Ecks Orion
Proposition Thirteen
The Third Rail
1
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Posted - 2011.09.09 18:14:00 -
[1] - Quote
Dorian Wylde wrote:FloppieTheBanjoClown wrote:Dracoliche wrote:I don't like to take special measures to make my $15/mo game work regularly for me.
I hope this isn't happening to any of my stuff. This. A "workaround" shouldn't be treated as a long-term fix to a problem in a product that people pay for. If they know what the problem is, they should know how to fix it. If they can't fix it, methinks they're in the wrong line of work. I love when people who know nothing about programming or computer science try to talk about bug issues. Known issue can mean many things. It could mean there have been several reports, and they're looking into it. It could mean they've been able to reproduce it on their test server. It could mean they have a patch for it next week. It could also mean they know what's wrong, but its so deep into the code, and tied into a hundred other things, that it will takes years to fix. Deal with it. All computer programs have bugs. Programs as large and complex as an MMO have lots of bugs, that may have no obvious cause or solution. That is a fact, and there is no way around it.
Hi. I do this for a living, and have for 15 years.
You're WAY offbase here. What you say is true in a general sense (what "known issue" means), but the person you're replying to is absolutely, 100% correct. This behavior is a regression. Something that used to work, and now all of a sudden it doesn't. That is a serious problem, especially since numerous people have complained about it, AND it has a pretty serious impact on gameplay. The fact that it wasn't found in internal test is pretty disconcerting (I'd be having words with my guys if this happened in my org).
There's a known timeline here. We know when it worked, and we know that now it doesn't. We KNOW that something happened within that defined block of time that broke it. It should be a fairly simple exercise for them to narrow it down to a particular build, or even a specific changelist, and then examine the changes to figure out what did this. Successful software dev organizations do this ALL THE TIME.
This statement:
"A "workaround" shouldn't be treated as a long-term fix to a problem in a product that people pay for."
...is 100% correct and appropriate here, especially a workaround as intrusive as leaving the game and having to log back in.
Like the poster above me said, this bug is a showstopper. That means that if it's found before the code is actually released, you DO NOT release it until the bug is fixed. This issue would cause a release delay in any self-respecting software dev org. |