Posts Tagged ‘boycott’

Boycott Eidos Interactive

August 27, 2009 - 2:09 pmDan1 Comment »

This is something that happened around May 2008, but I thought I’d share it with you.  There are several incidences of idiocy in this story, but at least it has a happy(ish) ending.

This is one of those posts that’s kind of long.  You may want to grab yourself a snack before you read any further.

I was looking through Steam’s game offerings one day, when I noticed the Commandos pack (containing all four Commandos games) for a relatively decent price.  I bought it, and happily downloaded my four new games.

Figuring I’d start at the beginning, I started up Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines and played the first mission.  Halfway through, I had to leave the computer, so I attempted to save and quit.

The “save” option was grayed out.  A few hours of googling confirmed it – Commandos does not work properly on Windows XP, and there’s basically no consistent way to fix it.

So, I e-mailed Eidos tech support, explaining where I bought the game (Steam) and what the problem was (the Save option is grayed out and unusable).  Their auto-response on May 10 read “we’ll assign a tech to this as soon as possible.”

(more…)

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No LAN support in Starcraft 2

July 1, 2009 - 11:59 amDanNo Comments »

Well, it’s official.   Starcraft 2 will have no LAN support.

Before I start, go sign the petition asking Blizzard to add it in:

http://www.petitiononline.com/LANSC2/petition.html

There are a number of problems with their decision – first and foremost being that they’re literally killing off their huge LAN-party-going fanbase.

Think about it.  Your average American does not have an internet connection that can handle eight simultaneous Battle.net connections.  And even if the host does have a connection good enough, Blizzard is now forcing all eight people to send their game round-trip to Blizzard’s servers just so they can play with the people in the same room.  That increases latency and reduces the “fun” value of the game.  If Battle.net dies mid-game, then the “LAN” party comes to an end.

Do any of you remember the original StarCraft, or Diablo I and II?  Blizzard provided a multiplayer-only spawn installer on their CDs.  They wanted people to play with their friends, even if their friends didn’t own the game.

Starcraft is still one of the ten best-selling games, more than a decade after its release.  Do they really think LAN capability hurt their sales?  Do they really think piracy hurt their sales?

But now, they’re claiming LAN capability will reduce sales of Starcraft 2.  Based on past experience, that’s only true if their game sucks – people buy good games.  Just look at Blizzard’s previous releases for the proof.

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