GoodGuy
Matrix Elite Guard

Posts: 1506
Joined: 5/17/2006 From: Cologne, Germany Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Prince of Eckmühl one that wasn't applied because it would have postponed payday for the developer. Did you ever consider those possibilities? Well, I think I just spotted your first hmm less bright statement. I, as a customer, have no sympathy for that kinda situation. That might be cruel, but can be explained easily: If you go to a store and let's say you buy milk, you don't want to find out that the product you just bought turns out to be adulterated milk once you open it at home, although the "best before" seal made you think it was fresh milk, right? You trust your fav store that it stocked the milk correctly, and you trust the transport company that they turn on the cooling devices on their trucks during the transport. Also, you would not accept an excuse from the producer, like "hey, but we did test the milk before it left our dairy facility, so we're not part of the deal anymore". Product liability laws in Europe use to grant the right to return products that are missing advertized features or which are featuring malfunctions. Funny thing is, this is valid for fridges, radios, mp3 players and what not, but (here in Germany for example) once you've opened a sealed game/software box, stores won't take it back to give a refund. If you get loud (so that other customers would hear it) and if you quote a few law paragraphs some stores might give in, but they would just give you a voucher to purchase another game. Some day a customer will go to court for some "lousy" (in lawyers + courts' views) 50 bucks, and fight for the right to get bug-free software. I am sure. I accept your point where you said ppl were trying to force the release in the forums, but I wouldn't accept the "payday" deal as a criterion for not applying vital fixes prior to release. In fact, I couldn't care less about a dev's payday (even if developers are tiny companies or even one or two-man-shows only, like in this niche-market), as I've got the right to get a thoroughly tested / solid programmed piece of software for my money, in my books. Oh, last but not least, humans (programmers in this case) aren't perfect, they do make mistakes, sure.... understandable. But if the fridge I just purchased has a malfunction, I get a new one within 24 hrs, or the store who sells it has the right to repair it (up to 3 times in Europe), before the seller has to grant a refund. Well, that's still faster than months with a series of patches for many games these days. Oh yes, software is more complex than a simple fridge, but if a software company (like let's say EA) with fully fledged Q/A divisions isn't able to test/verify things, quite frankly, it should produce/sell fridges..... Any other company (that's not in the software business) has to deal with that pressure on the market. Software companies still get away with their "there are so many possible hardware combinations, we can't test it on all possible combos"-excuses. It's about sloppy programming, rushed out games and about bad testing procedures (lack of time to test a given product, too) in most cases. The majority of console games are relatively bug-free, as there are less chances to patch things. The amounts of bugs in such games is one of the major factors which determine success or failure on the consoles. And yes, I'm well aware of the fact that console games contain more and more bugs these days. :)
< Message edited by GoodGuy -- 7/3/2007 4:50:55 AM >
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"Aw Nuts" General Anthony McAuliffe December 22nd, 1944 Bastogne --- "I've always felt that the AA (Alied Assault engine) had the potential to be [....] big." Tim Stone 8th of August, 2006
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