pasternakski
Posts: 6565
Joined: 6/29/2002 Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Veldor How is it helpful to spread the opinion that WiTP is completely broken? Look, Veldor. If you had been around here back in the UV development days, you would recognize me as having been one of the staunchest supporters of Matrix/2by3 and their efforts. I am not here to debate you or anyone else about whether UV and WitP were so poorly executed and supported that they are unplayable. That just happens to be how I feel about it, and I am not going to pretend that I am happy about it. As far as computer wargame design is concerned, if it doesn't get any better soon, I am going to say "the hell with it." The games I have sampled in recent times, including products marketed by Matrix, are generally bad designs and buggy failures. I have neither time nor money to subsidize the poor quality of what I am seeing (and buying, until I get to the point where I stop). So, I'm glad y'all feel like you got your money's worth and more out of WitP. I just don't happen to agree with you, and, like a good little consumer, I will vote with my money. I argued long and hard that UV and WitP needed to stay true to a unified, initial design and not try to pander to the "mod crowd" and those who clamor for results and features not contemplated by the designer and the design team. Build a game that performs solidly and fulfills the design goals. That is "design integrity" to me, and it's the approach that led to monumental successes like Civilization I and II, Master of Orion, and Railroad Tycoon 3. WitP started going wrong when it became apparent that Grigsby's idea was, "Well, I'll stroll through this, use some code from my old designs, dress it up, and everything will be fine." Matrix staff has stated on these forums that he just simply didn't know what he was getting himself into. Look at some of the ad hoc design decisions. You are responsible for assigning such tactical details as air mission altitude, yet you cannot select specific naval task force targets (even though you do select all other types). How can you be at all happy with the air search "system?" 360 degree full coverage to maximum range, ignoring the severe historical limitations on available aircraft that made it necessary to assign restricted air search arcs? Then, what was supposedly decided on got tossed in order to build in features whined for in these forums. The whole game, out of whack as it was from the outset, went completely wacky at that point for me - I say again, for me. And, for me, when the game trumpets that "leaders are vitally important," I see leaders of historical significance vanish from the game and leaders from one side's ships being replaced by leaders from the other side's army and air forces, I believe that there's something smelly going on. These leader bugs remain unfixed, and many of Matrix apologists here can say, "Oh, I think it's a great game," and "You can't expect a game this big and complex to be perfect," and "I just ignore that," and "Well, if you bitch about what's wrong, computer wargame companies might go out of business." I say, if they can't do any better than this, they deserve to go out of business. Thankfully, Matrix has signed some good designers who produce good products (non-wargame to this point), but I worry about such projects as GoA and EiA and wonder what that portends. Well. Enough of that. I will just close by stating once again that I am a dissatisfied customer with regard to the whole UV/WitP product line. I'm glad they won't be using THAT engine any more. Of course, the next thing I saw was an Axis and Allies clone with a little chrome ...
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Put my faith in the people And the people let me down. So, I turned the other way, And I carry on anyhow.
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