SH4 - post 1.2 status: A Plan of Action

[OlegM]

*yawn*

Another laughably naive, pointless, boring thread.......

[jdkbph]

Originally Posted by OlegM

*yawn*

Another laughably naive, pointless, boring thread.......

Those two games I mentioned.... with the help of the Connecticut State AG in one case and the Washington State AG in the other, I received refunds from the publishers (Ocean and SSI) for both.

It works.

[U-Bones]

Originally Posted by jdkbph

Those two games I mentioned.... with the help of the Connecticut State AG in one case and the Washington State AG in the other, I received refunds from the publishers (Ocean and SSI) for both.

It works.

Thing is, some of us want a working sub game WAY more than a refund... Know a way to get both ? I don't.

[Camaero]

Good thread. The more our voices are heard, the more there will be a chance for action.

[heartc]

Originally Posted by jdkbph

Those two games I mentioned.... with the help of the Connecticut State AG in one case and the Washington State AG in the other, I received refunds from the publishers (Ocean and SSI) for both.

It works.

Both of which were pretty damn good and do not exist anymore.
Ocean: TFX, EF-2000, Tactcom, etc
SSI: Oh, where to start? SHI, Harpoon, Great Naval Battles, Su-27 Flanker, Panzer General, etc. etc.

It works, indeed. :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

[Duke_Wellington_1st]

Great Thread.

I do not uderstand those voices that seem to support companies that sell faulty and unfinished products. Sure the Sub simulation genre is fairly bare.... but no reason to support publishers that rush release dates and fail to deliver what they advertise. That sort of behaviour should not be tolerated in any industry.

[heartc]

Originally Posted by Duke_Wellington_1st

Great Thread.

I do not uderstand those voices that seem to support companies that sell faulty and unfinished products. Sure the Sub simulation genre is fairly bare.... but no reason to support publishers that rush release dates and fail to deliver what they advertise. That sort of behaviour should not be tolerated in any industry.

Look, the thing is, how do you know they "rushed" the release date? Do you think they contracted the dev team without a time shedule set out beforehand and then all of a sudden one day broke through the door saying "All right, everyone STOP! We are going to publish now."? Publishing a software product on a worldwide scale, with buying shelf space in advance etc. is not something you do over a weekend. And sure enough when the publisher asks "So, when will it be done? We would like to see it on shelves in a year." the notion the devs could just answer back "It'll be done when it's done." is laughable. You won't find any publisher by doing so. This is what modders can do when there is no money involved, but not when you are in business.

So you gota make contracts and set priorities in developement to ensure you STICK to what you SIGNED and be able to deliver a working product on release date. Features described in the manual but totally absent in the product (like properly working radar, chronometer, map notes, and may I say convoys NOT stopping waiting to be torpedoed is also essential for a subsim and shouldn't even need to be mentioned, and bugs that weren't there in SHIII) is NOT acceptable and surely NOT the fault of the publisher. The devs build the game, not the publisher. And now, the publisher has already allowed for two more patches. The devs had two more patches to fix things, but were unable to complete it.

Of course Ubisoft gets the blame and rage of the customer for that - which is proper from the customer's perspective, since the publisher is his direct other contracting party - but the only thing the publisher will do when being "dropped" by the customer is drop HIS contracting party, the dev team. And it doesn't matter whether that's an in-house or external team.

So, all this "BOYCOTT / SUE UBI!" is not only half of the story, but if you think the devs are not to blame for any of that and want to see them stay in business it won't be helpfull to that cause at all.

[heartc]

BTW, just to clarify: My intend is not to harrass the devs. I'm pretty happy that there is a SHIV and even in its current state I'm enjoying it a lot and it's far from unplayable, like some people here portray it. What I'm saying is that if people want to hit Ubisoft, they will most probably hit the devs instead, regardless how often they state "It's Ubisoft, not the devs." Those are romantic words on the internet as opposed to contracts and money in the real world.

[castorp345]

Originally Posted by heartc

all this "BOYCOTT / SUE UBI!" is not only half of the story, but if you think the devs are not to blame for any of that and want to see them stay in business it won't be helpfull to that cause at all.

good post, heartc... thanks for the perspective!


i wonder though what you might suggest as recourse in the event of 1.3 never surfacing?
simply grin and bear it? it is afterall just a game, but it'd sure be nice to see it reach it's potential...
:hmm:

[Beery]

Originally Posted by heartc

So, all this "BOYCOTT / SUE UBI!" is not only half of the story, but if you think the devs are not to blame for any of that and want to see them stay in business it won't be helpfull to that cause at all.

Remember that Ubisoft is both the publisher and developer of SH4.

A company that releases a broken product and refuses to fix it doesn't deserve to stay in business. Customers should be actively trying to get such a company out of business because for every large company that serves its customers poorly there are always two or three companies overshadowed by such a company who want to serve the customer better, and they will hire devs who do good work (so Ubi devs won't go hungry) and hopefully they'll avoid publishers who serve the customer poorly.

[castorp345]

here's a copy of the email i'm sending via corporate communications:

***

Dear Mr. Yves Guillemot:

I want to inform you of my dissatisfaction with the Ubisoft software title Silent Hunter 4: Wolves of the Pacific. I purchased this item as a pre-order on March 10th from the Ubisoft online store.


My complaint concerns the following issues that leave this product defective and broken:

• Radar needs to be made functional.

• All AI needs fixing. Too often merchant ships all come to a stop and muddle around when under attack. Destroyers guarding merchants and especially in task forces occasionally seem somewhat uninterested in firing back. The Subchaser is unable to fire its main gun at all. If you mod the Subchaser to have a second gun in a raised position where the AA gun is it will fire this gun. The Akizuki DD has a similar issue, of the four guns it has only the two guns on the raised platforms actually fire. When the boat is rammed by a destroyer (for example) the destroyer generally comes of worse and often explodes.

• Units of measurement: Imperial units for ship dimensions, torpedo depth gauge, range figure in the TDC and Position Keeper, all UOM issues need to be resolved.

• Repetitive patrols still get assigned.

• Chronometer still doesn’t work as described in the manual. “The Chronometer bug”, this needs a quick and dirty fix, just a simple speed response in the text box when the Speed button is selected in the TDC, as occurs when the player clicks the Depth Beneath Keel button. But, importantly, the player should still have the choice of manually entering his own speed estimate in the TDC.

To solve these issues, I would like either for a patch to be released that fixes them, or to receive a refund in full for this currently defective product.


I look forward to your reply and resolution of my complaint and will allow two weeks before referring it to the appropriate consumer agency.


Thank you for your assistance and cooperation in this matter.


Sincerely,

[heartc]

Originally Posted by Beery

Remember that Ubisoft is both the publisher and developer of SH4.

A company that releases a broken product and refuses to fix it doesn't deserve to stay in business. Customers should be actively trying to get such a company out of business because for every large company that serves its customers poorly there are always two or three companies overshadowed by such a company who want to serve the customer better, and they will hire devs who do good work (so Ubi devs won't go hungry) and hopefully they'll avoid publishers who serve the customer poorly.

Well, all I can say is that I hope you're right in that. Fact is that the simulation market - or the simulation offerings - has taken a big hit and has become a niche market amongst all those FPS, console games, Online RPGs and moronic "Sims" computer games. In a way, I agree very much that you should not allow mediocre products being put on the market just because you are afraid to not get anything else. On the other hand, it might just be like that. I don't know. I just know that Microprose, SSI, Ocean, DiD, Digital Integration, Jane's, etc. are all gone already. There's not much left. All hail to anyone taking up the torch to run with it, but I don't see any indication for this happening anytime soon.

[Keelbuster]

Originally Posted by heartc

Both of which were pretty damn good and do not exist anymore.
Ocean: TFX, EF-2000, Tactcom, etc
SSI: Oh, where to start? SHI, Harpoon, Great Naval Battles, Su-27 Flanker, Panzer General, etc. etc.

It works, indeed. :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

I sort of agree - i feel like Ubi deserves to be punished way more than a smaller firm that tries to produce quality and falls short. Game companies that shoot for quality seem so few that we need to preserve them, and on the other hand, we need to help kill their competition.