I'm not getting TW: Warhammer and here's why

[JasonPratt]

On a game of this sort, there are fans who won't play unless they can play as (instead of only against) their favorite team.

It would be a little like next year's Madden deciding they'll release with ten teams, and make the other teams available for purchase as DLC to people who want to play them. Assume the Dolphins are included and the Titans are not. If I'm a Dolphins fan, great! If I'm a Titans fan instead (and not also), I'm going to be annoyed about paying extra to play the team I really want to play. The obvious main difference is that American football teams don't require anything like as much work to implement as different Warhammer or other fantasy or historical distinct forces. But if I wanted to play as Britain on the Company of Heroes or Combat Mission 2.0 engine, and didn't care about playing any other force, I'd be annoyed about having to buy more to play less, even though from a developer perspective it only makes sense to charge more for the efforts involved in designing and implementing such different forces. On a fantasy game, the differences will usually be much more pronounced than that.

For the people who are fans of multiple teams, or just of the gameplay itself, it isn't a big deal. For people who are buying the game to play as X, having to pay extra for X is a big deal.

I'm speaking as someone who is just happy the game is coming, and who isn't focused on only playing one team. But I imagine that's a

[PipFromSlitherine]

...perhaps we should look at what we do get for our money rather than what we don't get for our money?

You can't go around the internet making sensible statements!

Luckily most people vote with their wallets and are happy to buy (or not buy) DLC as they like, rather than this (as you say) new idea that DLC means you only get half a game.

Cheers

Pip

[ghostryder]

So the answer to what are you getting for your money? An incomplete game.

[FlickJax]

In that case every game is incomplete.

[Nefaro]

As for the delay, I'm mildly bummed, but I'll live.  ;)  I'd rather the game not be rushed out and full of bugs (especially given what happened with Rome II), and I'm glad that both CA and Sega were wise enough to allow for extra time.

I'd also rather they delayed as long as needed, for a less buggy release.

It doesn't leave me with buyer's remorse when there are fewer bugs on release day.  If I pay $60 for something and then end up shelving it for 5 months while they're busy patching it, that tends to make me sour about buying early.  Especially since you never know just how much will get patched.

I think CA did a great job of sticking to a very long & intense patch process with Rome 2, after it was released.  What was it.. something like 16 large updates?  They even listened to their fans and removed at least one infuriatingly annoying game mechanic with Rome 2.   O0  But Rome 2 was an exception, not the rule. 

Since this is a new one I'm sure they'll provide more post-release tinkering than something like TW:Attila, which is just Rome 2 with new assets and a very few new mechanics shoehorned in (poorly in some cases!).  But it's always best if the release isn't a shocking $60 bug festival.  Especially since many gamers & reviewers will base their opinion of it on their first playthroughs, forever praising or damning it afterward on that alone.  Maybe CA has wizened up in this respect?

[undercovergeek]

^

i think they may have learnt their lesson with Rome 2 - someone puts a lot of time and money into making these games, i imagine champagne and balloons are bought on release day and everyone watches the feedback roll in, and they got pummelled and abused on release day - it must have been pretty demoralising to see that - yes it got fixed but they must have lost a ton of cash with people saying never again, there are still people out there asking 'if its still a buggy mess like on release' - yes most are CA trolls but theres still a lot of hate

id like to think theyve thought in one hand we have all the TW fans, and in this hand we have all the GW fans - if we get this right well be billionaires - and someone, maybe GW has said 'do not fk this up'

[Nefaro]

I doubt GW told them, "don't fk this up".  I mean... look at some of the other shovelware that's been put out with GW IPs recently.  ;D

My initial impression is that someone with authority at CA realized their early press release review copies were gonna be buggy, and it would show in the "Let's Play" previews that will be so prevalent on release day, or just before.  So they pushed it back to fix more.  Good call.  I just hope they would do it again if the extra month isn't enough.

[JudgeDredd]

I get that someone wanting to play a particular faction may be getting an unfair rub if that particular faction is not included unless you purchase the DLC.

If I was buying an F1 game, would I think I was being ripped off if they didn't provide all the teams as available to drive? Yes, probably - but that's slightly different in the sense that they've always provided the teams for use.

However - if they were to say to me "There's two versions - 1 at £100 which comes with all teams or one that comes at £40 with Ferrari, Williams, McLaren and Mercedes" I would definitely go for the £40 game. Especially if the ability was there to add the other teams at a later date with DLC.

Perhaps the answer would be to allow people to choose which factions they want in their game?

[Nefaro]

Launch Day DLC..

What end-user thinks this is a good idea?  :P

[undercovergeek]

dwarves - check
elves - dont think so
empire - check
orcs - check

my boxes are pretty much ticked, im a traditionalist cannons, muskets, hammers and arrows kind of GW player - the magic weirdness of the undead and chaos always weirded me out - give me two guys smashing and hacking at each other, not some guy in a pointy hat making one all 'plaguey' - but im looking forward to marching over the mountains on their ass and turning them into meat paste

theres plenty in the gaming library to keep me going, as nef said good on them for the delay, and please have the balls to do it again if needs be

[JudgeDredd]

I think the term "complete game" is mostly subjective and should probably be linked to what you are paying and what you get for that.

I feel for the people as jasonpratt mentioned where they would want to play the Chaos faction and that's why I thought it may be best to let players decide what factions they want as playable in their game.

I'm for a lower entry point and build the game up. I don't want to pay £70, £100, £150 for a game because it's got all the cars and tracks the world over. I want to pay £30 for the game and add tracks and vehicles as I see fit...ala Project Cars

[undercovergeek]

i think since the days of discs stuck to the front of PC magazines there hasnt been such a thing as a complete game - and its a good thing

i think today if a developer released a game and said 'we're done, thats as good as its going to get, we're happy, and we're moving onto our next game' thered be collective chaos - people expect, nay, want DLC, patches, add ons

in ye days of yore if you wanted your character to have different clothes, different voices, your favourite tank to be in a game you were waiting for the sequel for a year

DLC - i dont understand the rage. Theres some new DLC in the can for XCOM2 coming soon, 'children of anarchy' or something, some kind of make all your characters look like harley from batman, that or some german erotica convention, latex, gas masks and weird zip up face masks - couldnt care less, but you know, i dont have to buy it - its not essential.7

On the flip side, the 'just release all the races on day one' crowd, thats cool 'just wait another 6 months for the artists to make it all without ONE WORD OF COMPLAINT about the wait time'

OR

wait for the aforementioned 6 months and get the Gold pack with it all in

there is no all AND now, only some and now or all and later

[Gusington]

I love TW, I think all you guys know that. But the series may have been around for so long that it is difficult to not repeat mistakes. Like with Empire TW CA got a lot of flak for the AI not understanding the game's massive structure. So then Napoleon was released and fans calmed down only to be riled into a frenzy by the release of Rome 2, only to be placated by the patch releases and then the Emperor's Edition. And then placated again by the release of Attila. Seems cyclical.

[FarAway Sooner]

To quote Animal Farm, every game is incomplete at release but some games are more incomplete than others.

I think Jason nailed it on the head.  Folks who are strongly invested in playing for or against one particular faction will feel the game is very incomplete.  Others, not so much so...

[jomni]

I love TW, I think all you guys know that. But the series may have been around for so long that it is difficult to not repeat mistakes. Like with Empire TW CA got a lot of flak for the AI not understanding the game's massive structure. So then Napoleon was released and fans calmed down only to be riled into a frenzy by the release of Rome 2, only to be placated by the patch releases and then the Emperor's Edition. And then placated again by the release of Attila. Seems cyclical.

They did get Shogun 2 right out of the box.