Matrix Games Forums

I have posted these comments on a number of threads and, probably quite rightly it has been suggested I should start a new place of discussion.

"I bought this game on the day it was released and I think it has many things going for it. What I did not realise when I paid my £70 was that I was not buying a finished product. So far I have had to download six patches and still I read that the "game will only be balanced" "possibly in a year" when enough people play it who can point out its faults.

35 years ago my first wargame, bought as a present for my fifteenth birthday, was "Drang nach Osten" by GDW. In real terms it probably cost in 1974 more than WITE today but worked "straight out of the box" and is still playable today without amy major modifications.

When I bought WITE I wish someone had written on the Matrix website that "this game will be great when you all find what is wrong with it now".

All right. See, rather than have a disjointed conversation across multiple threads you can now have your say in one location.

I wasn't trying to shut you up, rather get you to express yourself in the appropriate location.

So with that, I shall say goodnight as you await your official response.

Senno, thank you. Probably just on a bit of a role this evening because England beat France today, as usual!

I will disagree with you that DNO was that good.  Don't want to get into a Europa discussion here.  WitE is a large game and the few testers did what they could.

I for one am having a blast playing the game knowing that fixes were/are going to be done.  Very few computer games are released 100% done, most after it gets into the hands of the players find lots of things that could be better and are patched.

WitE let's you have settings on handicapping etc.  No one that I have seen on the forums (except one AAR) has attempted to change the settings to what they think the other side should have or not and played it and reported back.  Yes the game needs tweeting in some areas.  The designers decided on doing things a certain way and they are now hearing that some players don't like the WAD, ie weather.  Will the game be improved, yea.  You have stated in numerous areas the above, thanks.

To me even though I have whined to my opponent about how bad things are it still is a challenge.  If you don't want to play it don't, same with me and the Europa series (oh yea I was a play tester for Total War that hasn't come out yet).

send an email to 2by3@2by3.com, best place for customer feedback

"I will disagree with you that DNO was that good. Don't want to get into a Europa discussion here. WitE is a large game and the few testers did what they could.

I for one am having a blast playing the game knowing that fixes were/are going to be done. Very few computer games are released 100% done, most after it gets into the hands of the players find lots of things that could be better and are patched.

WitE let's you have settings on handicapping etc. No one that I have seen on the forums (except one AAR) has attempted to change the settings to what they think the other side should have or not and played it and reported back. Yes the game needs tweeting in some areas. The designers decided on doing things a certain way and they are now hearing that some players don't like the WAD, ie weather. Will the game be improved, yea. You have stated in numerous areas the above, thanks.

To me even though I have whined to my opponent about how bad things are it still is a challenge. If you don't want to play it don't, same with me and the Europa series (oh yea I was a play tester for Total War that hasn't come out yet)."

This is not an answer to my question, in fact in many ways it supports my problem. I paid £70 for a game that in its original form is broken. How many people, unlike myself, check for new patches every day, I like the game that much, but am annoyed that for that amount of money I , and the people I am playing against by pbem. seem to be viewed by 2by3 and Matrix as playtesters!

I also play extensively, and have released some very well received scenarios, for the John Tiller Panzer Campaign series of games and whilst they are updated to "ADD" new tweaks the original games are sound.

Which part of the game is broken?

Do you mean the First Winter Rules of the 1941 Grand Campaign?

In many ways which part is not! Control of air units, or lack of, the lack of political imperatives on the Soviets in 1941, the many misfunctions in the game pointed out in the "Tech Forum".

Please do not get me wrong, I think many parts of this game are brilliant, but I am questioning paying £70 for a game that "we", the players, are supposed to put right by reporting things that happen in our games. I am only questioning whether I bought "the finished product", which I obviously did not, and should that not have been made clear to me when I paid my money.

ORIGINAL: bdtj1815

"I will disagree with you that DNO was that good. Don't want to get into a Europa discussion here. WitE is a large game and the few testers did what they could.

I for one am having a blast playing the game knowing that fixes were/are going to be done. Very few computer games are released 100% done, most after it gets into the hands of the players find lots of things that could be better and are patched.

WitE let's you have settings on handicapping etc. No one that I have seen on the forums (except one AAR) has attempted to change the settings to what they think the other side should have or not and played it and reported back. Yes the game needs tweeting in some areas. The designers decided on doing things a certain way and they are now hearing that some players don't like the WAD, ie weather. Will the game be improved, yea. You have stated in numerous areas the above, thanks.

To me even though I have whined to my opponent about how bad things are it still is a challenge. If you don't want to play it don't, same with me and the Europa series (oh yea I was a play tester for Total War that hasn't come out yet)."

This is not an answer to my question, in fact in many ways it supports my problem. I paid £70 for a game that in its original form is broken. How many people, unlike myself, check for new patches every day, I like the game that much, but am annoyed that for that amount of money I , and the people I am playing against by pbem. seem to be viewed by 2by3 and Matrix as playtesters!

I also play extensively, and have released some very well received scenarios, for the John Tiller Panzer Campaign series of games and whilst they are updated to "ADD" new tweaks the original games are sound.

I'm playing a PBEM game and am having a lot of fun. I have to be a weirdo [&:] But needless to say the customer is always right [:D]

Hehe.. so show me wargames that are finished products... none that I can think of, all have problems and over time have gotten better.  So you should have been aware that you were not getting something totally perfect.  So I will stop now since you seem to be a troll.  Don't play the game if you don't like it your choice.  

ORIGINAL: bdtj1815
This is not an answer to my question, in fact in many ways it supports my problem. I paid £70 for a game that in its original form is broken. How many people, unlike myself, check for new patches every day, I like the game that much, but am annoyed that for that amount of money I , and the people I am playing against by pbem. seem to be viewed by 2by3 and Matrix as playtesters!

I also play extensively, and have released some very well received scenarios, for the John Tiller Panzer Campaign series of games and whilst they are updated to "ADD" new tweaks the original games are sound.

Question? What question?
Your first post does not contain a single question mark. [:-]

Please do not get me wrong, I think many parts of this game are brilliant, but I am questioning paying £70 for a game that "we", the players, are supposed to put right by reporting things that happen in our games. I am only questioning whether I bought "the finished product", which I obviously did not, and should that not have been made clear to me when I paid my money.

ORIGINAL: bdtj1815

I have posted these comments on a number of threads and, probably quite rightly it has been suggested I should start a new place of discussion.

"I bought this game on the day it was released and I think it has many things going for it. What I did not realise when I paid my £70 was that I was not buying a finished product. So far I have had to download six patches and still I read that the "game will only be balanced" "possibly in a year" when enough people play it who can point out its faults.

35 years ago my first wargame, bought as a present for my fifteenth birthday, was "Drang nach Osten" by GDW. In real terms it probably cost in 1974 more than WITE today but worked "straight out of the box" and is still playable today without amy major modifications.

When I bought WITE I wish someone had written on the Matrix website that "this game will be great when you all find what is wrong with it now".

The more people playing the game, the faster bugs will be discovered and fixed. It's also the best way to get the balance issue right.
If they didn't release the game until it was perfect we would be waiting till 2020 for it. A small company simply does not have the resources to perfect a game of this complexity in a short period of time.
I for one much prefer to play the game now and to have a hand in the perfecting process.

SO 2x3 shouldn't have bothered gathering customer feedback and made improvements?  The game worked out of the box, afterall.  Whether is was "balanced" (an eye-of-the-beholder thing really), or had the features people wanted wouldn't have mattered.  As to the number of patches, they are issuing BETA patches as they make improvements so people don't have to wait for the "official" patch.  To me, that's a good thing, but I guess some people count it as a negative.
 
And comparing a board game to a computer game is like comparing apples and toasters.

ORIGINAL: Franklin Nimitz

And comparing a board game to a computer game is like comparing apples and toasters.

It was nevertheless amusing though.

How ridiculous are your responses, have you actually read my comments? I am not questioning the brilliance of the game but the fact that we are, I suppose, play testing it. For £70 I would have expected a "polished" product, not one that needs patching every few days to make it work right.

I don't know enough about the original release of DNO to know if it was truly done or not upon release. For starters, board games and computer games are two totally different animals. Computer games have a tendency to be far more complex, so it is easier to have something "wrong" with them.

I would point out that there was probably errata from DNO and I have heard there are several "house rules" conversions to try to address some of the issues some players thought the original game had. Obviously DNO was remade in a huge way when FITE/Scorched Earth came out and there was certainly errata for that game. In addition I am aware of at least one totally different rules set that was published to address what players felt were short comings in the original game (sound familiar?). The game series has undergone yet another remake with new maps and rules rewrites, etc.

As far as WITE being released in the condition it was, from what I have seen, the staff should get a huge round of congrats and applause. Very, very few crashes reported. In general there have been very few issues as far as the game running, etc. If you want recent examples of how not to release a game, I refer you to Civ5 and Elemental. Now, that is not to say that you (or any other user) may not feel there are issues with the game (don't like how the weather goes, how the blizzard works, etc). While people may have a point about these, you move from working/not working to an opinion. You may not like how weather is modeled in the game, but that does not mean it isn't working.

Having been a member of many play testing groups for board games, there can still be issues after release that the designers/play-testers never caught or considered. It doesn't mean they were not thorough; but rather it means someone else came up with something that was never thought of. I can personally tell you that I was one of the people responsible for a change to GDW's game Pearl Harbor that specifically forbade amphibious invasions of Pearl Harbor in turn 1, because I figured out a way to do it and it broke the game and this was after it was published. (Essentially, the US lost their base 66% of the time). The same is obviously especially true for computer games because of their increased complexity.

Sorry for the book and I don't mean to be a shill for the WITE crew, but they did a good job with this game despite some of the current issues.

No matter how much money you pay, today, on the software game market, you will never find a perfect game, dealing with no errors. [:-]

In the case of Gary Grigsby's War in the East, wich I also already purchased immediately after the release, I can assure you that despite the "bug's", I found since 7 December fun, a lot joy and a many hours of excitement and tension.

From my side:
yes, the game is very expensive.
But Matrix, with I am a long time, with many games customer, matrix itself and others accountable show outstanding support for their products/games.
We are customers and Matrix takes serious care of us. [:)]

With other words, the games are getting better and better and here for you don't have to pay one more additional cent!
I know not one game released by Matrix that would not have been playable from the beginning because of the bugs.

So calm down now and enjoy the game, the patches and the improvements - maybe in a perfect world... [;)]

ORIGINAL: bdtj1815

How ridiculous are your responses, have you actually read my comments? I am not questioning the brilliance of the game but the fact that we are, I suppose, play testing it. For £70 I would have expected a "polished" product, not one that needs patching every few days to make it work right.

Well i tried to explain it to you but all you seem interested in is whining.
It's your own fault if your not satisfied. You could have waited to see the reviews of the game or read the forums to find out peoples views on the state of the game before you bought it.

Just found this comment as I "troll" the forum: "I have to agree with the consensus here that something is deeply broken with the winter campaign. The soviet side is grossly overpowered."

But seems to support my argument.

And never heard of these " If you want recent examples of how not to release a game, I refer you to Civ5 and Elemental" because they are not Eastern Front games and unlike the blurbs for WITE are not supposed to represent accurately.