posted 03-03-99 04:15 PM ET     

I bought SMAC when it finally decided to show up in UK (after version 2.0 was made available in the US, actually) and have been enjoying it ever since.

However, I'm really only able to enjoy half (OK, I'm exaggerating a bit here) the game people in the US are enjoying because all of the enhancements brought by V2 are unavailable here. I've got American friends waiting for me to start a PBEM game and they're starting to consider playing without me as well.

Can you tell us when we can hope to see the patch appear? Obviously, the functionality has been tested. It should only be a matter of integrating the copy protection (Gee! Lucky us... NOT!) and translating new messages in the various languages.

I don't think this justifies this serious lagging behind of the European patch.

Please, let us know what we can expect...

posted 03-03-99 07:01 PM ET            

Also, I've read in another thread that the requirement for copy protection was not due to Firaxis or EA but to the distributors. It has been a very long time since I was in the retail games industry in the UK (about 10 years), but EA was the one of the biggest *distributor* at that time. Is this not still the case? If not, who is?

Frankly I suspect that no-one at Firaxis operation has any great interest at supporting customers in the European market at all merely because they have no idea how annoyed we become, and how much we base future purchase decisions on things such as this. This has been, unfortuantly, a common problem with less experienced US houses (which usually go bust, I'm glad to say).

posted 03-03-99 08:01 PM ET         

Thanks for the support. Glad to see I'm not the only one getting annoyed at having to wait so long for "enhancing" the game.

It's a pity really because I really admire Sid Meier and Brian Reynolds. They have a great track record and usually do seem to care about the players.

Oh well, I'm curious to see if a more established house like Activision would dare to play this kind of trick with Call To Power.

Come on Firaxis! Don't let us down. Give us reasons to buy your upcoming games... (and if they're the same quality as SMAC and you do show a bit of support for the European market, many will)

posted 03-03-99 08:56 PM ET            

The equation

copy-protection = smaller market + more support needed + less happy customers

seems to still hold valid even when dealing with us untrustworthy Europeans.

BTW, I *do* like the game. Just not the way you treat us.

Cheers, Ian

posted 03-04-99 05:59 AM ET            

I tend to buy US-releases, because they're released earlier, seem to have less bugs in them and are supported better.

However, colleagues of EA (like Sierra) actually do ship from the US to Europe. Hmmm...

Well, Firaxis doesn't seem to have any influence on this and, understandably, get a bit tired of us nagging. Likewise, I get a bit tired of waiting...

I guess it must be because we Europeans cannot be trusted. Wonder why?

Ciao from the UN Copy HQ (The Netherlands)

mic

posted 03-04-99 08:06 AM ET            

Remember that pirates grow rich quickly, so they can easily afford one airfare for each season's most popular games. Even more so when they operate as groups.

Whereas legitimate purchasers bear the burden of mangled and broken officially sanctioned versions.

The consequence of this mistreatment of only the law-abiding members of a large market sector must be to drive up sales of pirated copies.

Scenario: I see a copy of a game I want on sale at retail price. I look at the cover, hmm US version. Good, this release may work, unlike the broken European version I bought last week. I pay recommended retail price, thinking this will benefit the developers.

What I don't know is that this copy was mass-produced by pirates from an original and legitimately purchased US copy, and that the markup is going to the pirates!

posted 03-04-99 10:15 AM ET            

When i told some gamers abouth my problem they told me this. The US version have been
available on the net for 1 month +. And that
the patch is integrated into the "download".

If i hadnt been honest i could:
Get it earlier.
Cheaper.
Better.

Instead:
I got it later.
Payd 55$ for it.
Dont get to use all it's features.
Get a less satisfactionary produtct.

posted 03-05-99 08:30 AM ET            

Anyway, Firaxis: I have to agree with a lot of posters around here. "Coming soon" just doesn't cut it after three weeks of daily check-in. If you or your subcontractors can't hold a deadline, well tough for all, that's life and so on, we (the customers) can handle that, but INFORM us please, don't give us the silent treatment. Acknowledge that you have a large group of loyal and ressourceful followers and allocate the few extra ressources it will take to keep us on the level with what's going on behind the walls of your corporation.
Now it may seem rather ungrateful to complain like this when several Firaxis-teammembers have posted regularly in these forums (Jeff's up to 700+ messages now), but the fact remains that you seem dreadfully understaffed to cope with the post-release stress of efficient bug-reporting and -fixing.
I think that the next time you release a game, you should think twice about setting up a dedicated website with all the frills (like this support/bughunting-forum) if you're not prepared - mentally and/or financially - to meet the (fair)expectations that such a service raises.

posted 03-05-99 10:39 AM ET            

full agreement to all of the posts on this topic though I haven't encountered serious problems with my German version yet.

But one thing that really bothered me was that I downloaded the US-Patch. If I'm right the site does not tell you that it's only for the US version. That's a waste of my time and money.

In addition you can't get access to AlpaHQ.net without the patch.

It's a great game though, in my opinion, as I spent three consecutive nights playing til 3 in the morning.

THAT'S why I'm waiting for the patch.

posted 03-05-99 08:37 PM ET            

Well, that might very well be the case, but I've tried emailing EA in UK and they simply refuse to answer (how rude btw). IMO Firaxis should provide us with atleast a proper email address where we can send our complaints.

I bought the game fair and square, but was forced to get the US version of terran.exe in order to play SMAC under Win2000. (I've played for more than 15 hours now in total, not a single crash so far!)

I was also recently haunted by BlueByte's lame copyprotection scheme as well, so from now on I'll exclusively buy all my games from the US. (fyi: I wrote a small webpage http://runesbike.com/BlueByte in a vain attempt to show BlueByte the finger)

posted 03-06-99 07:10 AM ET            

This is in stark contrast to the support offered by Red Orb Entertainment for their Warlords 3 - Darklords Rising game. When they released a patch for their US version, in advance of the European patch, the cry went up. The lead programmer then offered to e-mail the files from the US version to anyone who asked for them, effectively turning the UK version into a US version, and therefore able to utilise the patch!

Come on Firaxis! Or EA! Or whoever it may be! Here in Europe, we want the patch and we want it now! If we can't have it now, we want to know why and we want to know when - rather than a non-specific "soon".

posted 03-06-99 09:10 AM ET         

correct, and I wish additional a german Forum for all the german Users,which can't speak english.

posted 03-06-99 03:21 PM ET            

Ha Ha Ha!!

posted 03-07-99 07:26 AM ET            

So what's the point in this discussion now?

I don't like this Europeans vs. EA/Firaxis stuff because it is getting us nowhere. As I understand this is not Firaxis fault anyhow and their overall support seems to be quite good.

I also think that everybody deserves a chance to learn and improve, so let's give it to Firaxis. On the other hand we as serious customers deserve at least a release date other than ASAP for the patch. This cannot be so difficult with the US patch being out already.

posted 03-07-99 08:40 AM ET            

This whining and bitching vs. Firaxis/EA is getting us somewhere. We are customers just like the Americans and deserve to be treated equaly! The point is that Firaxis really blew it this time! Maybe it's not entirely Firaxis fault, but EA. That, however, is not my concern, I only know that I don't have a patch. Firaxis just should have anticipated this problem, but blaming the Europeans is pathetic!

People and especially companies are not very quick to learn, on the contriary! They have to suffer to learn and companies can only suffer by losing money, our money! If we let them get away with this they won't learn from it! THEY HAVE TO SUFFER! :-)

SMAC is also gathering dust on my shelf, not because it is a bad game, but I can't bring myself to playing it without the patch! And multiplayer is entirly impossible! I can't login at AlphaHQ, because it asks me to install the patch! THERE IS NO PATCH, you idiots!

oh well, what is the release date of Civilization: CtP again?

posted 03-08-99 03:27 AM ET            

See

http://www.gamesdomain.com/gdreview/strategy/

..which is good because EA's "24 hour" e-mail response seems to be in the same time zone as Firaxis "shortly" or ASAP.

posted 03-08-99 05:51 AM ET            

The UK version of terrain.exe is compressed (1.5Mb as opposed to 3Mb for the US one). Presumably this is to make it harder to remove the copy protection (Why anyone would want to with the US version so readily available I don't know) I wouldn't be suprised if this makes it damn tricky to patch though....

posted 03-08-99 11:52 AM ET         

VIRGIN RULEZ!!! EA SUCKS!!!

Juggler

posted 03-08-99 12:19 PM ET         

They also had a support email list for international needs...................
<grin>