Obsidian Mailbag

[HK_01]

I said that the game ran flawlessly at my PC. I wasn't trying to accuse people who claimed the opposite of lying. I was trying to help reflect the game's reality in a more realistic way. Thousands of people bougth the game. Only the ones who expierence bugs, go to forums and complain, which generates a too negative image of the situation of a whole and makes them believe that they will definately expierence a buggy game.
Which they won't.
I haven't.

Okay, only people who have complaints go to forums...right. That must be the reason why you so many "loved this game", "thanks, *developer*", "this is the greatest game ever", etc threads on forums for good games. Of course the complaints are slightly over-represented, but not that much.

And it's only fair to tell people that they have a good chance of experiencing a buggy game. I know that it helps me in deciding where I should spend my money, and right now it seems like waiting for the GOTY edition is the best way of going about things. I can't return the game once I've actually installed it, and if it turns out that it's full of bugs for me I'll have lost ~50 Euros, therefore knowing about the risk is nice.

Instead of making these articles, Shamus, maybe you should just post your system specs so I could give you a run around on updating your system, drivers and relevant software so that you can too rejoice with us in the glory that is FNV.

I am pretty sure that his system is perfectly up to date, since, you know, he plays games as a job!? And if it isn't I'm pretty sure he wouldn't be so dumb as to not update his drivers first before writing this column, knowing full well that there are a lot of people who are so overly protective of Obsidian and will blame the publisher, the player or someone else for all the problems. Seriously, what do you think he is, some sort of idiot?

Or are you expecting him to buy a new computer that's custom-built so that New Vegas runs on it?

I only say "it worked for me" so I can show how lucky I am compared to others. It's like winning at the lottery!

Also, it's really time Bethesda gets a new engine out.

It definitely is time. And that new engine should be introduced in TES V! Seriously, I want that game, now!

 

[Mezzo.]

I heartily agree. This game has some of the same problems that Fallout 3 had (the dialog for one is a bit better than 3's, but the animations still look weird to me). There are clipping glitches, slowdowns for no reason, NPCs running into walls with crap AI, and the list goes on...

I'm still granted to forgiving it though, but I wish it wasn't up to the player to fix these issues. Granted, now that I've digged around for files that looked helpful, the experience has been naught but fantastic for me (ANARCHY FOR THE WIN), but it would have been much, much more awesome had Obsidian fixed these issues in the first place.

 

[DeASplode]

I've had like three crashes in Fallout NV so far.

I'm playing on a Slim PS3 not even 6 months old... Other games work perfectly.

The only other bug I've encountered so far, is the characters getting stuck in walls and under floors, which has happened way too many times.

The game is fun, but I don't want to play it again at the moment. I don't want to play for like an hour, or nearly finish a quest to have the game freeze on me. Constantly saving also breaks immersion so I'm relying on auto saves.

 

[StriderShinryu]

I said that the game ran flawlessly at my PC. I wasn't trying to accuse people who claimed the opposite of lying. I was trying to help reflect the game's reality in a more realistic way. Thousands of people bougth the game. Only the ones who expierence bugs, go to forums and complain, which generates a too negative image of the situation of a whole and makes them believe that they will definately expierence a buggy game.
Which they won't.
I haven't.

Sure they definitely won't absolutely 100% end up with a buggy unplayable game on their particular system, but it's well worth mentioning and discussing the bugs simply because they do exist for what appears to be a substantial portion of the playerbase. Particularly given that you can't return opened games, buying a game shouldn't be a crapshoot as to whether it will work for you or not.

A few bugs and glitches always get through but even if there's, say, a 10% chance of the game not working on your system then that means there's a 10% chance that you just wasted $60. That, quite frankly, is unacceptable when it comes to professionally produced software from a well known company.

 

[thebighead01]

Don't know why you responded to these fools Shamus. You will always have idiots who will blindly defend a game no matter what. There's no way to change their pathetic little minds. Just let them be happy. If they're ignorant enough to think that a game that is so monumentally buggy should be accepted as a product for sale then let them think that way. They have low standards and because of that they are paying for people's salaries. In a way they are doing a good thing; you know helping the economy with their retardedness. Never say that their isn't anyone that can't contribute to society.

 

[RexoftheFord]

As fun as New Vegas is, yeah the bugs kind of ruin it. You'll be rollin' along tearin' out Caesar's Legion innards, decimating their entire force, feeling proud that you did your bit for the NCR, then you run into a framerate drop, the game freezes, or crashes to desktop, and suddenly you're not feeling anything about what's going on in the game except frustration that it doesn't work. Or you're exploring the Mojave, looking for left over equipment from misfortuned wastelanders, and you see some bighorners...having seizures. And you start thinking about the bugs. Fallout 3 and New Vegas are great games and fun. But it's like the whole Judge Dredd Lawgiver 2 bike "It's yours...if you can ever get the damn thing to work."

 

[Furioso]

Nice work Shamus! And although I disagree with your opinions on Fallout 3, I'll defend to the death your right to express them. No opinions on New Vegas though, haven't played it yet.

 

[skitskat]

you know, i didnt find any of the bugs anyone mentioned, until after i had read about them all.

i mean that was a good 30-40 hours put into NV just fine without seeing any bugs, and then after i go onto the internets and read about them all, i go back to NV for a 2nd go, and here are all the bugs

my advice for anyone wanting to avoid bugs, dont read about what they are, they'll be more obvious and then they'll make you cry, like they did to me....

 

[Red Albatross]

I'm with you on this one. I loved Fallout 3 despite all of its growing pains, but the entire point of recycling game engines is to reduce the development resources needed to code the engine, presumably increasing the resources available to refine and optimize the engine (see: Source engine - I hate to risk sounding like a fanboy, but it's hard to deny that Valve has done very well in the business of extending the Source engine's lifetime and polishing it). Bethesda seems to have missed out on this point entirely. I'm not sure what they were doing when they were supposed to be playtesting and bugfixing, but I'm going to imagine an elaborate situation involving chimpanzees, large amounts of Everclear and Wild Irish Rose, and a sociopathic snake-handling clown.

I'd probably enjoy Fallout: New Vegas if I were to play it, but I'm just not going to validate releasing a buggy mess again. It's time for us to start putting our feet down and wall up when this kind of thing happens. Stick to convictions. I wouldn't even pirate the game, because that makes a statement that I still want to play the game pretty badly, even if I wouldn't pay for it.

 

[SovietSecrets]

This only edifies one of the most prominent arguments against PC gaming. The substantial diversification in PC hardware ensures that developers have a difficult time developing games which will adequately run. You'll have a game which has a particular error with one graphics card and runs smooth as butter on another graphics card.

So one bugged game(excuse me two, FO3) make it so that PC gaming is difficult? Don't know bout you, but every other game I have ever ran on my PC hasn't really had issues unless said game is causing problems for everyone. Like this one for example. As for your graphics thing, its time to update then don't you think? Or at least install the newest drivers.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Then why is BioWare able to release stable games, even when dealing with those same publishers that allegedly ruined Obsidian's work? Why do other developers working with (say) Atari not have the same problems that Obsidian did?

Ahahahahahaha!!!! [http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Dragon_Age:_Origins_Bugs/Glitches]

Good joke Shamus. Bioware, stable. Pfffffff.....

 

[matrix3509]

This only edifies one of the most prominent arguments against PC gaming. The substantial diversification in PC hardware ensures that developers have a difficult time developing games which will adequately run. You'll have a game which has a particular error with one graphics card and runs smooth as butter on another graphics card.

You obviously didn't read the entire article. Other developers (like Bioware for instance) have absolutely no problem making games that run smoothly on a PC.

Secondly, even the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of New Vegas have game breaking bugs. Both consoles have a standard set of hardware, so your argument flies out of the window.

 

[Stabby Joe]

I'm still not getting all the complaints about bugs, at least personally so far.

 

[Roamin11]

Regardless of platform it seems each version has a wide array of bugs. My personal favorite? The black screen of death. Not sure if it's present on the PC or PS3 versions though.

My favorite bug, that made me have to delete all my saves is when my night vison scope for my varmit rifle turned into the hacking screen, I didn't see anything though its just a big black hacking screen. And at the time (before more bugs came to join the legion of bugs) all I could think of was, "AWWW MAN I PAID 366 caps for this scope and the bugs took it away DX"

And also, Shamus couldn't you have summ-ed all those up at once?? They all seemed to say the same thing, god couldn't your hecklers learn to be more orginal?!?!

 

[dghjdgdjf]

I feel bad for you guys. It seems like I'm one of the lucky few wich has a computer that this game actually runs well on.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Amend Shamus AMEND!

 

[dududf]

[I'm supposed to say "Okay, I am no longer annoyed that it's not working for me" when people say it worked for them.

But but, my opinion is the only one that matters! I said it's okay, and since the world revolves around me, if you disagree... you gotta be a hater face!*

In all seriousness though, I've only had now 2 crashes in my 13 hours or so of gameplay. Makes me happy, but since this is a obsidian game, I haven't let my guard down. A full save every 15 minutes, and do 3 of those saves at once, in case one of them gets corrupted.

*[sub]In case it wasn't obvious enough, I am making a funny. (no offence intended in this sentence)[/sub]

 

[Vetinarii]

Nice work Shamus! And although I disagree with your opinions on Fallout 3, I'll defend to the death your right to express them. No opinions on New Vegas though, haven't played it yet.

Just guessing you think that he hates Fallout 3? Not true if you watch Spoiler Warning where he runs through it with friends you find he just has a lot of problems with it and a feeling it never lived up to the Fallout name. In parts he seems to show that infact he does like the game a lot (especially the subways).


EDIT: Just got my first Bug... The Legate got shot and flew up into the air... and never came back...

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

If there is one fallacious argument that really irks me more than any other, it's the "It works fine for me, so it's obviously perfect" argument. That's like saying "Well, someone rear-ended MY Pinto and it DIDN'T explode, so there can't be anything wrong with the car. Maybe you shouldn't be using aftermarket air freshener."

 

[theSovietConnection]

I said that the game ran flawlessly at my PC. I wasn't trying to accuse people who claimed the opposite of lying. I was trying to help reflect the game's reality in a more realistic way. Thousands of people bougth the game. Only the ones who expierence bugs, go to forums and complain, which generates a too negative image of the situation of a whole and makes them believe that they will definately expierence a buggy game.
Which they won't.
I haven't.

Nicely said. 20+ hours in and I haven't experienced any bugs either, aside from the save glitch which was far easier to fix then I imagined. Does that make my input any less valid?