"Chris Schletter" <th0c...@xnet.com> wrote:
>> Thanks for the info, but with regards to the comment above, isn't a
>> "patch" a "fix" in itself? Given that, I find the idea that a company
>> needs time to START working on a fix for what was supposed to be a
>> "fix" in the first place a bid ludicrous. I truly applaud Papy for
>> releasing the patch in the first place, and for backtracking to
>> provide FF support where there was none before, but they do deserve a
>> bit of a slap on the snout for not involving a broad enough
>> cross-section of users as beta testers in the first place.
>No, a patch is NOT necessarily a "fix". In this case there were more
>features that were added to the game than features that were fixed.
>Backtracking to provide FF support? Huh? Are you smoking something the
>world hasn't seen yet? Good grief, when they wrote the game in the first
>place FF was just on the horizon and and was only beginning to make a notion
>of itself, let alone have at least decent devices out for them to test with.
No, I'm not "smoking something." Why the hostile and aggressive
attitude on your part -- you sound as though I've insulted your
grandmother, and that's definitely not the case. I made this post
with the intention of giving Papy (and Randy) the credit they deserve,
while pointing out -- in a level-headed manner -- what still needs to
be done, and to encourage them to do it and not just leave things as
they are. I did this in an attempt to provide a counterpoint to some
of the "GPL 1.1 IS CRAP" kind of ranting I've seen in some posts, and
despite my good intentions, YOU turn my post into a negative rant.
Thanks Chris -- pat yourself on the back. Well-done, Maestro.
As for the issues at hand, I've got to disagree with you on the issue
of a patch not necessarily being a "fix," at least in this case. GPL
1.1 is definitely a patch AND fix -- the GPL 1.1 "patch" does a couple
of different things, if you want to get technical: It ADDS Force
Feedback support, and supposedly FIXES or enhances some aspects of the
on-line gaming support.
Also, I say they are "backtracking" to provide FF support because GPL
came out at almost exactly the same time as Viper Racing (Q3/4 1998),
and VR offered FF right out of the box, while Papy boldly stated that
they CHOSE not to include FF support in GPL because they didn't feel
that Force Feedback technology was "mature" enough yet, I believe.
Given this, I don't think you have a leg to stand on when you say that
"FF was just on the horizon and was only beginning to make a notion of
itself"; MGI seemed to succeed with their FF implementation in Viper
Racing right out of the box, which has set the high mark for FF
effects up to this point. Papy missed the boat on FF entirely -- by
their own DECISION -- and now, thanks to Randy's efforts, they're just
getting on-board the FF wagon.
>>Either
>> they KNEW about these problems and released the patch hoping no one
>> would notice, or the DIDN'T know about the problems, which indicates a
>> bid of shoddy testing on their part. It took no time at all for a
>> large percentage of the people here to learn of the problems, while it
>> seems a small few have experienced no problems at all -- do these
>> numbers correlate with Papy's beta test results, I wonder?
>All you are doing is speculating about how bad of job Papyrus did with the
>patch, but later you will go on to say "kudos" to them. Make up your mind.
They did good, but there's still more to be done. As I pointed out,
what they ADDED seems to work nicely from what I hear (the FF effects,
that is), hence the kudos. On the other hand, some aspects of the
game have suffered from the patch (the frame rate slowdowns/speedups),
so that's bad. Now, thanks to the patch, there are things that need
to be fixed. That's bad, too. So what is there to make my mind up
about?
>> At any rate, I imagine that right now, WE are ALL Papy's beta-testers.
>The patch is free. Don't like it? Don't use it.
I'm not (see below for more details). I never said I didn't like it,
though -- in fact, I never even hinted at it. I've noticed you've
used this same line in other posts on this subject -- you sure seem to
be touchy today. Did somebody put Absorbine Jr. in your athletic
supporter this morning, or is your Force Feedback wheel out on loan,
too? <G>
>> The patch is out, they'll (probably) work on further fixes for the
>> patch, and I imagine that in the end we'll see a re-release of GPL in
>> stores, possibly a NEW versioin ("Grand Prix Legends II" perhaps?)
>> touting "Force Feedback" support once they get the bugs ironed out of
>> the patch. There's a long history of this within the company -- look
>> at how many variations of NASCAR 2 we have available, and then there's
>> CART Racing, which is merely a repackaged version of ICR2 with full
>> Rendition support. Granted, the variations bring various
>> enhancements, and Papy always gives us a superb product overall, but I
>> think that if the current patch is actually a beta patch, it should
>> have been released as such, along with full disclosure of what
>> problems people might encounter.
>Thats not necessarily Papyrus, that would be more in the realm of Sierra's
>marketing
>department.
>Not to mention, since it was primarily Randy, I do believe, doing the patch
>and not an entire section of Papyrus, I doubt they had the resources to do
>as full blown of beta testing job as they did the first time, so they might
>not have been aware that the problems would crop up quite as badly in a few
>instances as they did.
Let's see a show of hands -- how many people here would have
volunteered to serve as beta testers for Randy (raise your hand,
Chris)? Beta testers are typically unpaid volunteers -- volunteers
don't require much in the way of resources; in fact, volunteers mean
ADDED resources FOR NO ADDITIONAL COST. As I said in my original
post, Papy deserves a bit of a slap on the snout for not involving a
broad enough cross-section of users as beta testers in the first
place. Thank you for supporting my point here.
>And the patch wasn't released as anything such as
>beta, alpha, retail, etc, it was just released. Deal with it. You didn't
>pay a dime for it. Don't like it don't use it, GPL was fairly bug free to
>start with and runs well without it.
Yeah, the price was nice, but I'm still not using it, thank you very
much -- it probably won't be installed on any of my machines until
either:
A) I get my FF wheel back from the friend who is currently using it;
and/or
B) I find out that some kind of solution has been found for the frame
rate slowdown/speedup problems.
>> Graphic card manufacturers release beta versions of their video
>> drivers to the general public all the time -- why can't game companies
>> be forthright about releasing patches that are still (or should be) in
>> the beta stages due to known bugs?
>Who says there were known bugs upon release? Got inside information you
>wish to share with us John? If not, all you are doing is making rampant
>speculation.
Geez, man -- calm down (I'd recommend cutting a little bit of caffeine
out of your diet for starters). I'm not the one making "rampant
speculation" -- GPL 1.1 has KNOWN bugs (we know about them now). I
said NOTHING about known bugs on release of ANYTHING in particular --
what I said was (and I quote, just in case the words in the paragraph
above escape your notice): "Why can't game companies be forthright
about releasing patches that are still (or should be) in the beta
stages due to known bugs?" I specifically avoided referring to Papy
or the GPL 1.1 patch, because I was talking about ALL game companies
(which is why I said "Why can't GAME COMPANIES..." and not "Why can't
PAPYRUS...").
PLENTY of companies have released patches with known bugs, so I'm not
singling Papy or Randy out here. One example that comes to mind is
the V2x00 Rendition patch for ICR2 had a known bug; it worked fine
with the V2200 Rendition cards, but didn't work well with V2100 cards,
and this was known up-front -- AND this was made known up-front. No
hassle, no confusion -- a known bug, revealed up-front, use at your
own risk. THAT is the way it should be done (hats off to Papy and/or
the Rendition folks on this one, BTW -- I'm not sure who gets credit
for the V2x00 ICR2 patch).
I don't know if Randy and/or Papy knew of the bugs in the GPL 1.1
patch, and I don't claim to know (never did, in fact). When bugs
exist, though, it's either an indication that insufficient testing was
done prior to release, or a decision was made to go ahead and get it
out despite the problems/shortcomings/bugs. I don't know which was
the case with the GPL 1.1 release, but either way, there's definitely
a bug or two in there.
If the frame rate slowdown and real-time discrepancies created by the
GPL 1.1 patch aren't BUGS, for example, then I don't know what is --
surely Randy and Papy didn't INTEND for these things to occur.
Whether or not they knew about them in advance is debateable -- and
I've given them the benefit of the doubt on this by pointing out that
they EITHER knew about these problems and released the patch anyway,
OR they didn't know about the problems at all, which indicates that
they probably should have involved a greater number of beta testers.
THAT is pretty much my point -- if they knew in advance, we should
have been infomed; if not, they definitely needed to get more people
involved in testing phase, and they should take notes and do so in the
future for other sims and patches.
As I said, though, it sounds like they did good, so kudos to Papy (and
Randy, who really deserves the credit). I reiterate that there's
still work to do, though, and I hope they're not too busy patting
themselves on the back (or beating themselves up, for that matter).
>> All in all, though, I have to say kudos to Papy, and raspberries to
>> Papy.
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