By Jim Rossignol on September 8th, 2009 at 10:22 am.
The response to my Section 8 review on Eurogamer seems to have been tempered somewhat by the release of a demo on the 360. It’s worth stressing that I haven’t seen 360 code and can make no judgment there, but impressions have not been favourable. I tried playing it on the 360 pad and, well, yes. Mouse and keyboard will be the default choice. It seems like the release of a demo on the console might actually have seriously damaged the chance of the game on there. As a relatively complex multiplayer FPS it does seem to me like it carries some serious PC heritage, however, and you won’t win any prizes for guessing what version I would recommend. One other thing that I didn’t mention in the review was how impressed I was with the way the game scaled. I played a bunch of five-on-five games pre-release and the smaller maps still delivered tight games with so few people, which is pretty impressive.
However, ugh. It also seems that the PC version of Section 8 is having some technical difficulties in its US launch. The culprit: Games For Windows Live failing to intiate. Another fine game marred by Live? Why oh why… Developers: use something else, please.
08/09/2009 at 10:27 dalig varg says:
games for windows live is a pile of dog shite. thats about it i guess
08/09/2009 at 10:34 Pavel says:
Hmmm, I do not mind Live….when it works.
08/09/2009 at 10:42 Lars Westergren says:
Was it Alec that wrote “The eternally slack-jawed Games for Windows Live” a while ago, when some other game was seriously delayed and bugged out because of it? Gave me a chuckle anyway.
08/09/2009 at 10:46 KindredPhantom says:
I thoroughly enjoyed playing the open beta of Section 8. It really does come together when you play as a team, setting up an ambush for an enemy convoy resulting in knocking it off the bridge. Individual doesn’t matter as much in the game as team work which is probably why it won’t be too popular, I agree that it will have a small but dedicated community of players.
But after all that I don’t think I’ll be buying it, it was fun during the open beta but it isn’t enough to make want to play on a regular basis.
08/09/2009 at 10:48 KindredPhantom says:
Gah, i meant “Individual skill doesn’t matter as much in the game”.
08/09/2009 at 10:50 Seniath says:
I just read 2 pages worth of comments on that review. Remind me never to do that again.
08/09/2009 at 10:52 Mungrul says:
I found myself getting shafted by GFWL last night when I was trying to playing the single-player games of both DoW2 & SFIV.
For some reason, the GFWL client launched by the games themselves wouldn’t connect, but at a Windows level, the client would connect.
This prevented me from playing single-player games, which I really shouldn’t need an internet connection to play.
Big bag o’ shite.
08/09/2009 at 10:59 Greg Wild says:
Great review Jim.
I’m still not ready to part cash with it yet, honestly. But when I’ve got more, perhaps if it comes down in price, I’ll definitely be getting it at some point.
08/09/2009 at 11:05 Garg says:
I remember reading somewhere that Relic with DoW 2 only used Live because it had an in built match making thinger. And since before Live they’d have probably used Gamespy I can’t say it’s a great deal worse. Hopefully people will start using Valve’s L4D matcher in future games though.
08/09/2009 at 11:11 ChaosSmurf says:
I don’t really get why any developer would use Live at this point – do Microsoft pay them or something? Surely Steam would be better in 99% of cases, if they want to use anything? Can it really be hard to develop your own matchmaking system if companies like S2 can do it?
08/09/2009 at 11:16 Half Broken Glass says:
Waitwaitwait – Section 8 uses GfWL? Fuck, and it looked so promising. Next!
08/09/2009 at 11:17 Cooper says:
I’m tempted to get this once I’m back home – I like my team based FPS games, but things like ARMAII are a little too hardcore…
I gather (By the 8 page thread I haven’t bothered to read) that there’s a fairly activeish group of RPS forumites involved?
08/09/2009 at 11:18 Lack_26 says:
I really enjoyed the game, I didn’t find the gun-play fantastic, but the game kept drawing me back for reasons I cant quite word (especially dropping just out side the AA range with CC passives and then swooping into the AA range below it’s FoF like some sort of crazy combat swallow). I’m pretty damn sure I’ll be buying it eventually, but not quite now (I sort of need the money) but I should be able to pick it up in a month or two.
08/09/2009 at 11:28 Jim Rossignol says:
As far as I understand it, GFWL is free and offers decent peer to peer match-making. Having your online game tied to GFWL also makes things more tricksy for pirates? I don’t know. Either way, it’s definitely seen by developers as a decent shortcut for handling all that stuff on PC.
I might do a little more nosing into the subject and see what we can find.
08/09/2009 at 11:32 dr_demento says:
I played the demo on the 360 and really didn’t like it – the unbelievably slow movement speed, the odd hyper-run, the curiously weak weapons but vulnerable player …. apparently all of this would be explained if I’d played the full game. So yes, I’d have to conclude that the demo was utter rubbish, since it totally turned me off the game – but if Jim says the game’s good, then I’ll take your word for it.
That aside – even if the game is much better than the demo, the fact that the developers released that demo says a lot about their competency. If they cocked up the demo this much, why would I trust them with the full game? For the opposite of this, see WET.
08/09/2009 at 11:41 Chaz says:
I tried the demo, and thought it wasn’t a bad game, but then again there wasn’t anything particularly outstanding about it either. I’m going to have to say it but it’s still not as good as the original Tribes, and I don’t know, it just lacked soul, you know? I thought the weapons lacked punch too. Yeah, not a bad game, but nothing there that would make me want to buy it or play it for any length of time.
There’s just too much compertion out there for a multiplayer only game to be merely OK. There are plenty of games that offer great multiplayer content as well as a great single player game. So when you make a mulitplayer only game, it needs to be absolutely fricking awesome, and sadly Section 8 isn’t.
08/09/2009 at 11:45 Cooper says:
Not to make this a thread about GFWL, but I’ve managed to avoid it so far. I’ve bought other games instead of GFWL involved games, keeping the need to get involved at bay as long as possible. Without any first hand experience of it, my only reason has been that I’m a bit pissed that, as a PC gamer, I’m tied entirely to Microsoft as an OS. Yet they seem to have put very little real effort into making that experience smooth and rewarding. I end up feeling jilted and impotent with no where to turn. It’s an abusive relationship.
08/09/2009 at 11:51 Jim Rossignol says:
“the curiously weak weapons but vulnerable player”
This isn’t explained properly in game, but different weapons have different advantages and they aren’t immediately obvious. Whether you survive a fight depends on how you are loaded out, and what you you are using, ditto your opponent.
08/09/2009 at 11:58 crumbsucker says:
I think the publishers have deals with Microsoft regarding the Games for Windows branding and the use of GFWL. The devs probably know very well that GFWL sucks, but they have to use it because of their publishers force them to. This is just my speculation.
08/09/2009 at 12:02 rocketman71 says:
“GfWL” and “decent” shouldn’t be in the same sentence.
Developers who use it to finish their game earlier are either looking for problems post-launch or simply don’t care about buyers. GfWL is the typical POS from Microsoft. Who knows, perhaps GfWL9 will be decent, but for now developers should stay well clear of it.
08/09/2009 at 12:02 Lack_26 says:
I’ve taken a liking to GfWL since it accidentally gave me Point Lookout for free, I was messing around in the store with no Microsoft Points and the thing sort of went funny. Anyway, I ended up a screen saying I had paid successfully and I got to download it, I’ve never had anything like it since but I was happy.
08/09/2009 at 12:28 lumpi says:
“Games For Windows”
D: Oh god. Fail by default. Why do developers pollute their games with crappy software like that? Do they get payed by Microsoft?
08/09/2009 at 12:36 l1ddl3monkey says:
GFWL games I own:
Kane and Lynch (yes it was me, I bought it)
Gears of War
Fallout 3
Dawn of War II
GFWL games I own that have failed to work properly specifically because of problems with GFWL:
Kane and Lynch
Gears of War
Fallout 3
Dawn of War II
So to recap: 100% of the GFWL enabled games I have bought have had problems with the GFWL aspect.
Can anyone tell me any company, other than Microsoft, that would be allowed to force you to use anything that has a 100% failure rate? Anyone? Why do we continue to put up with this shit?
08/09/2009 at 12:40 MacBeth says:
Well done for resisting the ‘Section 8/10′ headline, anyway.
Apparently Zavvi are ‘sorry’ that my cheapo pre-order hasn’t arrived yet… doesn’t fill me with confidence. GFWL better not screw it even further…
08/09/2009 at 12:42 Dominic White says:
What I don’t get is WHY GFWL has had so many problems. It’s just the PC side of the Xbox Live network, which is generally reliable and stable. Surely having another variant of client connecting to it shouldn’t cause such crippling problems.
Somehow, Microsoft have managed to cock up every single aspect on the PC that we KNOW they can handle quite easily on the 360. The storefront falls over, billing is fucked, DRM is shonky, and matchmaking/server browsing often fails to work entirely.
How? I’m genuinely baffled as to how a company with Microsofts resources could manage to fail so spectacularly at something they’ve already proven that they can do.
08/09/2009 at 12:43 The Sombrero Kid says:
I’m beginning to see why people loath gfwl now, i know you will be excited to know Jim that i agree with your section 8 review, although the final score might’ve been a smidgeon high as if the number actually means anything.
08/09/2009 at 12:45 The Sombrero Kid says:
@Dominic White
it’s not the network it’s the problem and the fact that Microsoft don’t profit from it means they don’t commit as many resources to it’s maintenance, in this instance I’d all but garuantee that it’s a bug caused by the recent Zero Day Piracy “Upgrade”.
08/09/2009 at 12:46 Fenchurch says:
@Dominic White
I know! I keep looking at the 360 stuff they seem to manage quite well, admirably even, then looking over the PC side of things and throwing my hands up in despair. x-D
08/09/2009 at 12:46 The Sombrero Kid says:
EDIT: whoops where it says “it’s the problem” read “it’s the client”
08/09/2009 at 13:00 dsmart says:
As I said the first time it was announced, GFW is complete and utter crap. Period. It is Microsoft’s lame attempt at extracting money from gamers as well as compete with Steam. When BOTH attempts failed – miserably – they realized that they either needed to abandon it or add scotch tape. Being Microsoft, guess which path they chose.
EVERY SINGLE developer I know, hates it. The problem is that if you want the “Games For Windows” badge, you have no choice but to use most – if not all – of the subset.
Go ahead and add Steam + GFWL authentication to the mix and you have a recipe for disaster.
Anyway, I played Section 8 and I am in the same camp that thinks that while it adds nothing new to the genre, its just not the kind of game that is going appeal to a wide audience. Kinda like our hard core games – which is ironic when you think about it. Anytime you try something new, you either miss the mark or you end up alienating quite a few people. It is a lose-lose situation for the most part and thats why derivate games are so rampant in the industry.
Section 8, like most under the radar games will most likely fail at retail (once the numbers are out) due to the budget (paying back the $1m+ cost of the Unreal engine is pretty much 1/10th of the climb) behind it. If it were from a smaller outfit, hence smaller budget, overhead etc, they would be fine. But given Southpeak’s trend, only the publisher will make money, the devs won’t. My guess is they’re not going to see a dime due to the high recoupment cost associated with UE games. Sad really.
As I said over here, Jim’s reviews are always solid, but I don’t understand the score at all. Yet another reason why I think this whole numeric (or scoring for that matter) scoring business simply isn’t a good yardstick.
ps: Jim, are you guys getting my emails? I was getting bounces, then nuthin’.
08/09/2009 at 13:06 distended says:
Genuine question: is the desire for a “GfW” badge that strong? Does it significantly increase sales?
08/09/2009 at 13:10 dsmart says:
It has nothing to do with sales, but more to do with branding. Your game apparently gets to sit in a nice “Games For Windows” section – that apparently MS pays for (or subsidizes?) in stores. So basically it is the different between the game being on an end-cap or being tucked away in a shelf along with a bunch of other titles.
Yes, it is a marketing gimmick.
08/09/2009 at 13:18 AbyssUK says:
wait a minute did the beta use gfwl ? because that worked effortlessly
08/09/2009 at 13:23 dsmart says:
No, it didn’t.
08/09/2009 at 13:27 H says:
Okay, I’m going to ask something which might well sound stupid and I’ll get slated for but I’ll ask anyway as I genuinely don’t know.
I assume your review didn’t touch on GFWL because you didn’t need to use it for the review code? If this is the case, I would have thought that this was a downside to the reviewing process – oh god I’m not picking holes, for the record I happen to love the work RPS do, I’m literally just asking not the face not the face argh!
But seriously, if the review process doesn’t touch on all aspects of the game, from installation to logging into the dumb and unhelpful GFWL, how am I going to know how this game is going to perform for me?
Okay, okay, I can see that you can’t cover everything, such as how the game will perform on every machine. I mean you only have access to the one PC I assume, or at least only try it on one. But something like GFWL which will touch every user…
Would this be something that a developer/publisher would purposefully avoid by giving you review code that doesn’t use/circumvents GFWL/etc?
Sorry, these comments sound overly negative, but I was severely bitten by GTA:4 and haven’t forgiven GFWL since!
08/09/2009 at 13:36 Jim Rossignol says:
H: “I assume your review didn’t touch on GFWL because you didn’t need to use it for the review code?”
The beta didn’t need it, and the review code uses a non-public version of GFWL, for which there were no problems. It was smooth enough that I didn’t consider it a issue, which it obviously was. Which is why I am mentioning it now.
I think it’s a great game, and when it works fine for me it’s easy to miss out on the technical big-picture.
Derek: I’ve not had any emails from you in ages. Are you sending them to the RPS addresses?
Also my feelings about numerical scoring systems should be clear from the way we run RPS.
08/09/2009 at 13:38 Dominic White says:
Just to clarify – GFWL has nothing to do with the Games For Windows branding. The latter is a pretty much uniformly GOOD thing, in that it ensures Vista/W7 installation standardization, automatic support for the 360 controller where appropriate, and a bunch of other nice bits of standarization that PC gaming could use.
GFWL is their multiplayer/matchmaking/achievement-charting/shop network which apparently works perfectly on the 360 (and is cross-platform), but has a terrible failure rate on the PC.
08/09/2009 at 13:43 hellsyeah says:
Kinda like our hard core games – which is ironic when you think about it
Derek, the reason your games don’t enjoy mainstream success is that they are rubbish. Section 8 is a good game that may not be successful for entirely different reasons.
And yes, I have played All Aspect Warfare. It’s a joke.
08/09/2009 at 13:43 AbyssUK says:
Seesh when will programmers develop a spine, and just point blank refuse to use crap like GFWL. As in all technical jobs, it is us (i am a research scientist) who actually design/make the thing and its our heads that roll if they fuck up (actually if I fuck up people have a good chance of dying which is fun). So start refusing to program in rubbish, use rubbish components etc.. which are going to make you/your company look bad, screw the publishers, screw microsoft and there special advertising spaces. Get a grip and just say no.
08/09/2009 at 13:56 H says:
Jim: Thanks for the comment, hope you didn’t mind the question. Wasn’t picking :)
08/09/2009 at 13:56 Vandelay says:
@dsmart – Are the GFWL stands a US thing? Don’t think I’ve ever seen them over here in the UK.
That would explain some incentive to get in the GFWL brand, but I wonder if the desire to be part of the brand comes from the publishers rather than the developers. Outside of the marketing of the product it doesn’t seem to do anything but damage the final game.
08/09/2009 at 14:06 distended says:
Also, isn’t it up to the retailer which stand a game goes on?
Surely if the shop thinks it’s worth putting a game on an end shelf, then he will, regardless of what the branding on the box is?
I don’t see what leverage MS could possibly have that means they can dictate where a game is displayed in a private shop? I can’t imagine MS stumping up the cost for a metal rack would be enough to influence them.
08/09/2009 at 14:12 wm says:
I always though GFWL was short for God Fucking aWfuL.
08/09/2009 at 14:19 dsmart says:
@ Dominic
Not sure that anyone said that they were related. GFW and GFWL are part of the same package. The former is about branding, specific features that are needed to obtain the branding etc. The latter is a subset of the former.
@ Jim
Yeah, I figured as much. I am sending to both the RPS email as well as your @googlemail.com email. Same with Kieron.
I haven’t heard from Kieron since his last email to me of 07-06, which is why I thought something was up since he is fairly good with emails.
I also tried calling you on the last number I had in my contact dB, but thats no longer active.
Can you check your spam filter? My last email to you and Kieron was on 08-26-09 and it contained download links to the final game builds (and unlock keys) for reviews as requested by Kieron awhile back.
If you don’t see my emails, please send me email (dsmart – at – 3000ad.com) or catch me on Skype IM (dsmart.3000ad). cheers
08/09/2009 at 14:22 dsmart says:
When it is GfW branded, it has to go on an end-cap. Thats the deal that MS has with the retailers and the whole branding thing they’ve got going.
Since the publishers don’t have to spend any additional money on PC endcaps, they try to get their devs to implement GfW whenever they can – IF – they think its worth the hassle since its basically free for them as MS is picking up the tab (nobody knows if it is financial or tied to other incentives). Since MS has pretty much killed PC gaming, my guess is that there is no financial incentive to the retailer but rather some sort of incentive of sorts.
GfW Live is a whole other beast entirely.
08/09/2009 at 14:38 Tei says:
Games for Windows, from the authors of Zoo Tycoon and Flight Simulator, a middleware that will make life a pain to both the user and the dev’s and at the same time make happy the people that will never play these games.
08/09/2009 at 14:38 Tei says:
About my last post: Ignore it.
08/09/2009 at 14:39 ChaosSmurf says:
You know, with the money that likely went into server structure for/development of GFWL, Microsoft could probably have just bought Valve and slapped a tag on Steam.
Or you know, made some good games for a change (dum tish)
08/09/2009 at 14:39 Optimaximal says:
There’s no such thing as a GFWLive stand, rather just ‘Games for Windows’, of which there are loads.
Whilst there are a few stores that still run ‘PC DVD’ or ‘Windows PC’ stands (mainly HMV & Gamestation because of the store layout), most retail outlets (including supermarkets) in the UK run with the ‘Games for Windows’ display, which features the Vista/7 Orb and the cloud/squiggly background.
As Dominic says, GfW is a good idea that really should have been done sooner – it unifies the PC as a centralised brand and gives it a store presence akin to the consoles. The extra requirements like consistent support for the 360 pad and wide-screen out of the box are bonuses.
08/09/2009 at 15:16 The Innocent says:
As a sidenote to this GFW discussion, I bought Section 8 and I think it’s fantastic. So far it’s scratched my Unreal Tournament itch better than UT3 did, and so many of the little things in the game feel so right. On the other hand, I had GFW problems at the start, but half an hour later it was running fine. This seems to happen to me with every GFW game I buy: it doesn’t work for the first hour or so, and then it’s fine for the rest of the time.
08/09/2009 at 15:17 Phinor says:
I think the review is spot on. I first tried the beta for like 15 minutes, felt like it was very much just another shooter with open environments and really not much point to it. I disliked it, hate is too strong a word.
Few days later I realized I kept thinking about the game and finally decided to really get into it. It’s definitely all those things mentioned in the review and 8/10 is exactly the score I’m thinking. It certainly won’t attract huge crowds and it grows on you slowly but I bet the 10,000 players or so who keep playing it have the best time of their gaming careers. I decided not to be part of those players because nowadays I just play in public servers and such and this might not be the best game for that. For LAN parties it’s going to be a gem.
08/09/2009 at 15:36 JKjoker says:
i hate the GFW branding, apparently MS force the devs to implement “auto language” switching during install, and they almost ALWAYS forget to add any options to change language during install or the game (some games even give you the finger and let you choose the install language that has no effect on the game language), so you end up with crap like Wolfenstein that would install in spanish in my box even tho my region settings are set to australia (which i was forced to change a few years ago from my spanish country thanks to the gfw installing in spanish)
08/09/2009 at 16:07 x25killa says:
Let’s see what happens on Friday when the game is released in the UK.
08/09/2009 at 18:41 Matosh says:
Games for Windows Live is awful shit. Fortunately it is also irrelevant because Steam rules that particular market. Games that use GfWL which I would be interested in can be counted on one finger.
08/09/2009 at 18:43 j c says:
I don’t think I’m the only person in the world who has had absolutely 0 problems with GFW Live. Dawn of War II has worked fantastically well for me in all aspects (except for a couple of minor, inconsequential Achievement glitches that were due to Relic, not GFW Live, and were eventually fixed), and even Gears of War has worked well for me too. Though I didn’t get Gears of War on PC until after GFW Live was completely free.
I managed to score a free copy of Section 8 at PAX over the weekend, and so far things seem to be running well there too – though all servers were down temporarily yesterday. But hey, that happens with Steam games too, so it’s not exactly a unique occurence.
GFW Live isn’t perfect obviously, and I’m not using my anecdotes as proof that others are wrong or anything absurd like that. I’m just saying that hey, my computer setup doesn’t do anything special or differently, I haven’t set it up in any way special, I haven’t had to use any weird hacks or tweaks or delved into config files to get it working – it just works for me right from the outset. Obviously, the same must hold true for a huge number of other people as well, and people encountering problems probably isn’t anywhere close to the majority.
Also – the GFW branding has been *FANTASTIC*. I love that every game with that logo supports widescreen out of box, without question, and that (where appropriate), they also effortlessly support the 360 controller.
08/09/2009 at 18:50 Azhrarn says:
Both my copy of Fallout 3 and Dawn of War 2 behave perfectly fine when using GfWL, so does Universe at War for that matter, but interface is quite badly designed.
So I assume it’s not always just the software that is at fault, but a combination of hardware and software as most bugs are these days.
The closest thing to an issue I’ve had with GfWL was after installing v3.0 of the GfWL client, the Fallout DLC no longer displayed in “my media” in the client, Fallout 3 could find them just fine though, and uses them without problems.
08/09/2009 at 18:52 Azhrarn says:
I mean the Universe at War interface for GfWL, not in general, I quite like the unobtrusive feel of the default GfWL interface, it’s never in the way unless you call it down yourself.
08/09/2009 at 19:20 1stGear says:
To be fair, there were launch bugs other than GFWL. Apparently, S8 was also conflicting with lots of anti-virus programs and would just dump users back to the desktop with little fanfare.
But yeah, the first time I booted up the game and it crashed when GFWL failed to initialize, I was pretty pissed.
08/09/2009 at 19:30 suibhne says:
I have a certain admiration for Section 8, a little bit. It’s not the game for me – it’s not the second coming of older UT titles that took so much of my time up through UT2k4 (then again, neither is UT3) – but I admire the principles behind its design. It can be a lot of fun with good teamwork.
08/09/2009 at 20:50 minipixel says:
thanks Derek for the info on the business side :)
08/09/2009 at 23:23 Javier-de-Ass says:
Played a couple of games and not had any problems with the GFWL thing. What was the problem people had? It logging itself off Live or?
09/09/2009 at 00:43 Dorian Cornelius Jasper says:
Section 8 requires Games for Windows Live: Oh balls.
09/09/2009 at 01:05 Random commenter #376788 says:
Played this for a bit over the past two days, and while I’m still getting the hang of things, I’m definitely having fun. Best part so far: healing a teammate who was being fired upon by an enemy, using the jetpack to avoid said enemy’s gunfire, and then launching a grenade right at said enemy, killing him.
09/09/2009 at 01:31 dsmart says:
@ jc
yeah, all GfW titles must support widescreen. Here is the list of GfW branding requirements.
09/09/2009 at 04:59 JKjoker says:
@j c: and because they are also forced to support the 360 controller they usually “forget” to add support for other controllers (or they just make them harder to set up), you know, like those extremely cheap ones that are just as good as the 360 one… i wonder why ….
09/09/2009 at 06:36 Derek K. says:
I played the S8 beta and loved it. It was a deathmatch game that suddenly spawns multiple additional game modes. It requires teamwork, unless all people on both sides are lone wolfing – then you’re okay. But if even 3-4 people coordinate, they’ll dominate.
The guns are not very intuitive. The biggest part of the guns are their shield bypass ranges. Machine gun is okay at med to long, and very nice at very short, because at close range it bypasses shields, goes straight to armor, and fires really fast. Since the shotgun is crap, it’s the only real choice for very close range.
However, as in tons of games, the Assault Rifle is the best all around weapon. It has a longer shield bypass range, does better damage, is more accurate. Unless you’re dropping on people, you’ll most often find the AR best. If you get close, the time used to swap to MG mostly removes the advantage there too.
Sniper rifles don’t work the way you’d expect – they aren’t one shots, unless shields are down. Then they’re deadly.
I was pissed to see GfWL. I didn’t think they were going to use Gamespy, but I figured it would be *something* besides GfWL. The only upside is that my 360 is broken, so I can see my friends that way. ;)
S8 isn’t TF2, but it’s different. I think of it as a shinier, more populated Tribes.
And then there’s the whole build piece – it seems shallow, but it’s very deep to me. People forget that I can top drop in the middle of an AA field with the right setup….
09/09/2009 at 11:27 phuzz says:
@ Jim (and the rest of RPS): I for one would appreciate an article where you called all of your developer contacts and ask them “Why GFWL?”. It just seems to be shooting themselves in the foot from the consumers’ point of view.
(always worth remembering though, most people just go out an buy games and probably don’t give a flying f*ck if it needs gfwl, it’s just us AIM who care…)
09/09/2009 at 14:59 Pod says:
09/09/2009 at 14:59 Pod says:
Pretend I put a > where the ? is.
09/09/2009 at 17:51 j c says:
@phuzz
I asked exactly that of Relic at last year’s PAX, before Dawn of War II came out. I asked why they were going with GFW Live instead of Steam’s matchmaking or their own system, especially when they were also doing Steamworks activation.
Plainly and simply, it was easier for them to integrate it. Steam’s system wasn’t yet mature at that time (and even after the release of Left 4 Dead, took months before it got to a good level), while Xbox Live had been doing matchmaking for years already.
And, as Dawn of War II turned out in the end, it was pretty obvious that GFW Live did a much better job than Relic’s own service (Relic Online) ever did previously with Company of Heroes and their previous Dawn of War titles.
09/09/2009 at 19:13 Concept says:
@Mungrul
I have the same problem with GFWL and DOW2. In fact, when I updated to the new version of GFWL is deleted my DOW2 campaign.
Are you using ZoneAlarm? Because that seems to be the problem for me. On the GFWL forums ZoneAlarm is a “bad” firewall that has many issues and you should just use the standard windows one.
Retards.
09/09/2009 at 22:50 neems says:
Well, I’ve ordered this, if I’m lucky it’ll be tomorrow, otherwise Friday (I’m in the UK).
This better be good Mr Rossignol, as you are primarily responsible for my hard earned at this juncture :-)