IMPORTANT: State of the Game and Future Plans as of March, 2014

[Numdydar]

Again? Would you rather NOT have any version of WiF other than CWiF done for the computer? Or now that it is here, just abandon the project entirely? I still do not understand the points you are trying to make with these comments.
 
You say you feel sorry for fellow WiF players that have been jerked around. I happen to agree that many WiF players may feel that way (I do not for the record). Ok, they have been jerked around. Now what do you suggest Matrix to actually do at this point? Do you not think that with the state of the game to date, they have paid a price in reputation and sales because of this? I certainly feel they have, but do not know for sure. Steve certainly feels the pain as this is 100% his effort. And feels just as much pain about the current game state as you do about WiF players being jerked around.
 
As a suggestion, instead of making these comments that help no one as far as I can tell, prove Matrix wrong. Find another Delphi programer who is an expert on WiF and pass their name to Eric. Now THAT would be useful.

[CrusssDaddy]

ORIGINAL: Numdydar

I still do not understand the points you are trying to make with these comments.

I know, and this does not bother me.

[etsadler]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

To respond to the points above - to our knowledge no such other programmer exists. Steve is the only one we've found with the combination of WIF knowledge, expertise in Delphi and the diligence and organization to deal with this code base. As I said before, we have no one internally who even programs in Delphi and over the time that we've worked on WIF several other programmers have helped Steve out in certain areas, but none have been able to do what he has done in terms of mastering the ins and outs of the game and code base.

Our Technical Director is also the lead developer for several of our games, so he's not just "management", but he's not a Delphi programmer. We hope his renewed involvement will be helpful, but the point is that we're doing everything we can to improve WIF from our side.

Steve has our confidence and is capable of fixing the reported issues with WIF. I'll repeat again that while we appreciate greatly the patience shown by the community to date, we need to ask for a bit more to put this new plan into effect and hopefully the results will speak for themselves.

You can find the first public beta update through the link in this post:

tm.asp?m=3578629

Regards,

- Erik

Erik, I can easily believe that it is difficult, even impossible, to find a Delphi programmer what is also a WiF expert. It should not, however, be impossible to find a Delphi programmer that can become a WiF expert. No one is born knowing WiF, anyone can learn.

I work in an Agile Team. We do not do programming, but similar to the current situation we often are assigned projects that we have very little knowledge of. We then gain the knowledge necessary to complete the project. If we waited to find an expert in everything we do, we would never get anything done. There could be a lesson to learn here.

[Numdydar]

ORIGINAL: CrusssDaddy

ORIGINAL: Numdydar

I still do not understand the points you are trying to make with these comments.

I know, and this does not bother me.

Good [:)] Because it does not bother me that it does not bother you [:D]

[WarHunter]

ORIGINAL: RickInVA

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

To respond to the points above - to our knowledge no such other programmer exists. Steve is the only one we've found with the combination of WIF knowledge, expertise in Delphi and the diligence and organization to deal with this code base. As I said before, we have no one internally who even programs in Delphi and over the time that we've worked on WIF several other programmers have helped Steve out in certain areas, but none have been able to do what he has done in terms of mastering the ins and outs of the game and code base.

Our Technical Director is also the lead developer for several of our games, so he's not just "management", but he's not a Delphi programmer. We hope his renewed involvement will be helpful, but the point is that we're doing everything we can to improve WIF from our side.

Steve has our confidence and is capable of fixing the reported issues with WIF. I'll repeat again that while we appreciate greatly the patience shown by the community to date, we need to ask for a bit more to put this new plan into effect and hopefully the results will speak for themselves.

You can find the first public beta update through the link in this post:

tm.asp?m=3578629

Regards,

- Erik

Erik, I can easily believe that it is difficult, even impossible, to find a Delphi programmer what is also a WiF expert. It should not, however, be impossible to find a Delphi programmer that can become a WiF expert. No one is born knowing WiF, anyone can learn.

I work in an Agile Team. We do not do programming, but similar to the current situation we often are assigned projects that we have very little knowledge of. We then gain the knowledge necessary to complete the project. If we waited to find an expert in everything we do, we would never get anything done. There could be a lesson to learn here.

Learning how to play MWiF is very easy within our cycle of life. Once you are hooked, why the hell play anything else. [:D]

[rsunley]

I don't post a lot on this site but I am a MWiF customer and I just wanted to put in my 2 cents on this issue. I purchased this game in full knowledge that it had some issues to iron out. Anyone who has followed Steve's development blog over the last few years would be well aware of the complexity of the project and the amount of work he has put in to get it completed. When the announcement that it was to be released came out I was a bit surprised as the bug count in the blog seemed to be reasonably high, but after waiting so long and getting so close I understood the decision to go ahead with it. I made the decision to purchase because I wanted Steve to get something back for the investment of not only years of work but undoubtedly his personal health as well. I used to play the board game version back in the day but I figured it would take me quite a while to get back up to speed with the system as well as learning to drive the game. Therefore I do not mind how long it takes to resolve problems, I only care that they are resolved. To that end the announcement of renewed focus on this area is welcome. Regarding the available programming resources, it is easy to say what should or should not have happened in the past. Steve did end up getting some help towards the end of the project which no doubt assisted the process. I agree with other posters though that any developer worth his salt should be able to get up to speed with the task at hand reasonably quickly, regardless of the end product.

I think that this product is a magnificent piece of work and I am not going to let a few kinks dissuade me from that view. I look at this period as a post-beta phase, with the amount of testers increased by several orders of magnitude. Often issues can only be seen once a product is out in the wild, just ask any major software company, most of whom spend enormous resources on testing but still things go wrong. It may be valid to say that if people are paying good money they deserve something that works; this is fair enough, but to make an informed decision it does not take too much digging around to find out the current state of the product. If you don't want to buy something you view as being incomplete, you have every right to keep hold of your money. If you feel the product has been misrepresented to you, then you have every right to take that up with the publisher. If, on the other hand you want to support the good work that has already been done and help get the last bits fixed, then that option is available.

Lastly I am ever the optimist and I look forward to seeing the AI at work one day.

Regards
Ralph

[celebrindal]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

To respond to the points above - to our knowledge no such other programmer exists. Steve is the only one we've found with the combination of WIF knowledge, expertise in Delphi and the diligence and organization to deal with this code base. As I said before, we have no one internally who even programs in Delphi and over the time that we've worked on WIF several other programmers have helped Steve out in certain areas, but none have been able to do what he has done in terms of mastering the ins and outs of the game and code base.

Our Technical Director is also the lead developer for several of our games, so he's not just "management", but he's not a Delphi programmer. We hope his renewed involvement will be helpful, but the point is that we're doing everything we can to improve WIF from our side.

Steve has our confidence and is capable of fixing the reported issues with WIF. I'll repeat again that while we appreciate greatly the patience shown by the community to date, we need to ask for a bit more to put this new plan into effect and hopefully the results will speak for themselves.

You can find the first public beta update through the link in this post:

tm.asp?m=3578629

Regards,

- Erik

Been a number of years but I could be persuaded to help out!

[rkr1958]

-- misfire --

[rkr1958]

ORIGINAL: CrusssDaddy

I'm not a customer, I'm just advocating on behalf of fellow WiF enthusiasts who I think have been jerked around. If I'm wrong about your current efforts I'm happy to hear different: have you added as part of this new effort professional resources beyond Steve and the beta testers? (Note: Accelerated meeting schedules and increased executive scrutiny does not fulfill my definition of "added professional resources.")

I am a customer and satisfied owner of MWiF. Though new to WiF, I now count myself among the WiF enthusiasts. Please do NOT "advocate" for me.

ORIGINAL: CrusssDaddy

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

we're doing everything we can to improve WIF from our side.

This statement is demonstrably false.

Funny ... I believe this statement to be completely true.

[ParJ]

Steve will also meet with our Technical Director next week for a review of the remaining Net Play issues as this remains high on our list of priorities and we will be giving you some feedback on that point after they have met.

I spent some time to re-read this newest statement. Did the meeting result in anything? Can't find anything in this thread.

Even though I agree with the prioritized areas I think at least a discussion should be initialized about Net Play and at least a hint about when any Net Play improvements can be continued.

Apart from fixing the current flow and not run into freezes and crashes, there are other things to consider to improve Net Play to a usable state.

Some suggestions:
- Create a separate "Net Play - Tech support" topic in the forum.
- Change the save game procedure so that when one side saves a game the other is forced to save at the same time. The save game files for both sides should contain the same information (some basic encryption/password protection of US Entry and garrison chits should be all that's needed). Unit comments are personal and should not be included in the shared save game file (see below for another reason).
- Add some form of validation between phases (where needed) so that the unit status for both sides (e.g. disorganized units) is checked and resolved (by the players if the computer cannot determine this).
- It should be possible to open up a saved game without the other side being on-line, to check your units and plan between Net Play sessions. And preferably add comments for your own units (in the separate file suggested above).
- If being the active side, allow that player to perform actions in that phase, but not proceed to the next phase (or why not allow to proceed and send a game save e-mail to the opponent, adding PBEM ability to Net Play).
- After each phase, the non phasing player should be able to replay the opponent actual moves and actions. When playing the board game everyone is present and has the ability to watch what happens and ask questions (did you move that unit? Where did it come from?) and to make sure the opposing side follows the game rules. In the computer game this is enforced by the computer, so players will not spend time watching the opponent move, and should not have to.
- If a game crash occurs, the other player should be notified. Needing to rely on phone text messages, e-mail and actual phone calls should not be necessary, as it is now. No fun having to re-do a move because your oppenents game crashed.
- Add the ability to be able to select to chat with All, Side or Individual. Not needed now, but work that into the interface at least.

This is what I can think of now, but I'm sure this list will grow the more I think about it. And I'm sure many more suggestions will come when the "Net Play - Tech Support" is created.

[paulderynck]

ORIGINAL: oto02

I spent some time to re-read this newest statement. Did the meeting result in anything? Can't find anything in this thread.

Even though I agree with the prioritized areas I think at least a discussion should be initialized about Net Play and at least a hint about when any Net Play improvements can be continued.

Apart from fixing the current flow and not run into freezes and crashes, there are other things to consider to improve Net Play to a usable state.

Some suggestions:
- Create a separate "Net Play - Tech support" topic in the forum.
- Change the save game procedure so that when one side saves a game the other is forced to save at the same time. The save game files for both sides should contain the same information (some basic encryption/password protection of US Entry and garrison chits should be all that's needed). Unit comments are personal and should not be included in the shared save game file (see below for another reason).
- Add some form of validation between phases (where needed) so that the unit status for both sides (e.g. disorganized units) is checked and resolved (by the players if the computer cannot determine this).
- It should be possible to open up a saved game without the other side being on-line, to check your units and plan between Net Play sessions. And preferably add comments for your own units (in the separate file suggested above).
- If being the active side, allow that player to perform actions in that phase, but not proceed to the next phase (or why not allow to proceed and send a game save e-mail to the opponent, adding PBEM ability to Net Play).
- After each phase, the non phasing player should be able to replay the opponent actual moves and actions. When playing the board game everyone is present and has the ability to watch what happens and ask questions (did you move that unit? Where did it come from?) and to make sure the opposing side follows the game rules. In the computer game this is enforced by the computer, so players will not spend time watching the opponent move, and should not have to.
- If a game crash occurs, the other player should be notified. Needing to rely on phone text messages, e-mail and actual phone calls should not be necessary, as it is now. No fun having to re-do a move because your oppenents game crashed.
- Add the ability to be able to select to chat with All, Side or Individual. Not needed now, but work that into the interface at least.

This is what I can think of now, but I'm sure this list will grow the more I think about it. And I'm sure many more suggestions will come when the "Net Play - Tech Support" is created.

Excellent suggestions... although some would be very hard to implement with the current design.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: oto02

Steve will also meet with our Technical Director next week for a review of the remaining Net Play issues as this remains high on our list of priorities and we will be giving you some feedback on that point after they have met.

I spent some time to re-read this newest statement. Did the meeting result in anything? Can't find anything in this thread.

Even though I agree with the prioritized areas I think at least a discussion should be initialized about Net Play and at least a hint about when any Net Play improvements can be continued.

Apart from fixing the current flow and not run into freezes and crashes, there are other things to consider to improve Net Play to a usable state.

Some suggestions:
- Create a separate "Net Play - Tech support" topic in the forum.
- Change the save game procedure so that when one side saves a game the other is forced to save at the same time. The save game files for both sides should contain the same information (some basic encryption/password protection of US Entry and garrison chits should be all that's needed). Unit comments are personal and should not be included in the shared save game file (see below for another reason).
- Add some form of validation between phases (where needed) so that the unit status for both sides (e.g. disorganized units) is checked and resolved (by the players if the computer cannot determine this).
- It should be possible to open up a saved game without the other side being on-line, to check your units and plan between Net Play sessions. And preferably add comments for your own units (in the separate file suggested above).
- If being the active side, allow that player to perform actions in that phase, but not proceed to the next phase (or why not allow to proceed and send a game save e-mail to the opponent, adding PBEM ability to Net Play).
- After each phase, the non phasing player should be able to replay the opponent actual moves and actions. When playing the board game everyone is present and has the ability to watch what happens and ask questions (did you move that unit? Where did it come from?) and to make sure the opposing side follows the game rules. In the computer game this is enforced by the computer, so players will not spend time watching the opponent move, and should not have to.
- If a game crash occurs, the other player should be notified. Needing to rely on phone text messages, e-mail and actual phone calls should not be necessary, as it is now. No fun having to re-do a move because your oppenents game crashed.
- Add the ability to be able to select to chat with All, Side or Individual. Not needed now, but work that into the interface at least.

This is what I can think of now, but I'm sure this list will grow the more I think about it. And I'm sure many more suggestions will come when the "Net Play - Tech Support" is created.

Cherry picking a couple of these:

- It should be possible to open up a saved game without the other side being on-line, to check your units and plan between Net Play sessions. And preferably add comments for your own units (in the separate file suggested above).
Yes. I expected someone to mention this a long time ago. It has been on my "Gee, as a player I sure would want this capability."

- After each phase, the non phasing player should be able to replay the opponent actual moves and actions. When playing the board game everyone is present and has the ability to watch what happens and ask questions (did you move that unit? Where did it come from?) and to make sure the opposing side follows the game rules. In the computer game this is enforced by the computer, so players will not spend time watching the opponent move, and should not have to.
Well. This would require a replay feature which I envisioned many years ago. There is some code in place to support this, but it would require a lot more work be viable.

- If a game crash occurs, the other player should be notified. Needing to rely on phone text messages, e-mail and actual phone calls should not be necessary, as it is now. No fun having to re-do a move because your oppenents game crashed.
Not possible. Sadly the crash causes communications to be lost so sending the other player a message post-crash is not possible.

[Walker84]

ORIGINAL: rsunley

I don't post a lot on this site but I am a MWiF customer and I just wanted to put in my 2 cents on this issue. I purchased this game in full knowledge that it had some issues to iron out. Anyone who has followed Steve's development blog over the last few years would be well aware of the complexity of the project and the amount of work he has put in to get it completed. When the announcement that it was to be released came out I was a bit surprised as the bug count in the blog seemed to be reasonably high, but after waiting so long and getting so close I understood the decision to go ahead with it. I made the decision to purchase because I wanted Steve to get something back for the investment of not only years of work but undoubtedly his personal health as well. I used to play the board game version back in the day but I figured it would take me quite a while to get back up to speed with the system as well as learning to drive the game. Therefore I do not mind how long it takes to resolve problems, I only care that they are resolved. To that end the announcement of renewed focus on this area is welcome. Regarding the available programming resources, it is easy to say what should or should not have happened in the past. Steve did end up getting some help towards the end of the project which no doubt assisted the process. I agree with other posters though that any developer worth his salt should be able to get up to speed with the task at hand reasonably quickly, regardless of the end product.

I think that this product is a magnificent piece of work and I am not going to let a few kinks dissuade me from that view. I look at this period as a post-beta phase, with the amount of testers increased by several orders of magnitude. Often issues can only be seen once a product is out in the wild, just ask any major software company, most of whom spend enormous resources on testing but still things go wrong. It may be valid to say that if people are paying good money they deserve something that works; this is fair enough, but to make an informed decision it does not take too much digging around to find out the current state of the product. If you don't want to buy something you view as being incomplete, you have every right to keep hold of your money. If you feel the product has been misrepresented to you, then you have every right to take that up with the publisher. If, on the other hand you want to support the good work that has already been done and help get the last bits fixed, then that option is available.

Lastly I am ever the optimist and I look forward to seeing the AI at work one day.

Regards
Ralph

+1. This sums up my own feelings exactly.

[Erik Rutins]

Hi oto02,

ORIGINAL: oto02

Steve will also meet with our Technical Director next week for a review of the remaining Net Play issues as this remains high on our list of priorities and we will be giving you some feedback on that point after they have met.

I spent some time to re-read this newest statement. Did the meeting result in anything? Can't find anything in this thread.

Here's a summary I posted in the NetPlay Tech Support forum:

We went through the NetPlay architecture and design, discussed the most serious and common issues and reviewed the plan to fix NetPlay. Our goal was to review the design from the ground up and review our bug fixing process since release to make sure there were no fundamental issues that we were overlooking which would get NetPlay working as intended more quickly. The conclusion of the review was that we we are not, but that the sheer complexity of the game has been our biggest enemy in terms of the number of ways things can go wrong and how hard it is to test for all those cases.

Based on that review, we agreed that the current plan to fix the game-wide issues that also affect solitaire first is the best way to proceed as those would still affect NetPlay games as well. As soon as the most serious issues in supply, production planning and naval combat are resolved, the plan is to return focus to NetPlay and keep focus only on NetPlay (per our new functional area approach) until all the remaining NetPlay issues are resolved.

We also have in the works a more thorough internal validation test of client to server communications, but an intial test showed that WIF was communicating with the server as expected and that the issues are not due to server stability or server communications.

Thank you for your suggestions and you can find the new NetPlay Tech Support sub-forum here:

tt.asp?forumid=1388

[ParJ]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

- It should be possible to open up a saved game without the other side being on-line, to check your units and plan between Net Play sessions. And preferably add comments for your own units (in the separate file suggested above).
Yes. I expected someone to mention this a long time ago. It has been on my "Gee, as a player I sure would want this capability."

- After each phase, the non phasing player should be able to replay the opponent actual moves and actions. When playing the board game everyone is present and has the ability to watch what happens and ask questions (did you move that unit? Where did it come from?) and to make sure the opposing side follows the game rules. In the computer game this is enforced by the computer, so players will not spend time watching the opponent move, and should not have to.
Well. This would require a replay feature which I envisioned many years ago. There is some code in place to support this, but it would require a lot more work be viable.

- If a game crash occurs, the other player should be notified. Needing to rely on phone text messages, e-mail and actual phone calls should not be necessary, as it is now. No fun having to re-do a move because your oppenents game crashed.
Not possible. Sadly the crash causes communications to be lost so sending the other player a message post-crash is not possible.

Opening up the game off-line I think will be necessary when playing weekly sessions with 4-6 players. Of course it's possible to set up a session just for planning but that might be easy for a two player game, but not for six.

The "replay" feature would be nice to have and would save time, but isn't on the top of my list. But the undo feature would most likely include a lot of code to support this at some time in the future. At least highligt units that have moved.

I'm aware that a crashed or malfunctioning program will not be able to let the other side know that it has done just that. But if the program regularly sends game status to the opposing side, expecting a reply within a pre-defined time (and with any inconsistencies resolved), then the non-crashing side would notice if it has lost contact with the opponent (due to a lack of response). So it should be possible to implement.

When I get a little more time I'll post a few saved games under the Net Play - Tech support topic.

I'm enjoying playing around with the Barbarossa scenario, but what I'm really waiting for is being able to run a global war with 5 of my old WIF-buddies from 20 years ago.

Par

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: oto02

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

- It should be possible to open up a saved game without the other side being on-line, to check your units and plan between Net Play sessions. And preferably add comments for your own units (in the separate file suggested above).
Yes. I expected someone to mention this a long time ago. It has been on my "Gee, as a player I sure would want this capability."

- After each phase, the non phasing player should be able to replay the opponent actual moves and actions. When playing the board game everyone is present and has the ability to watch what happens and ask questions (did you move that unit? Where did it come from?) and to make sure the opposing side follows the game rules. In the computer game this is enforced by the computer, so players will not spend time watching the opponent move, and should not have to.
Well. This would require a replay feature which I envisioned many years ago. There is some code in place to support this, but it would require a lot more work be viable.

- If a game crash occurs, the other player should be notified. Needing to rely on phone text messages, e-mail and actual phone calls should not be necessary, as it is now. No fun having to re-do a move because your oppenents game crashed.
Not possible. Sadly the crash causes communications to be lost so sending the other player a message post-crash is not possible.

Opening up the game off-line I think will be necessary when playing weekly sessions with 4-6 players. Of course it's possible to set up a session just for planning but that might be easy for a two player game, but not for six.

The "replay" feature would be nice to have and would save time, but isn't on the top of my list. But the undo feature would most likely include a lot of code to support this at some time in the future. At least highligt units that have moved.

I'm aware that a crashed or malfunctioning program will not be able to let the other side know that it has done just that. But if the program regularly sends game status to the opposing side, expecting a reply within a pre-defined time (and with any inconsistencies resolved), then the non-crashing side would notice if it has lost contact with the opponent (due to a lack of response). So it should be possible to implement.

When I get a little more time I'll post a few saved games under the Net Play - Tech support topic.

I'm enjoying playing around with the Barbarossa scenario, but what I'm really waiting for is being able to run a global war with 5 of my old WIF-buddies from 20 years ago.

Par

Thanks for the feedback.

[Extraneous]

I would like to point out that MWiF was released at SPIEL 2013 in Essen, Germany which went on from October 24th to 27th.

Not in November.

[AxelNL]

ORIGINAL: Extraneous

I would like to point out that MWiF was released at SPIEL 2013 in Essen, Germany which went on from October 24th to 27th.

Not in November.

Although we are going in technicalities here - I was there, and it was sold to me as a special pre-release. Price-point was also different (150 Euro), and it included the maps as one package.

[Extraneous]

I can wait till the NDA ends whether its this month or next month.

[Boschy]

ORIGINAL: oto02

Opening up the game off-line I think will be necessary when playing weekly sessions with 4-6 players. Of course it's possible to set up a session just for planning but that might be easy for a two player game, but not for six.

Is it necessary? I never had access to my friend's garage during the week, so I could not plan my next evening's play until I was there on the night when playing the board game.