Dead Game

I've found that I can eventually get into a game if I'm patient and wait long enough. I just surf the 'Net and read e-mail, etc., while I'm waiting.

I'm not surprised ... but some of the fanboys, on this forum, might argue :


1. That your screenshot is a fake ;

2. Or, as one of the head fanboys has said on another thread :

« There are hundreds of players who are on ICO ... at other times. »


It seems that IC & SD are investing a lot of time & effort boosting MP for their big 1.1 update :

Building more stable deckchairs on the Titanic ?  

I stop playing sins too. I am totally disappointed about the support! Fist i was enthusiastic like alot and keep on playing although the online experience was horrible. Opened my ports, hosted and organized games, tried to help newbs ...

But there is no support for online gamers here. Somewhere in space there is patch 1.1 and perhaps there is somebody who works on it on sunday before breakfast. Thank you, for me its too late now ... start playing EvE, which is ALOT of fun! Great community.

*irony on* Have fun playing 1 vs 9 AI ultra hard.*irony off*

We're sorry to hear that some people are still having trouble but the simple fact is that the vast majority are not. As people from both Stardock and Ironclad have posted several times already, the v1.05 hotfix will resolve some of the multiplayer issues and the v1.1 update will include a total overhaul of the multiplayer code for those who choose to use it (which system will be an in-game option).

I really don't see how anyone can claim that the support on the multiplayer hasn't been there. In every update we've made to date, we have improved ICO and the multiplayer system. Finding and making these changes (especially wierd de-sync issues) takes a huge amount of time. It's not typically a 2 minute fix to make.

Counterstrike terrible post.

When making the statement that the "vast majority" doesnt crash, are you counting the people who play single player or those who just play on ico.

Again I would suggest that stardock or ironclad do a simple survey of those people who play online. Ask them if they crashed in the last week or so.

Ok the Problem with the vast majority , is that if someone in your team belongs to the minority and does crash , then you get effected just the same.

Everyone is finding problems with minidumps, However the vast majority online are patient , and are eagerly awaiting the fix. Im sure the fix is very hard to make and I bet theres more then one bug causing the minidumps so im sure you want to nail all of them together rather then release a fix that only fixes half the problems.

Also I think once people are able to host through NAT-Traversal in 1.1 , then it will be easier to get a game going. Im able to host , and I usually get into a game within 5 minutes , but I do know that if you cant host it might take up to 20 minutes to find a suitable game to join. I know the pain.

The good news is that Summer is approaching , and we will definitely see alot of people coming back online to play. As it is , ive seen numerous posts about people saying they have Finals , exams and stuff.

The migration feature is another problem. It doesnt work most of the time, and when it does you lose all sound. Whats that about?

Yea ive noticed that too. Probably a bug.

Migration might work better once everyone is host-capable through NAT traversal.

But you still lose all the sounds. Yay the game continues, but no sound

I believe part of the problem is that when someone crashes in multiplayer due to the sync bug, it brings everyone down with them. So this makes it seem like the bug affects more people than it does. Although it could be fairly argued that the bug indirectly affecting people is just as bad as it directly affecting people.

Thankfully I just play with the same group of three others all the time, and we have no problems. But I do understand the frustration some are having, so my suggestion is to be sure that the problem you're having is the sync bug. The test executables are in this thread.

-HM

Hey, it could be worse! You could log on, see a handful of people in the lobby, notice there are hundreds of 'players' online and that every server is populated well, and then join random servers to find out that those 'players' are actually bots and there's not a single human to be found. Ah, the waste of money UT3 was. That's not really helpful, but it could be worse. Considering I'm biased in that I don't like to play against random online people, it's not a big deal for me, but it looks like it is to you.

Not as bad as Genesis Rising Online

Their online forum

Just reading through the posts makes me shudder , and gives me a genuine appreciation of Sins multiplayer.

Sins will remain on my rotatign roster! I do this with all good strategy games. I rotate them every few months. I'm back into SOTS right now, but I still might play a quickie in Sins, simply cause it takes so little time. After Sots I'll be back in Civ4!

sold 100.000 copies (or more) - 50 players are online. You could say 50 is not the vast majority, all right, but you have to ask: Why 50 players only ?!?

I think you know best why you cant play sins online (from a technical view), but you cant expect your fans to the ICO hell for months. You should know this and patch the stability issues faster. Not in 2minutes but 4 weeks should be enough time. 3 Months after release ... ICO is a desert.

Game is not dead - it is hibernating...

I will say the same thing that i already said dozen or so times since the release...

If you want healthy MP online community in Sins with current MP options this is simply not possible...

Following things are needed at very least:

1. Clan support (via various ladders)

2. Claning initiative (via various, cups, competitions, leagues etc...)

3. Competitive MP game mode (something where round lasts no longer than 30 or so minutes)

Above 3 points is bare minimum - otherwise we will be seeing 40 people online forever

Oh well ihope it will be more online players after the release in europe ...

Clans are a result of a healthy community , not the solution to a healthy community. I dont think initiatives to support clans are neccessary at this point. We need to sort out the obvious problems first, once clans start to flourish again , then thats the best time to start intiatives.

Clans are result of a healthy online game


Sins is one of my fav games ever made - but both SP and MP need some heavy attention...

SP - obviously need story and campaign

MP - needs what i said above + more


Now, of course you are right as well - some technical issues and glitches need to be fixed too but this will not result in masses coming back to the game... Only major update (perhaps expansion or sequel) with heavily boosted MP experience will - until then just forget it...

Yarlen, I think you guys are doing a good job of supporting this game. I hope that my fellow Sinners will join me in realizing that Rome wasn't built in a day and that if Ironclad and Stardock were large commercial operations the game would probably suck and they'd be focused on pumping out the Playstation and XBox versions of the game and to heck with the less-profitable PC game.

As far as I know, UT3 (for the PC), in spite of all its faults, does not count bots as players in the server browser. However, that was a shortcoming of UT 2004.

I agree. Perhaps the game could use some sort of mechanism to encourage people who only play it single player to consider trying online play? Perhaps a tutorial with a sample page of the ICO lobby and a demo of how setting up games via ICO works would help? It could come after the current four tutorials. Also, perhaps an ad could pop up in the game from time to time inviting people to try the online multiplayer.

It used to count them before the first or second patch and definitely before the web admin tool came out. I stopped playing that game a long time ago for a bunch of reasons (mainly hearing 'take it!' every 5 seconds among other serious flaws and one of the developers, Jeff Morris, being an asshole to me and other former-fans on multiple sites). I even used to mod for Unreal games. Last time I played UT3, there were so few players that GameSpy was tracking stats for bots and there was absolutely no working cheat protection/prevention. Even Crysis managed to get the online part going better than UT3. Sins may be bad with people sitting in the lobby online playing games, but it pales in comparison to all the issues you deal with in those other two games on top of low player counts.

Have you ever considered that people also like to play the singleplayer or play with friends? I haven't signed onto ICO in a long long time because I don't like games online with random internet people. No offense to you personally, but my experience with them has always been abysmal, but with friends and AI opponents I get a more consistent experience. Also, it's possible people may be out playing GTA IV. Sins is not the only great game in town anymore.

Maybe it would help if Ironclad held another online night with the developers/publishers?

I agree, not only has a Ironclad and Stardock representative responded to all of the known issues, they have actually had people working with players to fix the problem. What people don’t get that this problem did not show up on their systems. So they have to recreate the problem, solve the problem and make sure everything still works for the rest of the people. This takes a lot of time, especially since Ironclad and Stardock are pretty much unknowns in the gaming industry and don’t have the experience Blizzard or any of the larger companies have, nor the resources.

If you say so. I bought the Collector's Edition two days after the game came out and I played the Demo the day it came out and I'm pretty sure that it never counted bots as regular players. I'm sure I would have remembered posts and protests about it that it would have generated on the ProUnreal.com forums.

Let me know if you still play the Original UT and I can hook you up with the CTF pug match community.