the thing is, do you prefer 3 patches, one every month over 3 months, or one big patch every 6 months ?

No that's not the question, I'm already on record elsewhere saying frequent patching done quickly is best. What I was calling into question was how acurrate the "numerous patches were required" and to the best of my knowledge that was not the case. It may never have been fixed to our desires, the fact was after only 1 or 2 patches it was very playable, as is H-V right now.

OK What's up with this:
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[Akul]

Be happy that the game was delayed. If it was released when it was intended, then H4 would look like a bug-free product.

To Bardolph:
No, it isn't programers fault. Programers have better jobs then making maps. Blame the mapmakers.

BTW, is it true that Heroic Corner was mapmaking for H5?

P. S. DL, you and I are on oposite locations

[Gus]

@jeff
yeah, but a "number" of patches is not really relevant, as it could be huge or tiny. My point was that H4 needed huge patches. Over quite some time.

[MrSteamTank]

Be happy that the game was delayed. If it was released when it was intended, then H4 would look like a bug-free product.

To Bardolph:
No, it isn't programers fault. Programers have better jobs then making maps. Blame the mapmakers.

BTW, is it true that Heroic Corner was mapmaking for H5?

P. S. DL, you and I are on oposite locations

Blame the management of both nival & ubisoft for this one. They simply didn't give the programmers and map makers enough time to bring out a finish product. They are the ones responsible for release dates and all that jazz.

[Akul]

Be happy that the game was delayed. If it was released when it was intended, then H4 would look like a bug-free product.

To Bardolph:
No, it isn't programers fault. Programers have better jobs then making maps. Blame the mapmakers.

BTW, is it true that Heroic Corner was mapmaking for H5?

P. S. DL, you and I are on oposite locations

Blame the management of both nival & ubisoft for this one. They simply didn't give the programmers and map makers enough time to bring out a finish product. They are the ones responsible for release dates and all that jazz.

It is just Ubi. Nival is doing that what Ubi tells theme to do.

[MrSteamTank]

Be happy that the game was delayed. If it was released when it was intended, then H4 would look like a bug-free product.

To Bardolph:
No, it isn't programers fault. Programers have better jobs then making maps. Blame the mapmakers.

BTW, is it true that Heroic Corner was mapmaking for H5?

P. S. DL, you and I are on oposite locations

Blame the management of both nival & ubisoft for this one. They simply didn't give the programmers and map makers enough time to bring out a finish product. They are the ones responsible for release dates and all that jazz.

It is just Ubi. Nival is doing that what Ubi tells theme to do.

You never know. Maybe nival said that the game was ready for publishing. Maybe ubisoft wasn't pushing nival for a deadline. Nival has a history of making subpar games. Perhaps it's the publisher and perhaps it is not.

[Akul]

You never know. Maybe nival said that the game was ready for publishing. Maybe ubisoft wasn't pushing nival for a deadline. Nival has a history of making subpar games. Perhaps it's the publisher and perhaps it is not.

You watch to much movies IMO.
It is in interest of every developer to have as much time as posible to make a game. But it is in interest of a publisher to throw the game onto the shelves as soon as posible.

[Ethric]

I daresay it is possible that a developer simply doesn't employ particularily good people and that that may lead to poor results. Not saying it's the case here but it's a possiblity, it doesn't always have to be the publishers fault alone.

[ThunderTitan]

I'm gonna take the stance that the bugs were mostly Nival's fault, based on something I read once. The weak story/universe is Ubi's fault. And hireing Nival...

[Kristo]

As a software engineer, I can speak from experience on this one. You can never be sure you got all the bugs out before releasing the product to the customer. It's just impossible to test for every conceivable thing your customers are going to do with it.

That said, Heroes V is an extremely complex game from a programming standpoint. Thousands of bugs were fixed during beta test and the game still ended up in the state it's in now. History points us to time pressure from the publisher as the culprit, i.e., pushing the game out the door before it's really ready. But I suppose we'll never really know the answer unless Nival and Ubisoft start pointing fingers at each other.

[ThunderTitan]

History points us to time pressure from the publisher as the culprit, i.e., pushing the game out the door before it's really ready.

Remember the extra month?! If Nival asked we could have screamed for more time.... or send DT's.

And there's a big diference between all bugs and faulty or missing descriptions.

In the end they both F* up.

[Kristo]

History points us to time pressure from the publisher as the culprit, i.e., pushing the game out the door before it's really ready.

Remember the extra month?! If Nival asked we could have screamed for more time.... or send DT's.

They didn't ask because it wasn't up to them. The publisher decides when a game is released. Everyone whined that the game wasn't ready and Ubisoft tossed you a bone and pushed the release date back. But in the end they had their timetables and budgets to meet. It's just business. It must not be as profitable to wait until a game is bug-free before releasing it. It sucks for the fans, but that's way the market works. I did my part by not buying a bad game. What about you?

[ThunderTitan]

What about you?

I bought the complete edition for the rest of the games. I'm a bad, bad titan.

I'm sticking with the Nival was more at fault then Ubi on this one.

[DaemianLucifer]

The one at the top is the one with most responsobility,thus the one that should be blamed.Ubi decided who will produce what and in what time,so if they changed any of those factors,the whole game would look different.They are the ones that should asses who is capable of doing what and in how much time.So if the game goes wrong,ubi is to blame the most.If the game goes right,ubi is to be praised the most.

[Omega_Destroyer]

I fully agree with that DaemianLucifer.

[jeff]

Obviously UBI decided the game had to be released in the financial quarter it was released in. A delay of one month kept it in the same quarter for the stock report so little was risked. Pushing the game too far into the next quarter, for whatever reason was deemed unacceptable. So we ended up with a game with bugs (I agree with Kristo bugs are inevitable if you want the game released in a timely matter), bugs I can except as long as gameplay can continue, but an incomplete game is another matter, no map editor = incomplete game.

[ThunderTitan]

Ubi decided who will produce what and in what time,so if they changed any of those factors,the whole game would look different.

Agreed that It's Ubi's fault too, but from what I heard 3 extra month wouldn't have changed much. Maybe get some descriptions fixed.