SHIFT Patch Update

[Vancouver Blade]

I just posted this on the US EA Forums and figured it was worth posting here:

I received more information about the patch which I wanted to pass on to everyone. First; some background. All the mods have been very helpful on the site as they've collated a range of issues and send them to me. I then collated a larger document from a range of sources and sent them to the game team.

RELEASE DATE
There is no set date yet; the team are still working on the patch so I wouldn't expect it to be released for at least another three or four weeks. I'm being pretty conservative here; it could more or it could be less. I will update when I hear further. The patch is a very big undertaking with more than just fixes being added to it.

FIXED ISSUES
The team are working on a lot of issues. Some of them have been fixed already while others have been reviewed and will not be fixed. Below isn't the list of all the fixes; just the major ones I can remember. I'll update when I'm back in the office.

Bouncing Cars - this has been dramatically reduced and only occurs on mis-tuned cars

PS3 frame-rate issues - this has been fixed although there are reports that 3.0.1 firmware has introduced some more frame-rate issues so we're investigating.

Muscle Car problems - I don't have the full list at the moment but the majority of issues involving the muscle cars have been fixed.

NOT 'FIXED'
Customisable Config - this is not going to be changed in this patch as it involved a significant amount of work e.g. designing a brand-new series of screens for the mapping system. We looked at changing this but it would have meant a lot of fixes not being addressed.

AI Difficulty - The team are not reviewing this as the AI difficulty is seen as a personal preference; what someone might call difficult might be perfect for other gamers.

 

[jasonb1985]

I just posted this on the US EA Forums and figured it was worth posting here:

I received more information about the patch which I wanted to pass on to everyone. First; some background. All the mods have been very helpful on the site as they've collated a range of issues and send them to me. I then collated a larger document from a range of sources and sent them to the game team.

RELEASE DATE
There is no set date yet; the team are still working on the patch so I wouldn't expect it to be released for at least another three or four weeks. I'm being pretty conservative here; it could more or it could be less. I will update when I hear further. The patch is a very big undertaking with more than just fixes being added to it.

FIXED ISSUES
The team are working on a lot of issues. Some of them have been fixed already while others have been reviewed and will not be fixed. Below isn't the list of all the fixes; just the major ones I can remember. I'll update when I'm back in the office.

Bouncing Cars - this has been dramatically reduced and only occurs on mis-tuned cars

PS3 frame-rate issues - this has been fixed although there are reports that 3.0.1 firmware has introduced some more frame-rate issues so we're investigating.

Muscle Car problems - I don't have the full list at the moment but the majority of issues involving the muscle cars have been fixed.

NOT 'FIXED'
Customisable Config - this is not going to be changed in this patch as it involved a significant amount of work e.g. designing a brand-new series of screens for the mapping system. We looked at changing this but it would have meant a lot of fixes not being addressed.

AI Difficulty - The team are not reviewing this as the AI difficulty is seen as a personal preference; what someone might call difficult might be perfect for other gamers.

if these issues are really being fixed then that it great. these are my two biggest complaints. all the bouncing makes the game unplayable to me.

 

[lildomplaya]

Muscle Car problems - I don't have the full list at the moment but the majority of issues involving the muscle cars have been fixed.

NOT 'FIXED'
Customisable Config - this is not going to be changed in this patch as it involved a significant amount of work e.g. designing a brand-new series of screens for the mapping system. We looked at changing this but it would have meant a lot of fixes not being addressed.

AI Difficulty - The team are not reviewing this as the AI difficulty is seen as a personal preference; what someone might call difficult might be perfect for other gamers.

I have no idea what the muscle car glitch is, unless its sharing its paint with 2 other cars like copycats. On the config, shifting in SHIFT with controller is messed up lol. As for the AI, the World Tour was easy. Other than that, the other races were real challenging & felt right for me.

 

[TheDabbinDave]

Thank you sir!

 

[opelgt1969]

PS3 questions

Good to hear something is being done. I have a couple questions 1) When they do finally make the game where we can map the controllers (wheel/sixaxis) Could you take a Big hammer and hit every team member over the head so they will remember to do so in the next NFS game:idea:

2) You didn't say anything about "game save" could you check on this as I've read a lot of players complaining about "game saves" going bye/bye on the PS3. We all know that you can not only save on a PC but it's very easy to edit the data if someone wanted to. We know you can save the "game save" on the PS2(not sure if you can copy it). If someone wants to cheat they will I just want to be able to backup my game saves. I own a 60GB/w500GB HDD so doing a complete backup takes almost 4 hours, about a year ago before updating HDD my PS3 crashed,Bad, I bought an used one off of eBay, I'm glad I had my GT4 data backed up as I was only at about 65% done with the game but I wanted to earn my way.If this is added in an update could you take that Big hammer I talked about in first question and repeat process:tup:

 

[Worst_Driver]

So you're looking to fix the bouncing and the frame rate ?

God bless you my friend.

 

[Imari]

Good on you. It's great to see that the team recognize the issues and are working to fix them. The bouncing cars was by far the worst, without that I think the game will improve markedly.

 

[MannyMoenjack]

Well, that's good news... but it could be better.

Don't misunderstand me. I'm glad a patch is in the offing, but why one BIG patch that fixes a whole range of issues and will take weeks for the game team to put together, evaluate and release?

Couldn't they have released a smaller patch that would correct the most glaring (read "game killing") issues first so that people could continue playing while the more comprehensive corrections could be released later?

I'm not really complaining. I have no idea what goes in to releasing a software patch. I was just curious about the thought process behind the decision.

Anyway it's good news that it's on the way!

 

[Biggles]

Thank you for this information.

I would like to ask (again) the central question about Shift: is there any possibility that a future update would remove the "steering/grip assist" that seems to kick in at (what should be) the limits of grip in this game?

It's become more & more clear to me that Shift is as "sim" as any other racing game out there, perhaps more so, at the lower levels of performance, but as you push the cars harder the physics are completely over-ridden by an unrealistic "uber-grip" that prevents the cars from losing traction. At its most obvious (at Road America "Carousel" for instance) this leads to weird seconds long power-slides, but at every corner it takes the edge off the skill required to drive fast & turns the game into much less of a sim experience.

I understand that for many gamers this driving model is quite satisfying, but for the many, more dedicated, racers out there it is very frustrating to be so close to being able to play an outstanding sim, but have it taken away by what feels like a "add-on assist".

I realize this may not be a question you can answer here, but is there any possibility of a future patch that would address this issue & provide a more sim version of the physics?

 

[EA11R]

There's something about the game that's been troubling me as well, perhaps someone may lend me some insight into the cause.

It seems that in SHIFT, the steering wheel I use (Driving Force Pro) has an especially loose connection to the car in-game. It's almost as if I turn the wheel, and there's a time-delay before the car begins to react. It makes basically the entire thing fairly unsatisfying, and I'm wondering: Is this a glitch, or the result of quirky (i.e. bad) physics?

I've already looked in the Wheel & Controller Settings thread and applied their recommendations, and even elaborated a little on my own, but the wheel just feels nowhere near as good as it does in other games. What might be causing this?

(I'm trying to decide whether or not it's a glitch or just bad physics, so this is a little on-topic?)

 

[jasonb1985]

There's something about the game that's been troubling me as well, perhaps someone may lend me some insight into the cause.

It seems that in SHIFT, the steering wheel I use (Driving Force Pro) has an especially loose connection to the car in-game. It's almost as if I turn the wheel, and there's a time-delay before the car begins to react. It makes basically the entire thing fairly unsatisfying, and I'm wondering: Is this a glitch, or the result of quirky (i.e. bad) physics?

I've already looked in the Wheel & Controller Settings thread and applied their recommendations, and even elaborated a little on my own, but the wheel just feels nowhere near as good as it does in other games. What might be causing this?

(I'm trying to decide whether or not it's a glitch or just bad physics, so this is a little on-topic?)

i've heard numerous reports of people complaining about that same issue. all the complaints were from people using one of the lower priced Logitech wheels (no offense), i can't recall which one. i have used both a Fanatec Turbo wireless wheel and a Logitech G27 with this game and there is no delay with either wheel. it always feels responsive to me.

my biggest complaints are the excessive cars bouncing on what i am assuming are bumps on the track and then the very frequent frame rate drops. sometimes the frame rate drops are so bad it make the game pretty much unplayable. another big issue is how the cars tunings are inconsistent. one race things will be fine, then the next race the car will behave totally different.

for me the game is unplayable until these issues are addressed. glad to see they are working at it though.

 

[Biggles]

The G25 also has a bit of a vague, loose feel with Shift. However, this "dead-zone" effect is present in all other games to some extent. I tried Shift with my Fanatec GT3 RS wheel for the first time yesterday: it was superb! No "looseness" or "dead-zone at all. Driving the Porsches with the Porsche wheel was an amazing experience - really the most "sim" feeling experience of ANY game I've tried ... until the "grip assist" kicks in.

 

[rexc]

Hi Vancouver, firstly thankyou very much for communicating with us here and keeping us up to date. It's most appreciated.

I'm glad the patch is addressing 2 of the 3 big issues the game currently has, namely the framerate and the overly bouncy cars.

However I think I speak for others as well, that one of the major current frustrations of the game is the way the car tuning can arbitarily change from race to race, and particularly between Quick Race and Online.

I'm not sure if this is what you mean by the Customisable Config issue, or if you were referring to the Livery Editor there.

Either way, Cars not holding their tunes properly is very frustrating and a bug I hope can be eliminated sooner rather than later. 👍

 

[Terronium-12]

I don't want to sound like an ass or anything in saying this because I appreciate the feedback and keeping us up to date on the progress of the upcoming patch, but, I can't help but think why all of this hard work had taken place now as opposed to at the get-go?

Just seems lazy and inexcusable to me.

 

[Sureboss]

Well, that's good news... but it could be better.

Don't misunderstand me. I'm glad a patch is in the offing, but why one BIG patch that fixes a whole range of issues and will take weeks for the game team to put together, evaluate and release?

Couldn't they have released a smaller patch that would correct the most glaring (read "game killing") issues first so that people could continue playing while the more comprehensive corrections could be released later?

I'm not really complaining. I have no idea what goes in to releasing a software patch. I was just curious about the thought process behind the decision.

Anyway it's good news that it's on the way!

As I've been involved in patching for consoles, I might as well answer this.

Off the top of my head, issues with releasing smaller, but more frequent patches are:

Each patch on the consoles (Title Update) has to go through similar rigorous processes to the actual game itself. Once the devs submit the final build to MS/Sony, they will put it through their own QA, etc, and this will take about 2 weeks. That's a huge time span. Now imagine you send out 3 patches, that's ~6 weeks of time where it's in the hands MS/Sony. That's a huge factor to patching consideration.

Patching in itself is a hugely risky process, changing one thing will often change another. You have to be able to trace the changes you make, otherwise if something does go wrong, you won't know what caused it. It's easier to keep feedback to your own team, QA testers and any other testers you might, than within public and having several builds. On one of the games I work on, tracking what went in each build, and thus tracing later issues, is very difficult, and without some clever comparison software (ie, put in two files, it will tell you what differs between the two) would have had me banging my head against the wall on many occasion.

Console patching is much tougher than PC patching, for example, one issue with Shift will be the consideration of the patch for Xbox 360 Arcade users, which I believe means the patch has to be condensed to 4MB.

You've then got an issue of what data is stored on the HDD and what is stored on the optical drive.

There's also an image issue, many gamers would get frustrated with 3/4/5 patches over a few months, rather than waiting a couple for one decent sized one.

I think I've typed everything I was thinking....

-----

That's good news, Blade. The bouncy cars has stopped me from playing the game at the moment, hope it all goes smoothly. The game has a few niggles which stop it being a very good game, hopefully the patch will correct these.

 

[L_Hamilton]

if these issues are really being fixed then that it great. these are my two biggest complaints. all the bouncing makes the game unplayable to me.

Same here. Autopolis is a big problem. About 4-5 corners are so bad, I don't even want to race there anymore. And I love that track, being on the Super GT calender.

 

[MannyMoenjack]

As I've been involved in patching for consoles, I might as well answer this.

Off the top of my head, issues with releasing smaller, but more frequent patches are:

Each patch on the consoles (Title Update) has to go through similar rigorous processes to the actual game itself. Once the devs submit the final build to MS/Sony, they will put it through their own QA, etc, and this will take about 2 weeks. That's a huge time span. Now imagine you send out 3 patches, that's ~6 weeks of time where it's in the hands MS/Sony. That's a huge factor to patching consideration.

Patching in itself is a hugely risky process, changing one thing will often change another. You have to be able to trace the changes you make, otherwise if something does go wrong, you won't know what caused it. It's easier to keep feedback to your own team, QA testers and any other testers you might, than within public and having several builds. On one of the games I work on, tracking what went in each build, and thus tracing later issues, is very difficult, and without some clever comparison software (ie, put in two files, it will tell you what differs between the two) would have had me banging my head against the wall on many occasion.

Console patching is much tougher than PC patching, for example, one issue with Shift will be the consideration of the patch for Xbox 360 Arcade users, which I believe means the patch has to be condensed to 4MB.

You've then got an issue of what data is stored on the HDD and what is stored on the optical drive.

There's also an image issue, many gamers would get frustrated with 3/4/5 patches over a few months, rather than waiting a couple for one decent sized one.

I think I've typed everything I was thinking....

Sureboss, thanks for taking the time to educate me on all that.

And SO, that being the case I'll echo Terronium's comment above... If patching multi-platform games is so difficult wouldn't you think they'd be more thorough in beta testing their products before releasing them?

I figure a big company like EA could've had this title beta-tested in a weekend by rounding up a dozen college kids, and at the cost of beer and a few pizzas have a smoothly running game.

It really does seem inexcusable...

 

[Sureboss]

They probably knew of most of the issues in the first place, from my experience that is the case. The most likely issue, as is one of the biggest in gaming (and most industries) is deadlines. To delay a release is a monumental failure, and you will gradually lose sales. Gamers are an impatient lot and hate delays (GT5 anyone? ) You can spend forever tweaking games, and finding the right balance between the myriad of factors, is tough. Especially with complex racing game physics engines. So with those constrictions, your QA/Beta testing will only go so far.

No, testing cannot be done over a weekend for a game of this magnitude, even the smallest of games couldn't do it in that time. Also, the "professional" side of testing is qute a complex process, and the effectiveness of it can vary a great deal depending on who is running it. It's certainly far deeper a process than a weekend involving, teenagers, beer and pizza.

Ideals and Reality rarely meet in gaming.

 

[MannyMoenjack]

No, testing cannot be done over a weekend for a game of this magnitude, even the smallest of games couldn't do it in that time. Also, the "professional" side of testing is qute a complex process, and the effectiveness of it can vary a great deal depending on who is running it. It's certainly far deeper a process than a weekend involving, teenagers, beer and pizza.

Actually I was using hyperbole about the college kids to make a point… apparently didn’t come across as well as I hoped.

I suppose there are market surveys and swarms of accounting data to prove otherwise, but I would’ve thought that delaying the release of a game for a month to make it playable would cost less in terms of money and tarnished reputation than releasing a defective product.

I’m also of the opinion that if Polyphony had the stones to delay years to insure their product met their own quality criteria, EA should’ve had the guts to delay a month to correct major framerate and drivability problems. Yeah, GT5 will have bugs too but I bet it won’t have ones that bring things to a screeching halt 2/3rds of the way through it.

But I’m an old fashioned kind of guy who thinks that quality counts... probably why I'm not rich!

 

[Nicko]

Thanks for the update Vancouver Blade, looking forward to the new patch. 👍

 

[dzidza]

@vancouver blade: can you tell the dev to make online patch for driver duel. Because it is insane how people are driving, if they are losing then they deliberately crash in your car or spin you out. it's really frustrating.

 

[AERO_HDT]

I also find it a very poor reflection on EA that the "bouncing cars" issue (arguably my greatest peeve) was overlooked. This one small problem has probably brought more negative comment on what is otherwise a decent racing game, than any other issue.

It's good to hear that it will be fixed to some degree, but it does make you wonder at the QA processes and Beta Testing that go on behind closed doors. To release a game with such an inexcusable flaw astonishes me, especially if it is based on the premise of tight release deadlines. Why do EA insist on rushing inferior products to meet what are undeniably, the most unrealistic schedules and dates ever seen in the entertainment business?

Or in any business for that matter?

Is it a simple case of oversight? Who bears the blame for such an error?

It is such a shame, because I, like many others, have played the game to a point where the physics do not correlate with the proposed performance modifications fitted to your car. And this to me, is a drastic backwards step, where is the point of "modifying" your cars if those very modifications decrease performance and give rise to ugly events that cannot be ironed out (even to a small degree).

Don't get me wrong, Shift is perhaps the best NFS game I've ever played. Another few weeks of testing would have made it an excellent title on any platform and would have easily covered itself with millions more in sales. Those sales will never be made because people have turned away from a product that is on some levels, fundamentally flawed.

If EA can no longer get the foundations of a game correct, then what hope is there for the future?

 

[Daniel_Elessar]

well it is a shame indeed that it seems nobody noticed the bouncy cars.
I also don't have this problem on every car, but they are lokking over it so it will be corrected in a patch.

i would also like to have longer endurances, but that is just a personal thing.
another problem, when playing with the controller i can look freely around, but with my wheel i can't , That is also something that needs te be done even if it's the smallest thing: looking right and left. the camara view is there so we need to control this also by using a wheel!.

besides that it's a decent game wich offers a challenge and a great expierence!
keep up the good work

 

[Sureboss]

Actually I was using hyperbole about the college kids to make a point… apparently didn’t come across as well as I hoped.

I suppose there are market surveys and swarms of accounting data to prove otherwise, but I would’ve thought that delaying the release of a game for a month to make it playable would cost less in terms of money and tarnished reputation than releasing a defective product.

I’m also of the opinion that if Polyphony had the stones to delay years to insure their product met their own quality criteria, EA should’ve had the guts to delay a month to correct major framerate and drivability problems. Yeah, GT5 will have bugs too but I bet it won’t have ones that bring things to a screeching halt 2/3rds of the way through it.

But I’m an old fashioned kind of guy who thinks that quality counts... probably why I'm not rich!

Shift is playable in it's current state, sure it needs some fixes, but it is by no means broken and literally unplayable.

 

[MannyMoenjack]

Shift is playable in it's current state, sure it needs some fixes, but it is by no means broken and literally unplayable.

I disagree.

SOME of the game is playable. Tiers 1 & 2 for instance. As you move up to Tiers 3, and particularly 4 however, many (including myself) have framerate, lag, gamesave, tuning and car control issues that make Career Mode impossible to continue with.

I'm playing on a PS3 with a G25 wheel so my issues may not be the same as yours depending on your platform.

So yes, technically I can continue to re-play Teirs 1, 2 and part of 3 and the game works, but beyond that I'd say the game is busted.

 

[WolfRacer543]

Shift is playable in it's current state, sure it needs some fixes, but it is by no means broken and literally unplayable.

When I first installed SHIFT, the game glitched so it was constantly pressing up. That was fixed by reading someone else's comment on a forum. Then it started crashing to desktop, constantly. This one had to be fixed by manually deleting a graphics config file. The game is still pretty unstable, and has other issues such as cars randomly not accelerating off the line, and I've still had a couple of crashes in the middle of race series (after one race is over, it crashes at the start of the next one).

Sounds pretty broken to me. When it reaches the point of me manually having to delete a config file to stop the game crashing... yeah... I'm not too impressed.

 

[Sureboss]

Oh I know it's got some major issues. Your experience sounds particularly bad, WolfRacer, on PC? Wasn't that glitch related to G25s? But I've seen a lot worse, you know when games actually have to get re-called. Should it have been released in the state it was? Probably not, but gaming isn't an ideal world.

 

[jswilli1]

Guys,

I finally got back on Shift to start my Tier 3 racing up, I really enjoyed the Tier 1 and 2 in Career. I have been keeping upto date on the threads and honestly I have been discounting most of what people have been saying as I had not truly been experiencing it forehand. I am so frustrated right now that I am ready to throw shift in the air like a clay pigeon and blast it to smithereens! I got to experience first hand the poor frame rates, slow motion, bouncing car, and AI that is the websters definition of a "Punter". This was all in one race and I was using the GT3 RS, I removed the "welded chassis" which helped a little, I put the shocks to the softest setting which helped a little, but I was still very disappointed because it still wasn't enough. I certainly hope this next patch fixes this bouncing issue as for now I am shelving Shift because it is not enjoyable and just too frustrating to play at the higher Tiers. In another post VB said that the AI would not be be worked on because some players are at different levels and may thing the AI is just right or too difficult. If I wanted to play bumper cars I would put GT5P in and play online in the beginner levels. Since I got to Tier 3 that is what the AI is like, bumper cars nothing like the AI in Tier 1 and 2. See you guys in a few days, weeks, months or whenever that next patch comes out...I'm done....jswilli1

 

[Paulie]

Aww, bouncing fixed! Sweet! I may pick this game back up with bouncing fixed.

 

[SuperCobraJet]

This game is loaded with glitches.

Along with those mentioned here, I have had problems with tuning adjustments, most notibly gear settings not changing at all, or once changed, not changing back.

The biggest problem with this is all tuning becomes suspect and when you're suspension tuning you are always wondering if the changes are being done correctly.

Of course with the basketball issue, maybe its irrelavant anyway.