SH4 1.5
 

the very idea of having to pay for a mod goes against everything this community is about.

it is my belief that we are about freely sharing ideas and talent so that all of us can have the best and most enjoyable naval simulation game experience possible.

once we begin paying for mods and patches we will start a process of prostitution of all shared content and destroy what this community is about. allow them to charge for one download (even if it only costs $1) and you will have to start buying every mod and talent sharing will be at an end.


EDIT: in order to understand the context in which this thread was originally created, please read below:

you must understand that at the time i posted this thread ubisoft was saying that there was a stand alone patch 1.5 that was built into the new u-boat missions expansion pack and it would be released soon as a stand alone patch but then they started acting like it never existed to begin with.

this thread was to protest about ubisoft not wanting to offer the patch for free download as long as they were making money selling it as part of the u-boat expansion. (thats just smart buisness sense)

my intention is not to imply you shouldnt buy the u-boat expansion but rather i just wanted everyone to hold off on purchasing it in protest just untill ubisoft relented and released the stand alone patch version. (this was a misunderstanding on my part about what UBM was all about)

ubisoft's official stance is that patch 1.5 never actually existed and UBM 1.5 is only an expansion with game enhancements and they have no plans to ever create another stand alone patch because 1.4 was the last patch they will make, so this post has kinda lost its purpose for being.

as time has gone by it has become much missunderstood what my intentions were in making this thread so i added this EDIT to clarify my opinion, which over time has changed somewhat as i learned more about the expansion and what it actually did to the game.

I really don't aggree with you.
For us it's entertainment, for them it's work.
I guess you don't work for free for your boss either.

Oh, and SH4 UBoat Missions it's not simply a mod... it much more than that - it's patch and an addon. Which has changes to the game that I very doubt any modder could do cause we don't have access to the source code.

How is SH4 1.5 a mod, especially if it introduces notable engine optimizations and hardcode modifications, along with new engine features.

Can a mod do this? I don't think so. Don't underestimate the resources that went into this.

Likewise, "this community" - what do the devs have to do with that?

...oh let's see, how about the fact that there would be no community without their work? Don't confuse. There is mods and then there's commercial development. This is absolutely neccesary for the community to function.

I'd mod stuff regardless. As far as I'm concerned, they can repackage and sell anything I've published to date. They need to make a living so that we have something to mod in the first place.

100% with you there Tater.
I didn't buy the 1.5 patch.
I bought the U-Boat expansion.
The 1.5 patch just came with it.
I'd poke my eyes out if we don't see a 1.5 aside from the expansion
sooner or later.
From a purely business aspect?
What I see makes perfect sense.
Heck, I'd do the same thing!!
Get a few bucks for the expansion (Patch included)
Once sales go down, release the patch.
Covers costs, increases interest in the expansion,
get better feed back on both.
Your not going anywhere.
You'll still be around for the 1.5 patch release.
And when it's free?
You'll grab it.
I said it before, I'll say it again.
(And NO! I'm not saying you Guys are putting out bad stuff!!;) )
Ubi should think about the
Field of Dreams thing.
If We build it?
The Modders will come!!
Thanks to all the Dev's!
You gave me a whole 4 months of things to play with.
:up:
:rotfl:

Those devs make great sub sims. I'd pay once, I'd pay double, I'd pay double twice over. It's worth it to keep them coming. I do NOT in any way whatsoever or even imaginable feel even the slightist bit cheated by U-Boat Missions.

well there is the very crux of the matter, if ubi sees that they can make $ selling the patch then they have no incentive to release it for free. quite the opposite in fact, it would not make sense to give it away for free if they (us) are willing to pay for it.

the u-boat expansion is worth paying for and i think should be selling for $20 instead of the $10 they ask for. they deserve to get rewarded for their hard work, but when they dont freely release the 1.5 patch and you can only get it with the expansion, i am afraid it will set a president of charging for patches from now on.

if they release the 1.5 patch for free then i will be very happy to be wrong but i just worry that it gives ubi an incentive to charge us for all future patches.

[quote=WEBSTER]At their own risk... cos I certainly will not buy SH3/4 'vanilla disasters' that they were, when these games first came out. They had better produce free patches to correct their misguided business policies.
:)

I remember these arguments from the pre-SH3 days. I have yet to see any company charge for a patch and the add-on is a lot more than a patch.

I disagree also..sorry.

I bought the U-Boat add-on and It didnt bother me one bit. Back when SH1 came out they put out "add-on" discs and nobody had an 'itch" about it.

So IMHO .....its not new.......its not a big deal.....I like sub sims....I'll support their efforts.

Frank

well unless you can show me where i can get the stand alone 1.5 patch download, you are seeing it right now. ubi is saying you cant have the patch unless you buy my expansion so pay up sucker! at this time i dont see anything from them saying they have any plans to release the 1.5 patch for free.

i have no problem with them charging for the uboat expansion, but i do not like when they simply deny the 1.5 patch to anyone who doesnt pay up for an expansion.

i have sh3 already so if i want uboats i play it but i want the 1.5 patch to fix problems with sh4 but cant get it. there is no reason not to release the patch as a stand alone download. as it stands now there is no other reason but they want to make money off of it.

The add-on has been avalible from other sources.

Read between the lines....

I'm with WEBSTER on this. The patch should be released free of charge. It's for the core game, which I've already paid for, and remedies flaws that shouldn't be there to begin with. And please, don't give me the "that's how this business works" mantra, cause it's us consumers that have let the publishers get away with this attitude. If we all acted smart, there wouldn't be this fiasco of patches being released just days after a game's initial release.

what makes me mad is that you can't get the 1.5 patch without shelling out 9.99!!
and if you can...link please!!

Its not the same doing a patch for SH 4 alone, that doing it in conjunction with an addon, the new sh4.exe must have a lot of code for the addon. I mean, i dont think the patch works for sh4 without addon, if it works its crazy if they dont release it for free.

Fear the paid patch.

It's 10 bucks.

It had addon content.

I feel I got my money's worth.

If it were anyone besides Ubisoft, I wouldn't have bought it(like the SH3 'expansion' which was a bunch of free mods stuck together).

Who dug this up? BTW, best $10.00 I spent in a while. I see years of enjoyment for $10.00.

the add-on is indeed a very good bargain at $10 and well worth it, the "patch" however is only available if you buy this add-on.
until the patch is available as a free stand alone then it is in fact a "patch with added content" that you must pay for.

my take is that ubisoft is now saying that it wont fix any more flaws in a game you already paid for, unless you will pay us more money, oh and by the way,
just to get you used to paying extra for something you already bought we will give you added content so you feel better and now that you are used to paying extra we can do this will all our games from now on.

no more free patches for games, suckers! ha ha ha!

i heard opinions saying the patch will be available as a stand alone soon, well it has been out for a while and it doesnt look like that will ever happen. as for it not working without the add-on, game fixes are not dependant on additional content so this is not the problem. the problem is that people are way too happy to shell out another $10 to buy a patch that should be free only because you get additional content that goes with it. if they want more revenue then thats great, more power to them but release the patch as a "free" standalone to fix the game that never worked right from day one. im not anti-add-on but i am against the "you cant have the patch without buying the add-on" attitude from ubisoft.

EDIT: ubisoft also knows that soon most mods will be made to work for the 1.5 patch and many mods wont be usable untill you buy the 1.5 patch with the added content, this makes "buying" the patch with added content even more necessary.

Misnomer using the word patch -1.5 is NOT a patch/mod
 

I work in a business where part of what I do is deal with software. We have various VERSIONS of software - but just because one is a later version - does NOT mean its a "patch" applied to something earlier. 1.5 is a seperate VERSION of software. There is no 1.5 patch because what is BUILT into the engine of 1.5 is not compatible without the elements of the UBM. Yes - the core is still there - but the core has been changed to deal with new elements and variables.

This idea that there should be a 1.5 "patch" is based purely off version numbers. Everyone has assumed that because 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4 were true patches - that is they rewrote hardcoded data to fix issues, 1.5 must be the same. That assumption is false. 1.5 is rewritten to have the engine do NEW things - and thus in reality what 1.5 really is - is SH4 V2.0 - an incremental true VERSION. The fact is that 1.4 and below did not have the additional handles needed to have "the flip side" playable.

What I hear is people want things like the faster load time, engine enhancements, etc - without the added in flip side - for free. I understand that. But those enhancements were not developed for SH4 v1.x - so if you want it - go to the next level. If you don't. then sit down with 1.4 that you have had for QUITE a while and have enjoyed and hush. SH4 had a total of 4 patches. By 1.4 they had ironed out a HUGE number of bugs, plus gave us all a slew of enhancements. 4 patches for a product of this scope vs its sales numbers is actually danged good. The enhancements were created to enable new content - not for the "old" version. Could they be applied retroactively? Probably. But the fact is that the devs with 1.4 had a stable, well working and playing program as the consumer expected. Product cycle finished. Yes, I know all about Ubi making the big bucks while we languish with only an occasional sim. I am not UBI-hugging here - the fact is the industry has a product cycle designed in - and unless the game is a huge seller, continued patches don't go past what is designed in. Regardless of developer/publisher.

So this idea that 1.5 is some patch/mod hybrid is a fallacy. Its a reworked game engine to accomplish new things in addition to the old. That constitutes a new VERSION - and any developer/publisher has a right to charge for a new version of the software, without new content or with it. Not so with a simple PATCH that fixes bugs.

Also - what "Bugs" were fixed in 1.5 that were present in 1.4 that were so glaring that there was a requirement for a "patch" in the first place? Seems that 1.4 has been for a long time what many of us wanted in a PTO subsim - a very stable and enjoyable product - just what we paid for.

As for mods going 1.5 compatible - is it UBI's fault that people want to use the latest and greatest? The fact is the 1.4 version of mods out there make for great gameplay as is. Lets drop the anti-corporate rants huh?