Shift 2 v1.02 Patch

[tribolik]

That's not what I said. I said that patches are for two things, fixing bugs and gaining goodwill through adding DLC. And that there is diminishing returns on the value of DLC. There are no such on fixing bugs, it's important to their image that they bring the game up to a standard at which there are no major bugs remaining.

I suppose it could be debatable whether they consider the freezing to be a major bug or not. I don't get it much, but a lot of people do. They'd certainly be wise to at least attempt to fix it or risk losing part of their customer base for Shift 3: Super-Extreme. If I was EA, I'd be paying SMS the money to fix it. It's the only major thing left though, and I suspect it might take them a while to nail it. If it was an easy fix, they'd have bundled it in with an earlier patch.

.

You shouldnt get it at all... whats with a game that freezes your console... you know why you dont get it much? Maybe because you dont take fast works cars to the ring much, if you did you would get it alot... I get it 2 times out of 3 with fast cars on the ring... and today I only got one freeze because I stoped taking fast cars on the ring... and it was a GT1 car on Mount Panorama.
And another thing - I really think its the last Shift we see - EA never released 3 Need for Speed titles with the same name and SMS are letting people go and trying to find people to invest on their next title... but that doesnt mean we have to be S&%$& with the game... either EA pay for the fix or SMS do it for free (because it was their bad coding in the first place)
Either way if it doesnt get fixed Im returning it and wont buy any more EA or SMS products...

 

[Imari]

You shouldnt get it at all... whats with a game that freezes your console...

Did you even read the part where I agreed with you?

...it's true that they [the games] should be released in a more stable state than they are.

Or are you just venting your frustration and not actually attempting to have a discussion? We have the rant thread for that.

 

[tribolik]

Did you even read the part where I agreed with you?



Or are you just venting your frustration and not actually attempting to have a discussion? We have the rant thread for that.

Im not angry at you, sorry if it seemed that way... Im just saying that if you think that you have few freezes, I think you shouldnt have any at all... the way that they handle their customers is what makes me really mad...

I admit Im frustrated with the game freezing on me so much (on the track and with the cars I enjoy the most) and maybe your right I should take it to the rants thread to let a bit of steam out but I was trying to proove a point and wasnt trying to upset you in particular, again Im sorry if I did...

 

[FuriousDemon]

I think at this point EA doesn't care too much what happens next, since there won't be Shift 3 (most likely). If you can't enjoy the game, might as well trade it in. Patch 2 (3 for consoles) will not address freezing, as far as I can tell.

 

[RomKnight]

Are there any rumors on a new patch? I can't tell by the way you wrote that...

 

[FuriousDemon]

This is mostly about PC but some topics cover consoles as well. There might be more console specific fixes, I'm not sure.

Major features implemented already for the second patch:

- Multi-player collision improvements (all platforms)
- Additional anti-alasing mode (MLAA).
- PC DLC support (Publisher driven release decision).
- Collision frame rate/stuttering improvements
- New 'Max' graphic options / improved shadow setting scaling.
- Harder AI setting (all platforms)
- Suspension animation graphics issues resolved (Caterham, Radical etc, all platforms)

In Development:

none - patch 2(3 on console) development work is complete. Submission to EA shortly.

 

[HKS racer]

Imari you talk like like an EA marketing manager, problem is all the other bugs in other videogames are not freezing the console. If they are not considering this to be a major one, once again they are proving the world to be just an harsh "gimmie the money" company. So screw them.
People expect a 60€ game to work properly and if it doesn't they expect they'll patch it until it works. It's not users fault of their bad coding. It's not users fault of EA rushing their development team even if the game's still unpolished. If they really are trying to fix it, well at least they should say it, it's marketing.. in the meanwhile their reputation it's falling dawn. Maybe they will not care that much, but some people will.

 

[tribolik]

Well if a patch is on the way Ill try and be fair and cut them a little slack... Ill wait for the patch before talking further actions... Ill probably wont be able to return the game to the vendor by then (it will be over one month since the date of purchase) but I canstill trade it (loosing money)

 

[Imari]

Imari you talk like like an EA marketing manager, problem is all the other bugs in other videogames are not freezing the console. If they are not considering this to be a major one, once again they are proving the world to be just an harsh "gimmie the money" company. So screw them.
People expect a 60€ game to work properly and if it doesn't they expect they'll patch it until it works. It's not users fault of their bad coding. It's not users fault of EA rushing their development team even if the game's still unpolished. If they really are trying to fix it, well at least they should say it, it's marketing.. in the meanwhile their reputation it's falling dawn. Maybe they will not care that much, but some people will.

I have no great love for EA. Shift 2 had a ******** of issues. I was less bothered by the lag than most, and I was apparently lucky to be able to avoid the freezing issue most of the time. Whether it's because I've got a slim, or because it's a JP console, or whether I'm just a lucky SOB I don't know. But that particular issue wasn't one I had.

To be honest, I had bigger issues with Shift 1, which was basically unplayable in release state. Some car/track combinations were completely undrivable, and the whole game was a wreck.

I won't say I'm not pissed at EA for pulling this crap. I am. It's just that it's par for the course these days. Dirt 3 is actually proving to be a massive exception to the rule.

GT5: Wasn't buggy as such, but shipped without features advertised on the box, and required patches to add them in. I'm not sure which is worse, buggy features or missing features.

F1 2010: Had a wide variety of race-destroying bugs, AI cheating on fuel and tyres, pitting issues, puncture issues, etc.

Shift 2 is only different if you consider the game freezes to be endangering the hardware of your machine. Personally, I don't, but that's just me (and I'm not playing at the moment). Otherwise it's just another race-ending bug. It's avoidable to a certain extent, in that some fairly specific circumstances trigger it.

It sucks that you can't play properly with the fastest cars on one of the world's most iconic tracks, but that's what we've got at the moment. I hate it, but I'm willing to overlook it for the other things the game brings to the table.

You're not, and you should trade it in.

I believe that SMS will do their best to fix the game, and I hope that EA will allow them to. I believe that even if there are no more patches, I enjoy playing the game enough to be worth keeping it. You don't believe either of those things, so you should get rid of the game now and move on to playing something that doesn't obviously irritate you so much.

 

[HKS racer]

I didn't buy S2U, but I was looking forward to it I was just waiting for the right patch to get rid of all those freezes. I bought Shift1 last year and I was aware of the huge number of bugs there were in, so I didn't buy the sequel immediately. Unfortunately It seems like I made the right choice, freezes imho are the worst bugs ever, a game killer, something scary lol, I don't want to risk that. You're right when you say other games have many other problems, that's true. Everyobody were pissed off by the lack of content of GT5, but at least it's not freezing the console, so I know I can take my favourite cars to the Ring without any concern, I know It's "safe". It's just a big shame EA don't want to take time needed to fix those problems.. if they are such a bad company letting people down in this way, I guess me best bet to enjoy Shift content without a super PC is to keep playing Rfactor convertions: Shift Street mod with the nice Ferrari DLC, the Pagani Huraya mod and a couple of Shift tracks, I know, not the whole game but better than nothing. And sorry if told you talk like them, you don't.

 

[RomKnight]

. Everyobody were pissed off by the lack of content of GT5, but at least it's not freezing the console,

After 12hstraight to do the Tskuba 9h GT5 stopped on me after I crossed the finish line. No trophy, no money, lots of time waisted not to mention the frustration.

So yes, maybe it's not like S2U for some but it does stop responding (the cars kept on going but no input was allowed)

 

[boxox]

Everyobody were pissed off by the lack of content of GT5, but at least it's not freezing the console, so I know I can take my favourite cars to the Ring without any concern, I know It's "safe".

Seems pretty much luck of the draw to me.

 

[FLX1981]

Same here. I had some megafrustrating freezes/crashes AFTER completing a race in GT5 too, like romknight. Luckily in shorter races, if I would have endured the horror of 9 hrs Tsukuba to get a crash afterwards not only would I have smashed my console to pieces, I would have jumped on the next plane to Japan to personally slap everybody at PD in the face!

I think GT5 actually froze on me more often (circa 10 times) than S2U (3-5 times).

 

[HKS racer]

I've experienced one single freeze from Nov 24th until today, it's not the same thing as multiple freezes in a DAY as people were reporting on S2U bug threads, or because of a particular car track/combination. Am I that lucky? If so I should go play casino, If you don't like the GT5 comparasion it's ok, but let me say trying to justify those big S2U freeze bugs with other games drawbacks is completely useless and childish. The problem still remain.

 

[C_Raccoon23]

I've experienced one single freeze from Nov 24th until today, it's not the same thing as multiple freezes in a DAY as people were reporting on S2U bug threads, or because of a particular car track/combination. Am I that lucky? If so I should go play casino, If you don't like the GT5 comparasion it's ok, but let me say trying to justify those big S2U freeze bugs with other games drawbacks is completely useless and childish. The problem still remain.

Because coming here to the Shift forum saying "Oh, GT5 doesn't have these problems, unlike Shift 2" isn't equally useless and childish.

Seriously, this is the kind of comment that fits better in the GT5 forum.

 

[tribolik]

Fair is fair and in the two months time Ive played GT5 it froze on me once... Shift 2 has froze on me (in less than one moth time) more than 20 times (I really just lost count but at least once a day, sometimes 5)
I cant compare the game to GT5 saying that it is better in some areas and I cant compare it saying it is worse in others, so to what game can I compare it to????

 

[NLxAROSA]

Why shouldn't anybody be allowed to compare? If Shift 2 crashes a lot more than GT5 on your system, it does. If it's the other way around, it is. In my case, neither one has crashed on me (yet). I can totally understand that people are sceptic from reading the forums. Then again, the number of people with complaints are always larger in number than the ones who haven't.

 

[RomKnight]

I did not compare anything or even tried to quantify on the matter. I was just making a point.

And like some people are waiting for the patch to fix the freezes in S2U (myself included), there are many more (myself included) waiting for the endurance mid-game save option for a long time now. I even stop palying GT5 because of that (I only have 9h and 24h race left to do)

I totality understand why people stop playing S2U.

I'm moving forward ATM with either gamer because I accepted the games as they are and I hope both can improve, simply because, despite everything, there are no better choices for PS3 ATM (IMO) and they complement each other.

 

[HKS racer]

Because coming here to the Shift forum saying "Oh, GT5 doesn't have these problems, unlike Shift 2" isn't equally useless and childish.

Seriously, this is the kind of comment that fits better in the GT5 forum.

Here we go again, let's start another damn useless GT5 vs. S2U flame in the 1.02 Shift 2 patch thread :rolleyes I'm sorry if you don't like that statement, but if that game are not freezing my console what I should say? I'm just reporting my experience if you don't like that it's ok but let's move on, don't derail the thread in "GT5 vs S2U who will freeze less?" thread. What's the goal? Trying to hyde S2U bugs? WOW that's really useful.

Useful for EA not for normal users, that's for sure. If I say "rFactor is not freezing my PC but I wish I could play Shift2 for PS3 as well, of course without all those damn freezes." Is that different? What you are going to do now? an rFactor vs S2U comment? Are you that childish? Is this a comment that fits better in an rFactor forum right? It's even because of people like you EA are not fixing their games anymore...

 

[brambos]

Here we go again, let's start another damn useless GT5 vs. S2U flame in the 1.02 Shift 2 patch thread :rolleyes I'm sorry if you don't like that statement, but if that game are not freezing my console what I should say? I'm just reporting my experience if you don't like that it's ok but let's move on, don't derail the thread in "GT5 vs S2U who will freeze less?" thread. What's the goal? Trying to hyde S2U bugs? WOW that's really useful.

Useful for EA not for normal users, that's for sure. If I say "rFactor is not freezing my PC but I wish I could play Shift2 for PS3 as well, of course without all those damn freezes." Is that different? What you are going to do now? an rFactor vs S2U comment? Are you that childish? Is this a comment that fits better in an rFactor forum right? It's even because of people like you EA are not fixing their games anymore...

Was there a point somewhere in there?

 

[C_Raccoon23]

Here we go again, let's start another damn useless GT5 vs. S2U flame in the 1.02 Shift 2 patch thread :rolleyes I'm sorry if you don't like that statement, but if that game are not freezing my console what I should say? I'm just reporting my experience if you don't like that it's ok but let's move on, don't derail the thread in "GT5 vs S2U who will freeze less?" thread. What's the goal? Trying to hyde S2U bugs? WOW that's really useful.

Useful for EA not for normal users, that's for sure. If I say "rFactor is not freezing my PC but I wish I could play Shift2 for PS3 as well, of course without all those damn freezes." Is that different? What you are going to do now? an rFactor vs S2U comment? Are you that childish? Is this a comment that fits better in an rFactor forum right? It's even because of people like you EA are not fixing their games anymore...

Man, I'm not turning the thread into what you describe. And show me one post where I defend Shift 2 for having bugs, then we can talk more.

I just think it's pretty odd that on a GT fansite, people come on forums for other racing games, and talk about how GT5 doesn't have certain issues that racing game X has, making it sound like it's the better game. Then those same people turn around and say it's childish when people bring up GT5's similar issues. Seems a little biased, just saying.

 

[bevo]

Fair is fair and in the two months time Ive played GT5 it froze on me once... Shift 2 has froze on me (in less than one moth time) more than 20 times (I really just lost count but at least once a day, sometimes 5)

I have never had either game freeze on me even once. I have though had the FF in shift stop working every single race I have played with it, and I have had GT5 make me do the same races over and over to get either enough money, or xp to keep moving the game along. Both problems kill the games for me. I stopped playing GT5 all together because of it, and will wait for another patch to play much more shift.
The developers really need to start taking more pride in their work. Games have really went down hill in the last few years. Everyone releases early and plans on using updates to fix everything, then a new project comes along and the patches stop. I really wish someone would win a huge lawsuit against a game company and make them be responsible for the products they release.

 

[HKS racer]

Man, I'm not turning the thread into what you describe. And show me one post where I defend Shift 2 for having bugs, then we can talk more.

I just think it's pretty odd that on a GT fansite, people come on forums for other racing games, and talk about how GT5 doesn't have certain issues that racing game X has, making it sound like it's the better game. Then those same people turn around and say it's childish when people bring up GT5's similar issues. Seems a little biased, just saying.

Again, forget about GT5 and let's try with bigger fonts.. maybe you will not deliberately ignore what I wrote

If I say "rFactor is not freezing my PC but I wish I could play Shift2 for PS3 as well, of course without all those damn freezes." Is that different?...

Is all the forum biased? Do you intend this as an rFactor vs. S2U post? If so grow up. People just want they patch the game, is that a big problem for you?

 

[C_Raccoon23]

Again, forget about GT5 and let's try with bigger fonts.. maybe you will not deliberately ignore what I wrote

Is all the forum biased? Do you intend this as an rFactor vs. S2U post? If so grow up. People just want they patch the game, is that a big problem for you?

Don't ignore what I wrote as well. I don't see why I should address your post when you can't even address mine, especially when I asked you first to show me where I am defending Shift 2. Not that I see a point in your rFactor example, since no one brought in rFactor in the first place and thus has nothing to do with this discussion. I replied to your initial post because you seemed biased towards GT5, even though people were experiencing similar freezing issues. And again, show me where I am defending Shift 2's bugs. Never did I say I don't want the problems people are experiencing fixed.

Until you can show me where I am defending Shift 2's problems and saying I don't want a patch for them instead of putting words into my mouth, I'm done here.

 

[tribolik]

I really dont understand why is everyone arguing with each other when everyone should stand together when it comes to the freezing issues on the PS3.
And I really cant think of a worst bug than this one that freezes your console.
Sure it might happen with every game but if it only happens one or two times then it can be a lot of things not related to bad coding and I consider that to be an exception to the rule (that is the game running smothly)
With Shift 2 I can replicate the freezing almost any time I want and that tells me that it is a serious bug... If it was only happening to me than I would consider getting a new PS3 but someone has already done that and he continues to have the freezing issues as Ive read somewere on this same thread. if you compare the amont of people that bought and play GT5 and the amount of people reporting freezing problems with the amount of people that did the same with shift 2 you will see that the problem cant even compare and its a serious issue (in shift) and to be honnest GT5 froze on me once and in my book thats nothing... The only other game that froze on me more than twice was the first shift (froze about 5 or 6 times) and this one is much much worse...
So I cant really understand why is everyone fighting each other when they should be complaining to EA... if you dont have the freezing issues than thats fine but then dont talk about what you dont know and if you want to know what Im talking about take any works car over 2000 PI to the ring and do a couple of fast laps and then maybe youll understand...
I also understand that some of you may have issues with GT5 - I have them too (hell I dont even like the game anymore) - but please take your bug reports to the correct forum - this forum is all about shift

 

[Imari]

The fact that some people seem to be affected more than others notwithstanding, the freezing is a clearly identified problem. I'm not seeing anyone in the thread saying it SHOULDN'T be fixed. Pretty much everyone thinks it should.

The question is, will EA do it? Hatred for EA aside, if it was some totally new company we'd have to be asking all sorts of questions to try and guess what will happen.

-Is a fix feasable at this point, or are the coders still stumped as to what's inducing the crashes?
-How long will it take and how much will it cost to produce a fix?
-What is the expected impact on future DLC sales and Shift 3 (if there is to be one) from NOT producing a fix?
-What is the expected impact on the producer's (EA in this case) brand from NOT producing a fix?

We don't really know any of these things. From a moral standpoint, a fix should be made. But companies, all companies, work for profits. They're not charity organisations, and generally they only behave in a moral manner when they expect to see increased profits by doing so. Smaller companies tend to be less like this, and larger companies more so, which is why expecting a massive company like EA to behave in anything other than it's own self-interest is somewhat futile.

Things like returning the game help to send your message. I'd suspect that trading it in might too, because if I were EA I would have figured out some way to keep a monitor on the amounts of my games being traded. They'll either buy that information off the major game resellers, or they'll infer it from the buy prices of places like Gamestop. There's nothing wrong with selling the game now, and picking it back up again later down the line when/if they fix the problems you're having.

If you want to hold onto the game but want it fixed, about the most productive thing you can do is help diagnose the problem. Tribolik and others have done pretty well with this, Nurburgring+works car+2000PI=freeze. That's useful information. Make sure that gets to one of the SMS guys, either here or on nogripracing.com, and at least then they have a fighting chance at tracking the bug down. You can say it's their job to figure that stuff out, but they have any number of other problems to deal with too so if you can save them some work then the patch will be out that much faster.

 

[jbuzza]

The fact that some people seem to be affected more than others notwithstanding, the freezing is a clearly identified problem. I'm not seeing anyone in the thread saying it SHOULDN'T be fixed. Pretty much everyone thinks it should.

The question is, will EA do it? Hatred for EA aside, if it was some totally new company we'd have to be asking all sorts of questions to try and guess what will happen.

-Is a fix feasable at this point, or are the coders still stumped as to what's inducing the crashes?
-How long will it take and how much will it cost to produce a fix?
-What is the expected impact on future DLC sales and Shift 3 (if there is to be one) from NOT producing a fix?
-What is the expected impact on the producer's (EA in this case) brand from NOT producing a fix?

We don't really know any of these things. From a moral standpoint, a fix should be made. But companies, all companies, work for profits. They're not charity organisations, and generally they only behave in a moral manner when they expect to see increased profits by doing so. Smaller companies tend to be less like this, and larger companies more so, which is why expecting a massive company like EA to behave in anything other than it's own self-interest is somewhat futile.

Things like returning the game help to send your message. I'd suspect that trading it in might too, because if I were EA I would have figured out some way to keep a monitor on the amounts of my games being traded. They'll either buy that information off the major game resellers, or they'll infer it from the buy prices of places like Gamestop. There's nothing wrong with selling the game now, and picking it back up again later down the line when/if they fix the problems you're having.

If you want to hold onto the game but want it fixed, about the most productive thing you can do is help diagnose the problem. Tribolik and others have done pretty well with this, Nurburgring+works car+2000PI=freeze. That's useful information. Make sure that gets to one of the SMS guys, either here or on nogripracing.com, and at least then they have a fighting chance at tracking the bug down. You can say it's their job to figure that stuff out, but they have any number of other problems to deal with too so if you can save them some work then the patch will be out that much faster.

I would assume when EA deal with developers such as SMS that the arrangements hold the developers accountable for delivering quality in the product. Why should patching rely on EA ? Any major issues should be patched by SMS and those patches provided to EA for distribution.

 

[Imari]

I would assume when EA deal with developers such as SMS that the arrangements hold the developers accountable for delivering quality in the product. Why should patching rely on EA ? Any major issues should be patched by SMS and those patches provided to EA for distribution.

Thing is, it's a bit difficult to define "quality" in a contractual manner. No bugs? Impossible, all games have some bugs. No major bugs? Then you have to define what a major bug is. I work Quality Control for adhesives, and even though there are solid parameters to measure regarding the quality there we STILL get issues about products that conform to standards but don't perform in the field.

Someone who actually works in the game development industry wowuld be able to be more specific maybe about how this stuff works. But I wouldn't be surprised if it was as simple as SMS being retained for patch/upgrade work for X number of months post-release. Anything beyond that, EA would have to pay more.

The reason it has to rely on EA, it that it's ultimately their game. They're the ones making money off it, not SMS. SMS has got their paychecks, from EA.

 

[boxox]

You might want to look at the credits (in 'extras'), scroll down to the bottom, and check out the ratio of QA people at SMS to EA.

 

[tribolik]

One guy from SMS and alot from EA (maybe more than 100)

So now we know who is to blame.... that guy from SMS

Kidding