martxyz
Posts: 194
Joined: 1/29/2005 From: Broughton, Northants, UK Status: offline
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I don't know if this contribution will be helpful, though it's intended to be. When the original computer version of Harpoon came out (1989?), I read about it in a magazine which was, at that time, based in the UK and called Strategy Plus. I found the articles so fascinating that I ordered it and then the Battlesets, as they emerged, as imports from the US, fthrough a brilliant London company which has, sadly, recently folded. I loved Harpoon, and played it on an Amiga. It wasn't exactly fast on an Amiga 500. Well, the world moved on, and Harpoon 2 arrived, and then the world got very fed up as a result. It had quite a few "issues" and, as I recall, was clocked as an heroic and over-ambitious project which was inexplicably slow-running and basically didn't cut it. I lost track then for years, although I realized recently that people had secretly been sorting it out, while I wasn't looking! I no longer play Harpoon in either version, but I was really surprised that, almost from the moment the current forum opened, eloads of people seemed to be complaining, despite the fact that Harpoon ANW was clearly bucket-loads better than the original release of Harpoon 2. I certainly remember a time when Harpoon 2 was deemed to be so awful that it had effectively "killed off" Harpoon on the computer. People have put in so much work to make sure that did not happen, and produce what seems to be a fine product. They also seem to be trying to improve it and debug it on a continuous basis. Harpoon is a very complex, very detailed, very comprehensive, and very thorough program, which has been completely rescued. It would be really nice to see the team given some space to sort things, even when that means a glitch from time to time. It isn't Pac-Man. Personally I'm amazed at the job they've done with such a complicated program, and building on original code. Well; that's my sanctimonious post for the week, but if you're out there, harpoon-fixers, I think you came up trumps.
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