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Beamdog Update, February 20, 2019

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  • kanisathakanisatha Member Posts: 1,308
    Adul wrote: »
    I'm honestly surprised by how many people complain about how 5-7 year old remasters of 20 year old games are not getting regular updates.

    My complaint isn't that there are no updates, but that the issues that should be fixed by now are still not being fixed. If Beamdog would have fixed the UI regressions in the first (or second, or third) year after SoD's release, they would have also removed the reason for these complaints.

    It's not fair to try to turn this around and say that we're being unreasonable because the game is old now. The fact that the game is old only means that Beamdog has had plenty of time to address these issues. But they just haven't.

    But isn't it the case that there are a great many games out there, including the original IE games themselves, where the developer ended patch support with several issues still not fixed? So why is Beamdog being held to a different (and unfair) standard?

    Also, the so-called UI regressions are entirely subjective. Yes for a number of people in this forum who are rabid IE games fans this is a big issue. But for the vast majority of people owning these games, myself included and including the hundreds of thousands of owners who don't frequent this forum, this is not an issue and in fact we love the new UIs.
    StummvonBordwehrgugulug5000realshemp
  • kanisathakanisatha Member Posts: 1,308
    I'm honestly surprised by how many people complain about how 5-7 year old remasters of 20 year old games are not getting regular updates. While I would love faster updates, I'm just glad to get any new content or any new updates, no matter how long it takes. The games play just fine for me, and though I've found (and reported) bugs, I understand where Beamdog is coming from, and I appreciate any efforts they put into these awesome games.

    The thing that does actually disappoint me though is the fact that Beamdog seems to be abandoning the idea of doing more enhanced editions of other games. There are still plenty of other awesome games that could be modernized and enhanced, so I hope Beamdog doesn't completely abandon the idea.

    Totally agree with the first paragraph. Disagree with the second paragraph. They need to move on to making new games. AAO is not exactly what I have in mind, but if it serves as a first step to demonstrating that they have what it takes to make an original new game, I'm cheering them on.
    Prince_Raymond
  • gugulug5000gugulug5000 Member Posts: 248
    kanisatha wrote: »
    I'm honestly surprised by how many people complain about how 5-7 year old remasters of 20 year old games are not getting regular updates. While I would love faster updates, I'm just glad to get any new content or any new updates, no matter how long it takes. The games play just fine for me, and though I've found (and reported) bugs, I understand where Beamdog is coming from, and I appreciate any efforts they put into these awesome games.

    The thing that does actually disappoint me though is the fact that Beamdog seems to be abandoning the idea of doing more enhanced editions of other games. There are still plenty of other awesome games that could be modernized and enhanced, so I hope Beamdog doesn't completely abandon the idea.

    Totally agree with the first paragraph. Disagree with the second paragraph. They need to move on to making new games. AAO is not exactly what I have in mind, but if it serves as a first step to demonstrating that they have what it takes to make an original new game, I'm cheering them on.

    I agree they need to do their own games, but I would like to see more enhanced games as side projects as the Beamdog team grows. I would love a new BG style RPG by them. I'm just greedy and want both I guess.
    StummvonBordwehrrealshempkanisatha
  • ckoeckoe Member Posts: 26
    I'm honestly surprised by how many people complain about how 5-7 year old remasters of 20 year old games are not getting regular updates. While I would love faster updates, I'm just glad to get any new content or any new updates, no matter how long it takes. The games play just fine for me, and though I've found (and reported) bugs, I understand where Beamdog is coming from, and I appreciate any efforts they put into these awesome games.

    Let me stress they actually introduced new game mechanics bugs in 2.5, and the 2.? versions are from the SOD DLC which they sold. The timeline has been pointed out before elsewhere. I am waiting for patch 2.6 (which hopefully brings no new regressions) since it was announced last year and this becomes tedious. So while I believe most people here and me among them appreciate that Beamdog has supported the EE's that long there is some perhaps growing element of frustration and confusion after the ongoing NWN EE work and the new game announcement in my perception.

    If there is a "not working as advertised" language support (thats what I understand) I would believe it to be perfectly reasonable to expect Beamdog to bring the game in a "works as advertised" state with a patch, regardless how long after the introduction of the initial problem that is.

    Now, some patch will certainly be the last patch for whatever reason. But this has not been communicated yet. To the contrary.
    The thing that does actually disappoint me though is the fact that Beamdog seems to be abandoning the idea of doing more enhanced editions of other games. There are still plenty of other awesome games that could be modernized and enhanced, so I hope Beamdog doesn't completely abandon the idea.

    An Arcanum EE as brought up by @alexey_ko in the "Ask Beamdog" thread (certainly slim chance on that :-) would actually interest me opposed to that new game they are promoting, I am certainly not their target audience. But if it keeps the IE patches (without introducing regressions) trickling in after (!) 2.6 I certainly will not complain.
    byrne20 wrote: »
    @ThacoBell thanks for the refresh. I completely forgot as it’s been a while since I have played Siege of Dragonspear. I have skipped it on my last few playthroughs as I always wanna go straight to BG2 EE. I also agree that it does need addressing as it is a pretty big plot point that they created.

    There is a mod shsforums.net/files/file/1204-skie-the-cost-of-one-girls-soul/ by LavaDelVortel which tries that. So not all is lost, probably (did not play it) it is quite good in fact, so a win perhaps ? :-)
    AdulRavenslightMiraStastny
  • kjeronkjeron Member Posts: 2,367
    @Klakier Is it not as simple as moving all files from "00806\lang\pl_PL\override" to "00806\lang\pl_PL\sounds" ? Or is this a different issue from the SAV being filled with WAV files?
  • kanisathakanisatha Member Posts: 1,308
    Ok, I can accept needing to fix issues that were introduced into the EEs that were not in the original games in their final pre-EE state, but that would be about it. @Adul, I appreciate you saying that expecting Beamdog to keep fixing these games forever would be an unreasonable demand, but you have to admit that at least some in this forum have come pretty darned close to demanding exactly that if not outright so.

    Also, I do think it is reasonable for me to extrapolate that most IE game owners who are not registered in this forum don't have much if any complaints about the state of the games, because if they did they'd surely be active in this forum to voice and vent their complaints.

    Bottom line, Beamdog should release a couple more big patches to fix up the last of the issues introduced into the EEs that were not there in the originals, maybe provide a 'rollback' toggle for the UI to the old UI for you guys who insist on using the clunky and unwieldy and ugly old UI :wink: but without taking away any of the new UI for those of us who will not go back to that ridiculous old UI, and then draw a line under these games.
  • kanisathakanisatha Member Posts: 1,308
    Oh, and one more point about doing more EEs, an Arcanum EE for example. Given what Beamdog has had to go through trying to keep satisfied the IE purists all these past six years, I can't imagine they'd want to add to that pain with any more EEs. They'd just be opening themselves up to more of the constant complaining that they have taken yet another "greatest game ever made" and "wrecked" it. In fact, I don't see why any developer would want to do an EE of an old game other than possibly if the game was their own game to begin with. Beamdog has zero incentive to do another EE.
  • ckoeckoe Member Posts: 26
    kanisatha wrote: »
    Oh, and one more point about doing more EEs, an Arcanum EE for example. Given what Beamdog has had to go through trying to keep satisfied the IE purists all these past six years, I can't imagine they'd want to add to that pain with any more EEs. They'd just be opening themselves up to more of the constant complaining that they have taken yet another "greatest game ever made" and "wrecked" it. In fact, I don't see why any developer would want to do an EE of an old game other than possibly if the game was their own game to begin with. Beamdog has zero incentive to do another EE.

    I agree that some citicism leveled at Beamdog over the years was not fair as far as I am concerned. I will leave it at that.

    But they did a NWN EE which is not an IE EE, didn't they ? :-) Apparently the IE EE's kept them economically afloat to the point they could develop new stuff Trent Oster personally is reportedly very interested in. So, may be all in all dealing with the community which kept the original IE's alive and extended them by modding for about an equally long time could be called a fair trade in the end.

    And no, I do not seriously believe there ever will be an Arcanum EE or a ToEE EE. I do not believe those would be economically viable.
  • AdulAdul Member Posts: 2,002
    kanisatha wrote: »
    Ok, I can accept needing to fix issues that were introduced into the EEs that were not in the original games in their final pre-EE state, but that would be about it. @Adul, I appreciate you saying that expecting Beamdog to keep fixing these games forever would be an unreasonable demand, but you have to admit that at least some in this forum have come pretty darned close to demanding exactly that if not outright so.

    Well, that's on them then. If Beamdog fixed all the EE-specific regressions and then never touched any of the IE games ever again, I'd kiss their feet, shake their hands, and wish them well on their further endeavors.
    kanisatha wrote: »
    Also, I do think it is reasonable for me to extrapolate that most IE game owners who are not registered in this forum don't have much if any complaints about the state of the games, because if they did they'd surely be active in this forum to voice and vent their complaints.

    Not everyone who plays games posts in gaming forums. This is just not something you can reasonably assume about other people without asking them.

    But if you want to go on believing that, who am I to stop you?
    kanisatha wrote: »
    Bottom line, Beamdog should release a couple more big patches to fix up the last of the issues introduced into the EEs that were not there in the originals...

    Hey, that's my line! ;)
    AndreaColomboRavenslight
  • AndreaColomboAndreaColombo Member Posts: 5,524
    I, for one, have many other things on top of UI fixes that I’m interested in—some of which, again, reported one or more years ago.

    Beamdog’s a business and I appreciate the need to eventually drop patching these games and move on to more profitable ventures. Until then, I’ll keep vouching for those fixes and features I think are important and would make the game better.
    AdulkanisathaRavenslight
  • AdulAdul Member Posts: 2,002
    I, for one, have many other things on top of UI fixes that I’m interested in—some of which, again, reported one or more years ago.

    Oh, I completely agree with you. To be clear, I meant that Beamdog should fix all regressions, not just the UI-related ones. I just tend to bring up the UI because that's one area where they've barely made any progress despite the astounding number of issues they've introduced to it.
    AndreaColomboRavenslight
  • realshemprealshemp Member Posts: 33
    Adul wrote: »
    [
    Not everyone who plays games posts in gaming forums. This is just not something you can reasonably assume about other people without asking them.

    But if you want to go on believing that, who am I to stop you?

    That is not what he said... he said that it can be assumed that most people not posting in these forums do not have any issues, which I completely agree with. In my 20 years as a developer I have only heard from a handful of people that have no issues with the software, but you can bet that any users that run into bugs are contacting my team. It can be reasonably assumed that if somebody runs into a bug or issue that person would come here to report it or find out if others are also seeing the same bug.
    kanisatha
  • KilivitzKilivitz Member Posts: 1,459
    edited March 2019
    I'd also like to add that it's not just the so-called 'purists' who think the new UI ought to be much better. Check out the reviews for both games on Steam to see plenty of folks complaining about the post-2.0 changes.

    It's just as reasonable (if not more) to argue that it's in fact a few people with questionable taste trying to fight the common sense narrative that BD has botched the aesthetics and usability of these games, regardless of the overall value of the EEs.
    Post edited by Kilivitz on
    AndreaColomboAdulRavenslightMiraStastny
  • AdulAdul Member Posts: 2,002
    edited March 2019
    Kilivitz wrote: »
    It's just as reasonable (if not more) to argue that it's in fact a few people with questionable taste trying to fight the common sense narrative that BD has botched the aesthetics and usability of these games, regardless of the overall value of the EEs.

    I think it's also a matter of how detail-oriented the observer is. A lot of SoD screens look great on the surface. I bet a lot of folks were blown away when they first saw the honestly very handsome SoD main menu screen.

    Meanwhile, most of the UI issues are subsurface, meaning you need to scratch at the UI a little in order to see them come tumbling out. Granted, you don't need to scratch a lot, and once you do they start popping up by the droves, but still, one might miss them if they don't pay much attention to the UI, or if they just don't remember how things used to work when they actually worked.

    This is just speculation, but this could also explain how the 2.0 UI got past QA. E.g. "When you just look at it, it's great. Just don't start clicking on things."

    Well, that and pre-release crunch, probably.
    KilivitzAndreaColombolefreutRavenslight
  • anastielanastiel Member, Translator (NDA) Posts: 246
    edited March 2019
    .
    Post edited by anastiel on
  • KlakierKlakier Member Posts: 39
    kjeron wrote: »
    @Klakier Is it not as simple as moving all files from "00806\lang\pl_PL\override" to "00806\lang\pl_PL\sounds" ? Or is this a different issue from the SAV being filled with WAV files?

    Unfortunately SAV is being filled with WAVs, and once WAV is pumped into SAV it stops working.
  • KlakierKlakier Member Posts: 39
    kjeron wrote: »
    Klakier wrote: »
    Unfortunately SAV is being filled with WAVs, and once WAV is pumped into SAV it stops working.
    Unless you're on mobile, all you need to do is move (not copy) entire contents of folder:
    lang\pl_PL\override
    
    to:
    lang\pl_PL\sounds
    
    and new SAV files should stop filling up with WAVs. It won't do anything to help SAVs that are already corrupted though.
    I can play using Polish language of BGSoD like this without generating corrupted SAV files.

    I just tested it and i think i owe you some ale :D Big shout-out to you, i'll spread this workaround in Polish section. ;)
    JuliusBorisovRaduzielGusinda
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