A customers journey (true story)

[Biffa]

Not sure if this thread will help anybody but here goes:

I totally missed Winterstorm but a few weeks ago I spotted Kharkov reviewed on The Wargamer website, I've looked forward to the release ever since and WAS going to buy it, I say WAS because this is the process I've just gone through, like anyone would who was thinking of buying the game...

I'm actually playing Rising Sun atm since I love this type of game and have the usual Combat M, Close C, Talonsoft collections like many other players here.

Anyway I've been on holiday for a week so missed its release, tonight I had some free-time online so I got my wallet to go for the download (digital and box coz I can't wait) but decided to check out some reviews first, went to IGN and saw an average rating by only one person, so then randomly I went to gamespot, I read the three reviews and ofc one of them was RH's review at 2.5 or whatever.

All I'm saying is that as of this moment I still haven't bought the game. RH mentions the support pages here in his review (so this is how I found this forum) anyway a lot of the things he mentions are being discussed here as 'issues' and hopefully will be fixed soon. Sadly some of them are important to my enjoyment of this type of game aka 'movement bugs, anti-tank art not moving, 1km maps, no cities.

I don't want to draw attention to the damage that this kind of persons bitter review can do to the success of a game (he's proved he is a bit of a fool anyhow) but at the moment there isn't a lot of players reviews out there and as you can see me 'a random person' was influenced by it. I know the thread concerning this issue has just been locked and maybe I shouldn't have referred to it in this post.

I have no axe to grind here, I'm a tt wargamer of 30 years and pc gamer of 15 years, I love any company that supports good pc strategy games (especially on a PC!).

I guess what I'm saying is that you guys (the community here) honestly need to get out there and say how good this game actually is and that will water down the odd daft review like his from stopping customers like me from possibly buying it.

Don't forget If you don't support games the games you like then we will all be stuck with the usual brainless eye candy console rubbish.

(To be honest I will wait for a patch to address some of the issues before I buy, but that decision is based on what I've read on this forum written by people who honestly care and like the game.

[Prince of Eckmühl]

ORIGINAL: SAF_Biffa

anyway a lot of the things he mentions are being discussed here as 'issues'

Could you elaborate?

PoE (aka ivanmoe)

[marcusm]

He slammed CMBB as well (found an old thread where he did that). He is negative
to 99% of the games around and he doesnt even buy them.

[Mobius]

I responded to his 'problems' only after reading about him from another poster. I had given up reading anything posted by him for about a week prior to that post. As he didn't have any facts at his disposal.

I did respond to his post over at the Wargammer point by point. Most of his solutions to problems would only create new problems. Like figures of a squad being eliminated at each step. After losing a figure your squads would be indistinguishable from teams and would therefore be more confusing.

He did give TOW a 2.0 so a 6.5 for PCK means its 325% better. Of course he didn’t play that either.

If you go to the review site now it has 9's showing and his review has dropped off the page.

[Prince of Eckmühl]

ORIGINAL: marcusm

He slammed CMBB as well (found an old thread where he did that). He is negative
to 99% of the games around and he doesn't even buy them.

Hi marcusm,

I'm curious as to what SAF_biffa has to say, because I found the review in question to be really, really thin on the substance end. It seemed like the salient "issue" raised in the piece was related to the use of the IE7 (even though you don't need a web-browser to play the new Kharkov game).

@SAF_biffa:

Do you have concerns about the game beyond the version of Internet Explorer that was previously required for use with its several included utiiities?

PoE (aka ivanmoe)

[Hertston]

ORIGINAL: SAF_Biffa

(To be honest I will wait for a patch to address some of the issues before I buy, but that decision is based on what I've read on this forum written by people who honestly care and like the game.

Your call, of course, but unless you make a habit of always waiting for patches I can't see much point in doing so in this case. There won't be larger maps or cities (the latter are not relevant to the campaign, anyway) until the next title. Anything else is relatively trivial, IMVHO (subject to anything system specific that I'm not suffering from). Not that patches aren't needed, of course (name a game released recently where they aren't), but Kharkov is one of the most 'issue' free titles on release I've seen in a while.

[Prince of Eckmühl]

ORIGINAL: Hertston

Kharkov is one of the most 'issue' free titles on release I've seen in a while.

Let me echo this sentiment in regard not only to the new Kharkov game, but Koiosworks other games as well. IMO, there are but a few developers that put out as polished a package for publishing, distribution and sale as do these guys. Might I add, this stands in stark contrast to the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of the wargames published today.

PoE (aka ivanmoe)

[marcusm]

ORIGINAL: Prince of Eckmühl

ORIGINAL: marcusm

He slammed CMBB as well (found an old thread where he did that). He is negative
to 99% of the games around and he doesn't even buy them.

Hi marcusm,

I'm curious as to what SAF_biffa has to say, because I found the review in question to be really, really thin on the substance end. It seemed like the salient "issue" raised in the piece was related to the use of the IE7 (even though you don't need a web-browser to play the new Kharkov game).

@SAF_biffa:

Do you have concerns about the game beyond the version of Internet Explorer that was previously required for use with its several included utiiities?

PoE (aka ivanmoe)

Just to clarify. I meant that Ravinhood is negative to 99% of the games .

Btw. Another reason why IE6 shouldn't be an issue. Windows Update more or less forces updates to IE7 anyway. It shouldn't be an issue for anyone.

[Hertston]

It pisses me off the more I think about it... Matrix/Koios have seemingly busted a gut trying to get IE6 compatibility sorted quickly, and about the only person for whom it was actually an issue was you know who. [:@]

[rickier65]

ORIGINAL: SAF_Biffa

Not sure if this thread will help anybody but here goes:

...

All I'm saying is that as of this moment I still haven't bought the game. RH mentions the support pages here in his review (so this is how I found this forum) anyway a lot of the things he mentions are being discussed here as 'issues' and hopefully will be fixed soon. Sadly some of them are important to my enjoyment of this type of game aka 'movement bugs, anti-tank art not moving, 1km maps, no cities.

I don't want to draw attention to the damage that this kind of persons bitter review can do to the success of a game (he's proved he is a bit of a fool anyhow) but at the moment there isn't a lot of players reviews out there and as you can see me 'a random person' was influenced by it. I know the thread concerning this issue has just been locked and maybe I shouldn't have referred to it in this post.

I have no axe to grind here, I'm a tt wargamer of 30 years and pc gamer of 15 years, I love any company that supports good pc strategy games (especially on a PC!).

I guess what I'm saying is that you guys (the community here) honestly need to get out there and say how good this game actually is and that will water down the odd daft review like his from stopping customers like me from possibly buying it.

Don't forget If you don't support games the games you like then we will all be stuck with the usual brainless eye candy console rubbish.

(To be honest I will wait for a patch to address some of the issues before I buy, but that decision is based on what I've read on this forum written by people who honestly care and like the game.

Thanks for the heads up - and I appreciate your candor. I know I posted responses on the two boards I know where RH put some factually innaccurate statements. But that doesn't always help.

In any event, sounds like you still have some concerns though, ie:

Movement bugs -- is this the issue some folks mention about vehicles getting stuck? (I have to admit, I haven't seen that one yet, not to say I wont of course), the only close thing I got was I order a platoon to withdraw and one of the vehicles started reversing then ran into an infantry squad and manuevered around, unfortunately, the manuevering around it ended up with the tank reversing in a half circle around the infantry squad (actually gave me a lugh to see), but to be honest, this didn't bother me too much.

The immobility of the antitank art: I recall seeing a thread about that one, but again, it hasn't affected me yet, and I wouldn't be surprised to see someone in community mod that unit, or a replacement unit that can be moved (but i might be wrong - maybe they cant mod like that).

1 km maps - yeah, this was the one thing that concerned me as well, and I really thought about it before buying (although I ended up buying pretty darn quick) - and you know, again, it hasn't bothered me playing yet. I know it might after a while - but I"m not bothered by it right now at least.

Cities - that was never one of my fav in CMBB, so I'm not bothered by not having them.

I think this game is maturing quite nicely myself, and the migration path the Matrix is planning sound really good to me, ie upgrading each new release with the old one embedded and upgraded for those that own them is a good way o be future proof.

Thanks,
Rick

[rickier65]

ORIGINAL: Hertston

It pisses me off the more I think about it... Matrix/Koios have seemingly busted a gut trying to get IE6 compatibility sorted quickly, and about the only person for whom it was actually an issue was you know who. [:@]

Well, I wouldnt go that far -

Rick

[Erik Rutins]

Hi Biffa,

Thanks for posting and I'm sorry to hear about that whole drama ending up affecting your opinion of Kharkov. I'm going to lock this thread simply because we're trying to put that behind us (and I've promised not to discuss it as it's a Catch 22 for me as far as appearances go), but I hope you will post new threads with any questions you may have and read through the First Impressions thread below as well if you haven't.

Regarding issues, I can only say that I find Kharkov to be remarkably issue-free. Sure, some did slip through but overall fewer than the average release we've put out in my experience and as with all our releases, we're working hard to get rid of those ASAP.

It's also important to realize the difference between issues and design choices. It's easy to turn a design choice or a development time trade-off into an apparent issue and by focusing on those one can get what is, in my opinion, a very narrow view of the game because you end up only knowing its potential negatives. Any game is a sum of its parts and often more than the sum - I think the best way to get a sense of how the whole game comes together is to read through those first impressions and threads like the CMBB vs. PCK comparison and so on.

In any case, I hope you'll stay with us to post and read and I hope that in time you might decide that Panzer Command is your kind of game too.

Best Regards,

- Erik