I don't think a patch is coming

[Supr49er]

Welcome to the Forums ScottD413.

 

[Lord Shadow]

1) I have not been on these, or any other, boards for months "whining". I just created this account

I apologize. I didn't mean you in particular. I meant the board in general.

 

[ScottD413]

Welcome to the Forums ScottD413.

Thanks

I apologize. I didn't mean you in particular. I meant the board in general.

Please don't misunderstand me, I am not flaming you. I am talking about what happened before.

I'm sorry if it seemed like I was attacking you. I was just remarking about Firaxis's history with this board, and saying I thought your letter seemed a little aggressive from that perspective.

No worries Gents. It was a misunderstanding. My apologies to you as well.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Let me tell you a little story.

I bought one of The Tiger Woods games for Xbox a few yrs ago, and it had a MAJOR bug, in that they had forgot to include "wind" for any of the career or tournament modes (this was same for PS2 version too). After triple checking I wasn't going mad (entirely possible) I went online and searched to see if this had been resolved. It hadn't..

So I started a correspondence by email, which started by me reporting this , them sending me a "do this -you must be a fool" standard type of response, me informing them I wasn't, them saying "are you sure", me "yes", and eventually them confirming "you are correct", but with the insinuation (almost) that it was a design feature

So Firaxis really aren't that bad after all.....

Edited summary of various correspondence with EA for your amusement ( names removed to protect the guilty)....

Spoiler :

-------------------------------------------------
Customer (*****) 06/01/2007 05:13 PM
It seems impossible to have a wind speed set during career or tournament modes. Even when the "difficulty settings" are correctly changed and saved, once that screen is left the game resets the wind to 0%. Upon re-entering the settings screen, the wind speed is shown to be 0%, however if you tab down to the "wind speed settings", it then temporarily changes back to how you originally set them.

This is obviously the cause of the problem, as part of the program is refusing to aknowledge the saved settings. Unfortunately, wind speed is of course a major part of Golf, and not having any at all ever, completely spoils an otherwise excellent game..

Pls see this thread by me in your forums section, for more info:-

(now obsolete link originally here)

Thanks
----------------------
Response (EA Tech *****) 06/02/2007 12:34 AM
Hello ****,

Thank you for contacting Electronic Arts. I’m sorry for the difficulty that you are having with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07.

Were you able to change the wind speed setting before? When did this issue start?

Please try these troubleshooting steps one by one then run the game after each step and see if it resolves the issue:

This error message means that a temp file exists in a read-only format, which the game needs to edit in order to operate properly. This can usually be resolved by simply clearing your Windows temporary files, which will allow the game to create it from scratch.

To clear your Windows temporary files, click on the following walkthrough for instructions on clearing your temp files.
http://support.ea.com/cgi-bin/ea.cfg/php/enduser/olh_adp.php?p_faqid=10705

Make sure that you have closed any programs or tasks running in the background as sometimes one of the programs can conflict with the game. Background applications such as anti-virus programs are often the cause of conflicts.

· Hold down the Ctrl, Alt, and Delete keys at the same time
· Click the "Processes" tab.
· Click on the gray bar in the middle column that says User Name to sort by user name.
· Do NOT select anything for SYSTEM, LOCAL SERVICE, or NETWORK SERVICE.
· Click on anything besides EXPLORER and TASKMGR for this User Name or other user names.
· Click on END PROCESS
· Repeat these steps until only explorer.exe and taskmgr.exe are open for this user profile.

Also try to manually disable any anti-virus programs that are currently running in your system prior to running your game as these programs are more than likely to interfere with proper gameplay and/or installation... And more often than not, these processes are not running under your account name. That is why you cannot seem to disable these programs.

You will need to lower the Hardware Sound Acceleration setting on your computer to "basic".

To do this, follow these steps:

· Click the Start button in the bottom left hand corner of your Desktop.
· Click on "Run". · Erase any text already in the run prompt.
· Type in: dxdiag
· Click the OK button.
· Select the sound tab at the top of the tool.
· Set the Hardware Sound Acceleration Slider to "Basic".
· Click "Exit" in the bottom right hand corner.

You can also try and uninstall the game, delete the game folders, then reinstall again as there may have been corrupted game files during initial installation or subsequent gameplay.

Should you require further assistance about this or any Electronic Arts games in the future please visit our website and review our extensive Self Help knowledgebase (http://electronicarts.co.uk/support)

****
EA Technical Support

----------------
Response (customer)

Thanks for your reply but I didn't make it clear (my fault) that this is not for the PC version, this is for the original XBOX (not 360) version. Therefore the remedy you suggested does not apply to my problem.

Thanks.
---------------
Response (EA Tech ****) 06/02/2007 11:18 PM
Hello ****,

Thank you for contacting Electronic Arts. I’m sorry for the difficulty that you are having with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07.

Well, after researching on this matter, I found out that indeed it is not possible to set the wind speed in career or tournament modes. The wind speed is automatically set by the game. (my bold and italics)

Electronic Arts Technical Support does not offer any live game play assistance. Try searching this database using the Game Features and Information category (and an appropriate sub-category) to find guides, hints, and information. Otherwise check boards.ea.com for the forum for your game; you can post questions or browse threads to find useful information from other players.

Web searches and published game guides (from bookstores and game stores) may also help you find what you are looking for.

Should you require further assistance about this or any Electronic Arts games in the future please visit our website and review our extensive Self Help knowledgebase (http://electronicarts.co.uk/support)

****
EA Technical Support

-----------------
Response (Customer)

Fair Enought, thanks for reply, but this is obviously a bug (you dont set the wind speed yourself, you use the difficulty settings to give the game a range for generating wind speeds). Because it thinks you have the wind set at 0%, there is no applicable variable for the tournament and career mode to pick up and create a range of random wind speeds, therefore defaulting to no wind at all on any courses ever. This of course, could never have been the programmers intention. Many thanks for confirming it's a bug (there's no point in me trying a different copy of the game), but is there any intention on your part to attempt to patch it via Xbox live for instance?
Many Thanks.

----------------

I never received a reply to this final question, Im still waiting 17 months later. Not really holding much hope though......

 

[jenks]

Im already 'resigned' to playing the unofficial patchmod and whatever else people will put out there, generally the stuff people submit freely as mods gets better playtesting

 

[strollen]

I am generally pretty understanding of game companies and patches but...

IMO Col 2 is a far cry from the quality of games I expect from Firaxis, it is low cost is the only reason I am not screaming loudly. (You get what you pay for in some respect.)

What baffles me is why Firaxis is remaining silent on the issue of the patch. At this point, I rather here them simply say. Gee we are sorry but no patch is currently planned than simply remaining silent.

 

[Tatran]

...it is low cost is the only reason I am not screaming loudly.

29.95 € not much?

 

[TehJumpingJawa]

29.95 € not much?

Ouch!
It was £14.71 here in the UK (in Tesco).

 

[Shabbaman]

IMO Col 2 is a far cry from the quality of games I expect from Firaxis, it is low cost is the only reason I am not screaming loudly. (You get what you pay for in some respect.)

What you expect or what is to be expected? Firaxis has delivered pretty poor support on games like Sid Meier's Railroads!, it's not set in stone that the company will deliver good support at all. I surely hope they'll come up with a patch, but otherwise I'm looking at the community to come up with a solid patch. The good thing about the game is that it's highly moddable.

 

[Sir Ralph]

29.95 € not much?

Considering the educational "serves you right for trusting a company name" value it is a steal!

 

[Tinkerbell]

Scott, which e-mail address did you use for your question? Was it a tech support address?

 

[theKurgen]

Commiserations to those of you tricked into buying Colonization by Firaxis. For those whining, I would advise you all to continue it. I Imagine there would not have even been a BTS 3.13 and 3.17 if it wasn't for all the players constantly badgering Firaxis and complaining about the state of the game. If everyone keeps quiet about the problems you not only risk Firaxis never bothering to make a patch but may also make other gamers ignorant of the problems, giving this botched game even more sales.