Bugs crashes and lock ups - when will it all end?

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Author Topic:   Bugs crashes and lock ups - when will it all end?

Mark fed up of crashes posted 03-25-99 04:24 AM ET
I am absolutley fed up with this game and Firaxis. After months of waiting and anticipation I buy the game only to find that it constantly hangs. I contact Firaxis who just say 'Its a driver problem. Update your drivers.' So I update my drivers and it still hangs. Hold on a moment there is a patch out. Perhaps this will fix it. Oh! What a fool I have been!! The patch just makes it worse, it now crashes constantly. I contact Firaxis who just say 'Its a driver problem. Update your drivers.' My drivers are the latest drivers there are, I try the game and save files on other machines ranging from P200MMX desk tops to PII 300 laptops and they all crash in exactly the same place!! I report this to Firaxis who say ........ NOTHING. The driver problem wont wash any more. This game is so full of bugs it is not fit for purpose. What a waste of thirty five pounds. How do I get my money back???
I cant belive I waited so long for this rubbish. It has left me feeling extremley frustrated, angry and disappointed. I certainly wont be buying another Firaxis game and reccomend that you dont buy SMAC either.
sphinx_1981 posted 03-25-99 04:30 AM ET
hmm....ive already bought the game and find it to be the best game ive ever played
i think a few others would agree with me as well....
Kusobaba posted 03-25-99 05:11 AM ET
I bought this game when it first came out, experienced multiple terran.exe errors from using the Scenario Editor, and decided to wait out the patches. I have patiently made the changes as suggested by Jeffrey from Firaxis, as well as EA's customer support via telephone, and have had to reinstall my system 5 times. (I have a new Dell here purchased 2 months ago, so we're not talking about maxed out resources). Now on Patch 3.0, I find that the scenario editor has exploded -- which was a fortunate find since I can no longer start my game without at least trying 20 x in one sitting.
Simply put, that is 19 sittings too many.
Firaxis -- You've done a terrible job. I have been very happy with other EA products and their subsidiaries, but I have never experienced problems of this caliber since Microsoft's wickedly flawed DOS 6.0 and Outpost.
How can I exchange this product?
And Sphinx...I'm glad you like the game. There are many more of us who have had horrifying experiences, so perhaps you should gravitate towards your own happy peppy lot. Our anger here is more than justified.
Hemlock posted 03-25-99 07:04 AM ET
Count me as one who has had no crashes or lockups and is thoroughly satisfied. My system is overclocked heavily and should lock up on many things but it simply doesn't. I have had to do no fixes to run SMAC or any other games.
As for returns, geez you whiners need to get a life. If you're unhappy with the product, return it to where you bought it.
Hemlock
CaptComal posted 03-25-99 10:35 AM ET
Hemlock ... I think they want to return it. The problem is the store likely says they can't take it back. Kusobaba said he would exchange it for something else and Mark said he wanted his money back. They want to do just what you said.
However, I believe they have run into a similar situation that I hit with the game MAX2 and Interplay. MAX2 would not run out of the box ... PC GAMER confirmed that in their review. It was only worse after the "final" patch when it crashed on 100% of the Multiplayer games for everyone but two people that I heard of (and I heard from alot of people since I was webmaster for the "Best MAX2 website" - an award I received directly from Interplay themselves). I say "final" patch, because even though 100% of the MP games crashed, Interplay quit working on patches - basically taking the customers money and not giving them a playable game. MANY of us tried to take the game back to the store - but were refused refunds or exchanges. MANY of us then wrote to Interplay requesting a refund. Interplay refused.
This may be why in a following PC GAMER article INTERPLAY was noted as a SHOVELWARE company ... and along with Sierra as the two companies who hated their customers the most. MANY people decided they would never buy another INTERPLAY game (co-incidently, the companies stock price plummetted too and some of MAX2 development team no longer work there).
I ended up selling my MAX2 game to Half Price Books for $3. Does this make me feel happy? Heck No.
Now ... as to Firaxis ... I see these guys trying their darndest to get the game to work (opposite of Interplay). It sounds like they may have gotten bit by using 3rd party "game accelerators" that use low level coding that hangs up some PCs.
My own opinion is that if it can be verified that the game does not run for SOME people (crashes all the time), then those people should be able to get a refund for their full purchase price including taxes, VAT, shipping, etc directly from either EA or Firaxis if their store will not refund the money. Is there anything wrong with this?
While the game is working for me (I have noted maybe half dozen bugs in the game patch 3.0 of which I EMailed to Jeffrey Morris the SAVE GAMES already) so I am not one of the distraught.
I wish the whole Firaxis team well and think it is a shame that they are all likely working 12 hour days ... 7 days a week right now trying to make things work. I applaud their efforts - and at the same time hope that they can see what some of their customers are dealing with. (I know - it is terrible that I am seeing the issue from both sides at the same time - it is not impossible !)
Best Regards,
CaptComal
http://members.tripod.com/ACHeaven
PS: I notice the name Lindsay Riehl in the manual credits for Marketing ... somehow that name rings a bell as the same marketing person for Dark Reign. Am I right?
sphinx_1981 posted 03-25-99 05:46 PM ET
af for returns, this is a matter of being a smart consumer. as with anything that you buy, ask if it is returnable. everyone had the chance to play the DEMO before buying the game. if the demo crashed, the game will likely crash on YOUR system as well. also, why buy from a store that doesnt allow returns. there is no excuse for the whining that is occuring.
comrade posted 03-25-99 08:34 PM ET
Well maybe policy is different where you live, sphinx my friend. But where I am, no store will accept video game returns except for reasons of manufacturer's defect. This does not mean that you can take a game back and say 'this wouldn't run properly on my system.' It means you can return them if say there is a mark on the cd surface itself, causing it to be unloadable. But if it installs, no store around here will take it back.
I, for one am lucky that this game works great for me. I've had few crashes and only one freeze. That's one player mind you.
Every single time I play multipalyer, the damn thing goes into guru meditation. I would dearly love to have a fix for this, but after one reply, Firaxis decided to stop responding to my posts.
As far as I'm concnerned, the claims of multiplayer use on the box are false advertising. I can't get it to work, not even after 2 full versions of the patch.
I do applaud Firaxis' efforts try to fix this game, but I am a little sick of people kissing their collective asses and saying that we as consumers 'owe them something'. That's bull**** and you all know it. Consumers don't owe anything to a manufacturer. They owe it to us to deliver a good product, after all, we make them what they are. It's our money that makes them or breaks them. Firaxis should have done more product testing, in my opinion.
Likewise, if they let us down, they can go the way of the dodo, like Interplay is in the process of doing as we speak. It's not just consumers...I'm sure some smart magazines will do follow-ups on the soap-opera of SMAC patching and crashing.
I'm sure Firaxis knows this, despite what some of their associates say about the whole situation. So come on guys, let's get this thing working. Less talk, more action. I'm rootin' for ya, I love this game! I just want it to WORK.
Brenda posted 03-26-99 06:58 PM ET
It crashes (hangs) fairly often on my system, too, usually when I haven't saved in awhile 8) ...
so I just save frequently. Once it wouldn't reload unless I rebooted my system -- that time, my color palette had been fried.
I haven't tried playing multiplayer yet. Luckily, I can still play and finish the game; I just save after each move (even though it doesn't crash THAT often; just paranoid). My guess is severe memory fragmentation, a danger for games with a lot going on, since it appears to happen more the later you get in the game.
brenda
Jeffrey Morris FIRAXIS posted 03-27-99 12:22 PM ET
Are you using the autosave feature Brenda? I hope you're not manually saving after every turn.
jkm
firaxis games
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Author	Topic: Bugs crashes and lock ups - when will it all end?
Mark fed up of crashes	posted 03-25-99 04:24 AM ET I am absolutley fed up with this game and Firaxis. After months of waiting and anticipation I buy the game only to find that it constantly hangs. I contact Firaxis who just say 'Its a driver problem. Update your drivers.' So I update my drivers and it still hangs. Hold on a moment there is a patch out. Perhaps this will fix it. Oh! What a fool I have been!! The patch just makes it worse, it now crashes constantly. I contact Firaxis who just say 'Its a driver problem. Update your drivers.' My drivers are the latest drivers there are, I try the game and save files on other machines ranging from P200MMX desk tops to PII 300 laptops and they all crash in exactly the same place!! I report this to Firaxis who say ........ NOTHING. The driver problem wont wash any more. This game is so full of bugs it is not fit for purpose. What a waste of thirty five pounds. How do I get my money back??? I cant belive I waited so long for this rubbish. It has left me feeling extremley frustrated, angry and disappointed. I certainly wont be buying another Firaxis game and reccomend that you dont buy SMAC either.
sphinx_1981	posted 03-25-99 04:30 AM ET hmm....ive already bought the game and find it to be the best game ive ever played i think a few others would agree with me as well....
Kusobaba	posted 03-25-99 05:11 AM ET I bought this game when it first came out, experienced multiple terran.exe errors from using the Scenario Editor, and decided to wait out the patches. I have patiently made the changes as suggested by Jeffrey from Firaxis, as well as EA's customer support via telephone, and have had to reinstall my system 5 times. (I have a new Dell here purchased 2 months ago, so we're not talking about maxed out resources). Now on Patch 3.0, I find that the scenario editor has exploded -- which was a fortunate find since I can no longer start my game without at least trying 20 x in one sitting. Simply put, that is 19 sittings too many. Firaxis -- You've done a terrible job. I have been very happy with other EA products and their subsidiaries, but I have never experienced problems of this caliber since Microsoft's wickedly flawed DOS 6.0 and Outpost. How can I exchange this product? And Sphinx...I'm glad you like the game. There are many more of us who have had horrifying experiences, so perhaps you should gravitate towards your own happy peppy lot. Our anger here is more than justified.
Hemlock	posted 03-25-99 07:04 AM ET Count me as one who has had no crashes or lockups and is thoroughly satisfied. My system is overclocked heavily and should lock up on many things but it simply doesn't. I have had to do no fixes to run SMAC or any other games. As for returns, geez you whiners need to get a life. If you're unhappy with the product, return it to where you bought it. Hemlock
CaptComal	posted 03-25-99 10:35 AM ET Hemlock ... I think they want to return it. The problem is the store likely says they can't take it back. Kusobaba said he would exchange it for something else and Mark said he wanted his money back. They want to do just what you said. However, I believe they have run into a similar situation that I hit with the game MAX2 and Interplay. MAX2 would not run out of the box ... PC GAMER confirmed that in their review. It was only worse after the "final" patch when it crashed on 100% of the Multiplayer games for everyone but two people that I heard of (and I heard from alot of people since I was webmaster for the "Best MAX2 website" - an award I received directly from Interplay themselves). I say "final" patch, because even though 100% of the MP games crashed, Interplay quit working on patches - basically taking the customers money and not giving them a playable game. MANY of us tried to take the game back to the store - but were refused refunds or exchanges. MANY of us then wrote to Interplay requesting a refund. Interplay refused. This may be why in a following PC GAMER article INTERPLAY was noted as a SHOVELWARE company ... and along with Sierra as the two companies who hated their customers the most. MANY people decided they would never buy another INTERPLAY game (co-incidently, the companies stock price plummetted too and some of MAX2 development team no longer work there). I ended up selling my MAX2 game to Half Price Books for $3. Does this make me feel happy? Heck No. Now ... as to Firaxis ... I see these guys trying their darndest to get the game to work (opposite of Interplay). It sounds like they may have gotten bit by using 3rd party "game accelerators" that use low level coding that hangs up some PCs. My own opinion is that if it can be verified that the game does not run for SOME people (crashes all the time), then those people should be able to get a refund for their full purchase price including taxes, VAT, shipping, etc directly from either EA or Firaxis if their store will not refund the money. Is there anything wrong with this? While the game is working for me (I have noted maybe half dozen bugs in the game patch 3.0 of which I EMailed to Jeffrey Morris the SAVE GAMES already) so I am not one of the distraught. I wish the whole Firaxis team well and think it is a shame that they are all likely working 12 hour days ... 7 days a week right now trying to make things work. I applaud their efforts - and at the same time hope that they can see what some of their customers are dealing with. (I know - it is terrible that I am seeing the issue from both sides at the same time - it is not impossible !) Best Regards, CaptComal http://members.tripod.com/ACHeaven PS: I notice the name Lindsay Riehl in the manual credits for Marketing ... somehow that name rings a bell as the same marketing person for Dark Reign. Am I right?
sphinx_1981	posted 03-25-99 05:46 PM ET af for returns, this is a matter of being a smart consumer. as with anything that you buy, ask if it is returnable. everyone had the chance to play the DEMO before buying the game. if the demo crashed, the game will likely crash on YOUR system as well. also, why buy from a store that doesnt allow returns. there is no excuse for the whining that is occuring.
comrade	posted 03-25-99 08:34 PM ET Well maybe policy is different where you live, sphinx my friend. But where I am, no store will accept video game returns except for reasons of manufacturer's defect. This does not mean that you can take a game back and say 'this wouldn't run properly on my system.' It means you can return them if say there is a mark on the cd surface itself, causing it to be unloadable. But if it installs, no store around here will take it back. I, for one am lucky that this game works great for me. I've had few crashes and only one freeze. That's one player mind you. Every single time I play multipalyer, the damn thing goes into guru meditation. I would dearly love to have a fix for this, but after one reply, Firaxis decided to stop responding to my posts. As far as I'm concnerned, the claims of multiplayer use on the box are false advertising. I can't get it to work, not even after 2 full versions of the patch. I do applaud Firaxis' efforts try to fix this game, but I am a little sick of people kissing their collective asses and saying that we as consumers 'owe them something'. That's bull**** and you all know it. Consumers don't owe anything to a manufacturer. They owe it to us to deliver a good product, after all, we make them what they are. It's our money that makes them or breaks them. Firaxis should have done more product testing, in my opinion. Likewise, if they let us down, they can go the way of the dodo, like Interplay is in the process of doing as we speak. It's not just consumers...I'm sure some smart magazines will do follow-ups on the soap-opera of SMAC patching and crashing. I'm sure Firaxis knows this, despite what some of their associates say about the whole situation. So come on guys, let's get this thing working. Less talk, more action. I'm rootin' for ya, I love this game! I just want it to WORK.
Brenda	posted 03-26-99 06:58 PM ET It crashes (hangs) fairly often on my system, too, usually when I haven't saved in awhile 8) ... so I just save frequently. Once it wouldn't reload unless I rebooted my system -- that time, my color palette had been fried. I haven't tried playing multiplayer yet. Luckily, I can still play and finish the game; I just save after each move (even though it doesn't crash THAT often; just paranoid). My guess is severe memory fragmentation, a danger for games with a lot going on, since it appears to happen more the later you get in the game. brenda
Jeffrey Morris FIRAXIS	posted 03-27-99 12:22 PM ET Are you using the autosave feature Brenda? I hope you're not manually saving after every turn. jkm firaxis games