Any word on next patch yet?

[bjon045]

Just wondering if there is any word at all on any future patches. Will be a shame if they leave it at 1.12 till the supposed addon comes out.

[Danicek]

I haven't heard anything. I suppose their focus probably shifted to some other tasks such as expansion.

[Acleacius]

Yes after the 1.12 patch the devs mentioned that many things which need to be fixed can only be done as a part of one big patch.
Though they never said when, so either they will release it before or with the expansion

[txa1265]

Just wondering if there is any word at all on any future patches. Will be a shame if they leave it at 1.12 till the supposed addon comes out.

I haven't seen / heard anything either ... even if it *is* going to take another few months some communication would be nice.

[Moriendor]

The last and latest word on future patches is in WoG's Xmas special as far as I know. A translation can be found here (http://forum.worldofplayers.de/forum/showthread.php?t=185874) .

[darghan]

forget about patches until the addon :)
they simply do not have money
there are some really interesting threads on jowood forum asking if ppl are going to pay for the patch actually :)
mods are answering that there WILL be a patch and then they say that no changes will be done until the addon
i have also heard a 1GB patch rumor ... which by all means is either nonsense or the game code is less than thrash
acleacius - no code is written in a way that you would have to apply a large 1gb patch that is bullshit and they say it just to lead some ppl into thinking that the addon is their only hope
anyways the company has lost me as their fan
1) no communication and if any than bullshit
2) fucked up game - an ex-masterpiece
3) no support

[darghan]

anyways - have a look at www.taleworlds.com and look how community support should look in a 5 man team developing a true work of art
moriendor - wog xmas special oh my oh my -

[Corwin]

Thanks for the link Mo. It's a very interesting read. The fact that they admit the game is still unfinsihed and needs work was revealing, as was their admission that they failed to achieve some of their key goals!! At least they are trying to move the genre forward, instead of playing it safe!!

[darghan]

I haven't seen / heard anything either ... even if it *is* going to take another few months some communication would be nice.
you will probably have some communication - in a month or so maybe releasing a small patch of sorts repairing nothing and then some more addon blah blah :)

[darghan]

Thanks for the link Mo. It's a very interesting read. The fact that they admit the game is still unfinsihed and needs work was revealing, as was their admission that they failed to achieve some of their key goals!! At least they are trying to move the genre forward, instead of playing it safe!!
that is what i thought at first corwin but this info is old and now there is the 1GB patch thing ahead - which leads us to the inevitable addon another 20 euro and then we will probably have another unfinished product because the large scope of the game - id rather have a semi breakthrough product that would play just nice - not like Oblivion and not like NWN2 (both do not count as RPGs by my standards)
and another thing if the guys do not play it at least a bit safe then we will not have PB in one year

[Moriendor]

i have also heard a 1GB patch rumor ... which by all means is either nonsense or the game code is less than thrash
acleacius - no code is written in a way that you would have to apply a large 1gb patch that is bullshit

Why would you say that? The folks from PB themselves have explained why such a large patch is needed. The reason is that they can not fix the world in incremental updates. They can only fix the whole thing, compile it and then release it all in one big chunk. It's what they would need to do to fix the "world bugs" like flying objects and messed up physics (NPCs falling through the world etc).
Besides, demos of 1GB+ size are slowly becoming the norm. I don't see a problem with this. They just need to update the auto-patcher to allow for manual updates (so the dial-up ISDN/56K folks aren't forced to download the huge update if/when it becomes available). Then release the patch on game mag DVDs.
Shouldn't be a problem (in theory) but we'll have to wait and see what they will do in the end. Fact is that they have more or less promised to release a uber (GB) patch in that WoG interview. I hope they'll keep word.

[Acleacius]

darghan
"acleacius - no code is written in a way that you would have to apply a large 1gb patch that is bullshit and they say it just to lead some ppl into thinking that the addon is their only hope anyways the company has lost me as their fan"

What the hell are you talking about, why would you think I said "there was going to be a 1 gig patch" and then attempt to tell me about coding. are you drunk or do you not understand?
Who said the patch was a gig?
And for the sake of trying to understand wth your talking about, why exactly couldn't a patch be any size and how is the reason you say "it can't be" based on code?

[ToddMcF2002]

I don't know how G3 is architected, but the engine codebase couldnt possibly be 1 Gig. Think about it. The art assets sure, but how could the exe/dll's be that size? I don't have this game installed but just take a look at the directory structures.

Maybe the art assets are fubar and that's why a 1 gig patch is necessary - but the game engine???

[Acleacius]

I have no idea what darghan is talking about, but PB said they needed to do a large patch which they were trying to put many corrections in such as floating trees and rocks so his contention doesn't seem to make since based on the code you can't have a patch which is 1 gig in size, where ever the hell he gets that from.

I sure agree with you ToddMcF2002, when you refer to code base not being 1gig as you mentioned the exe and the couple couple of dll (s) which do exist are nothing close to that size.
No one afaik has even insinuated the max size of a patch is based on any releationship to or part of the code size, well except darghan. ;)

[Moriendor]

Well, as you may (or may not it seems :biggrin: ) remember from the time before Gothic III was released, one major problem that PB were facing and that was causing them, JoWood and the Romanian QA folks much frustration, was that PB needed to compile the entire code base from scratch every time they made enough fixes to warrant the compilation of a new build of the game. They said that the compilation process took 12 hours+ every time so there was always a long wait between builds and before the testers would submit feedback on the latest build.
Now why they have to do that (compile the entire thing) every time, I don't know, of course, but I would guess that it might have to do with the underlying database that the game is using and with data integrity checks.
In essence, this means that a major patch (which would in fact be a new build) would probably include new versions of pretty much everything but the art assets. And it will most likely be a gig or more. We'll see...

[gaboru93]

Well, as you may (or may not it seems :biggrin: ) remember from the time before Gothic III was released, one major problem that PB were facing and that was causing them, JoWood and the Romanian QA folks much frustration, was that PB needed to compile the entire code base from scratch every time they made enough fixes to warrant the compilation of a new build of the game. They said that the compilation process took 12 hours+ every time so there was always a long wait between builds and before the testers would submit feedback on the latest build.
Now why they have to do that (compile the entire thing) every time, I don't know, of course, but I would guess that it might have to do with the underlying database that the game is using and with data integrity checks.
In essence, this means that a major patch (which would in fact be a new build) would probably include new versions of pretty much everything but the art assets. And it will most likely be a gig or more. We'll see...

what was that about Romanians. i have never heard until now...

[Pfandpirat]

Gothic III was bugtested by a romanian firm, I guess they were much cheaper than any german company in that branch would have been.

[darghan]

lol why all that flame ? :) - no i was not drunk writing it last time but now i drank 3 glasses of vodka with cola :) still I am not a retard... possibly
Acleacius: man i did not say i heard or read it from YOU in HERE - the 1 gig patch is a confirmed rumor .. read all the other forums and you will understand (WOG, Jowood)
moriendor - only theoretically - and RE-compiling and then releasing the whole game ?
now what is the biggest space eater - sounds and graphics - not the physics man and neither the AI or any other things - AI, physics and such are just very complex mathematical calculations and they do not account for large quantities of space . howgh
and acleacius - i have not seen the game code and i am not a coder - i just work at a company that actually does the coding and i have some basic understanding of game development from my previous jobs
- maybe i am wrong ... for sure i can be :) but you guys can bet that there will not be any bigger patches until the addon

[Acleacius]

"acleacius - no code is written in a way that you would have to apply a large 1gb patch that is bullshit..... "

Ahh well my appoligies, I never had see this info and you addressed it to me, so I was like huh? :)
And no flame, just seemed really really weird. ;)

[darghan]

:) ok
no need for apologies actually .. I could see from other posts you being a nice guy :) i was just a little bit surprised - thats all :)
anyways read the other forums .. they really claim something like this might happen ..

[Gorath]

The reason for a possible ca. 1 GB patch has been explained in the WoG interview and their other articles around Christmas. Certain changes can only be made directly to the world mesh. For whatever reason the whole thing needs to be replaced to fix things like floating trees or missing sounds for visible objects, for example waterfalls. No idea if this really makes sense, but their reasoning was something like that.

[Dez]

All i'm waiting is them to fix

-robes skill
-missing jump attack
-?? skill
-poison skill which doesn't work.
-Improve armor is also missing
-fixing the 12:th paladin thing.
-And lastly i'd like to see merchants selling all kinds of weapons. Weapon balance as a whole is truly a tragic story.

[darghan]

add to that:

- animals chasing you way too slow and on a short distance
- very short distance of view on NPCs and animals (making bow shooting a nonsense)
- idiotic AI

Gorath: no it does not make sense :) - you could release a patcher that would recompile the world mesh on your own computer as this has been done MANY times before by many games - its a long patching process but in most cases well worth it

[txa1265]

Gorath: no it does not make sense :) - you could release a patcher that would recompile the world mesh on your own computer as this has been done MANY times before by many games - its a long patching process but in most cases well worth it

That is what I was thinking - but I just wonder if they think that by controlling the patch they can get a better handle on post-patch bugs ?

[bjon045]

Other things to be fixed -
- No one in the game world trains the master thief skill (and murder is only trained by one guy in ishtar - not really a bug)
- NPC's walk through walls (orcs patrolling in montera and geldern) and monsters can fall through the ground and still attack from under the ground!!!

Surely if they used something like RTPatch then it could just update the parts of each file which needs to be updated?

The only way I could see it needing such a large patch is if it is in an interpreted language that has file validation checks. Is this possible? I know G3 installs the M$ Visual C++ runtime when you install it, this would at least explain why you need a higher spec machine than the graphics of the game would suggest.

[darghan]

That is what I was thinking - but I just wonder if they think that by controlling the patch they can get a better handle on post-patch bugs ?
yeah .. that might be a possibility
i remember in the early days reading some thread in wog about the code of G3 ... and some coder (sounded like that) was saying that the game code is in a really poor state - so i guess its very hard for them to apply any patches at the moment - that might also explain the 1.12 patch released 1 month after 1.09 and fixing only smaller issues
bjon: it might explaing the size of the patch but not the spec issues - visual C++ runtime is installed with many games and it does not pose a problem - Visual C++ is actually one of the best choices for making games atm
and you can even have good all around engines written in java - the devs just have to think when making it :)
the game is slow because it has a poorly written and optimalised engine - e.g. the engine renders everything around the actor ingame and so uses insane amounts of memory and cpu power (both gfx and core)
modern and well written engines render only the objects in the vicinity of the player ....
anyways my guess is still on PB and JW bullshitting the ppl :) and holding them until the addon - jwood spent a horrible amount of money on developing this game and they want the money back real bad and real fast
in other words - patching the game will not pay the bills
and hell yeah - read some jwood forums on ppl asking if they will have to pay for the patch actually :) - look at the mods answers and read all of them carefully ... i really think they have been caught with their pants down

[Gorath]

I´m sure we´ll see at least one big patch (number of fixes, not necessarily size) before the add-on. Gothic is mainstream in Germany. Their customers expect at least one more significant patch, if not more.
Holding content updates back for the add-on would be quite clever IMHO. Fixing broken or incomplete elements is one thing, but adding more depth something completely different.

[darghan]

I´m sure we´ll see at least one big patch (number of fixes, not necessarily size) before the add-on. Gothic is mainstream in Germany. Their customers expect at least one more significant patch, if not more.
Holding content updates back for the add-on would be quite clever IMHO. Fixing broken or incomplete elements is one thing, but adding more depth something completely different.
yes i agree almost completely
with one exception :) - G3 is not really mainstream in germany ... we are their neighbours (czech) and it is a very good and hot selling title but not exactly mainstream as was for Flashpoint in czech republic back then or Mafia
any yes the community expects a patch as well as i do :)

[Acleacius]

It still freaks me out hearing a 1gig + patch is a possiblity as the many years playing games just can't think of anything like it before. ;)

I really liked Mafia, certianly not perfect but an amazing first attempt at an orginal IP. :)
I was really looking forward to Mafia 2 but Illusion couldn't agree or the company broke up not sure atm (it's been awhile) but something happened, so sad. :(

[bjon045]

yes i agree almost completely
with one exception :) - G3 is not really mainstream in germany ... we are their neighbours (czech) and it is a very good and hot selling title but not exactly mainstream as was for Flashpoint in czech republic back then or Mafia
any yes the community expects a patch as well as i do :)

I recall Gothic 3 setting sales records in Germany so I think it would be considered "mainstream" (whatever the hell that means).

[Gorath]

I completely forgot an official post from two weeks ago.
Another patch is confirmed. Also that their won´t be "patches for money" or whatever you want to call it.

[Wulf]

Free patches....that's the right response, there can be no other way, imagine the uproar if they put a price tag on bug fix. >:(

[Gorath]

The community manager even wrote paid patches are "not under consideration".

[Maylander]

That's good news.

[Lethal Weapon]

Gorath do you have any info what the new patch will focus on? I found the changes in the last patch rather insignificant.

[Gorath]

No infos yet.

[darghan]

It still freaks me out hearing a 1gig + patch is a possiblity as the many years playing games just can't think of anything like it before. ;)

I really liked Mafia, certianly not perfect but an amazing first attempt at an orginal IP. :)
I was really looking forward to Mafia 2 but Illusion couldn't agree or the company broke up not sure atm (it's been awhile) but something happened, so sad. :(

sry i know its off-topic but the company did not break-up its just made some changes in the lead-positions - especially the development-lead position.
the company is working on a new project http://games.tiscali.cz/news/news.asp?id=20623
mafia 2 is also in works .. dont be afraid :) .. ive got some internal info as one of my friends is working there
The problem in the company was that Mr. Vochozka (owner) started 5 projects at the same time after having huge success with Mafia- the company fell into a deep financial crysis and had to fire some employees - it was a mistake and I think they will not do it again - anyways they are coming back in force ....

as for the patch - good news - still we will probably have a 1.09 to 1.12 type of patch - my bet - but i hope for a bigger one

[darghan]

Free patches....that's the right response, there can be no other way, imagine the uproar if they put a price tag on bug fix. >:(
acually this is quite normal in custom software development :) first you get a product and then all the B class bugs are considered service and the client has to pay for repairing them :D - it requires a high-level of diplomacy though :)

[Wulf]

@darghan,

Of course what you say makes sense, but specifically with G3 we have a more pronounced severance situation than was expected leading to some fans becoming disgruntled and losing loyalty to the gothic series. So now a more than normal generous act in the way of patches (or goodies) may indeed serve to make up some lost ground at least. :)

[Acleacius]

darghan
"mafia 2 is also in works .. dont be afraid"
Maybe the best news I have had about games in a while, thanks. ;)

[boneshaker]

Great news about Mafia 2, Darghan, I was devastated when I learned that there wasn't going to be an official follow up to this superb game.

Even more so when the COLD mod ( the only one to continue the story after the Death of Art scene) proved to be so unplayable 'cos the production team insisted on having one huge game world...including all the interior locations. The lag was horrendous!

Couldn't help thinking of that when I started out on Gothic 3!

Dejavu overcame me again when I was escorting NPC's. Reminded me of trying to stop that hothead Paulie getting himself killed in the baseball bat raid on the hoodlums up in Chinatown!

Don't really have any real preference re the Gothic 3 patch situation. On the one hand I would like some of the more irritating bugs solved right now. Then on the other, I now know how to avoid many of them, so maybe they won't be so much of a problem next time round. IMHO, patch 1.12 has delivered a pretty playable game and I wouldn't really mind waiting for PB to get them all fixed and released in a paid expansion....with the obvious proviso that this doesn't take forever.

Either way, Wulf, I'm not one of those who'll lose my loyalty to the Gothic series. No matter what happens I'll snap up Gothic 4 directly it hits the streets. Just hope I get the chance.

[darghan]

Great news about Mafia 2, Darghan, I was devastated when I learned that there wasn't going to be an official follow up to this superb game.

there surely will be .. we will all just have to wait ... its been a massive project and the company needs to revitalize to fully blow it again
some of the game is in works now .. but i do not think we will see a follow-up for at least two years from now ... but hey ... its well worth the wait .. such as the first mafia was .. actually its on my top 10 games of all time .. i remember i finished it at 5 in the morning and it was work week for me :) but i did not care a bit hehe

[darghan]

come to think of it ... i will try to get in touch with my friend from illusion to see what parts of mafia have been done already and release an official piece of gossip :)

[HiddenX]

PB is still working on a patch:

http://www.gamestar.de/news/pc/spiele/rollenspiel/gothic_3/1469147/gothic_3.html

and Kairo is talking about a 'gigabyte-patch' -> so it will be a huge one.

[txa1265]

Google tools helped a bit but sketchy ... "the programmers have “large difficulties within the most different ranges"

And definite concern expressed about how to deliver a 'gigabyte range' patch to most people, particularly those without high-speed internet.

[Gorath]

a) Check the news.
b) Gamestar should really hire a news editor without a reading comprehension problem.

[Moriendor]

b) Gamestar should really hire a news editor without a reading comprehension problem.

If a lack of reading comprehension were the guy's only prob, he could call himself lucky. Seriously, the guy who wrote the original Gamestar newsbit is completely retarded beyond any hope of salvation. Not only did he completely turn around KaiRo's statement about the inclusion of the patch in a future product (which KaiRo said would be only one option next to others like free downloads to obtain the patch) by saying that PB was looking into ways how to properly market a pay-per-patch system but the most amusing and hilarious kicker is that he also wrote that PB is concerned about the requirement of users to restart their systems(!!!) after applying the patch. KaiRo obviously said that they were concerned about the requirement to restart the game. Honestly, there's no excuse other than extreme drug abuse for a fuck-up of this proportion.
What's worse is that pretty much all German gaming news sites just copied the Gamestar story (at least the part with the paid patch stuff) without checking what KaiRo actually wrote in his post.
So we can all thank that frickin' uber retard at Gamestar if PB becomes even more tight-lipped than they already were about the patch and the add-on *sigh*.

[rasmuslarsen]

What's the latest information we have about the patch?

Any timeframe?

[Gorath]

No news since the last piece on the front page.

[rasmuslarsen]

It's hard to wait. I played the game when it came out but stopped to wait for the big patch. Now I really want to play the game but on the other hand I want to wait, too.

It was mentioned earlier that you probably had to restart the game after installing the patch. What are your views on this?

[Gorath]

I suspect you don´t have to restart but practically you should restart because PB will probably make 100s of small changes.

A restart after applying the current patch (1.12) is unnecessary.

[Zaleukos]

I just hope they fix the holes in the world so we wont have NPCs fall into the void any more. That was the single most aggravating bug in my last playthrough. I had Merdarion JUST getting to the end of a cave, entering the void, walking out on the other side of a bloody mountain range, falling into the void while crossing the mountain, ad nauseum. And that guy who guides you to the clans in Nordmar who keeps falling into the void a few meters before reaching the fire clan.. Ugh.

But I guess that literally patching up these holes is part of the reason for the patch being large...

[Maylander]

Version 1.12 is actually very solid; hardly any questrelated bugs, and no class A ones as far as I know.

[Dez]

yes, but still some of the skills are broken (poison, improve robes etc) or missing totally ( improve armor, firemage etc). I'd not say those are small bugs

[Maylander]

They're not bugs, they're just cut content I think, hehe.

[Zaleukos]

Most of my void issues were with a clean install of 1.12. I didnt notice them on earlier playthroughs as I skipped a lot of quests. But besides that I had very few problems (mainly with the frustrating escort quests are stupid and badly balanced but not buggy per se), save one irreproducible bug where all the bodies disappeared from Ishtar upon liberation, including old Zuben who I had killed first of all and had a main quest item:p And of course there are the pathfinding issues that seem to plague all 3d rpgs...

[Sem]

Although those little things aren't real bugs they really take away the fun of roleplaying.
For example I'd like to make a smith, but improve armor is not working, and blueprints and ore blades are hardly anywhere to find.
Of course I can play the game, just not the way I want.

[rasmuslarsen]

I'm beginning to get a little impatient (in the good way). Right now I look forward to the patch with the same kind of enthusiasm that I had before the game was released.

I tried to get a word from PB but they don't seem to answer.

Does anyone want to make a wild but qualified guess as to when we can expect the patch? For example; is it mid 2007, late 2007 or maybe 2008?

[txa1265]

I'm at the point that I'd rather see it done 'right' than 'right now'. It will mean a replay for me, so I'd rather know that it is worth it!

[ShadowMoses]

Yeah i agree but at the same time i'm worried that the patch will be abandoned. The longer the wait the easier it is for them to walk away.

[Maylander]

I am also looking forward to this patch, and will definetly start playing Gothic 3 again as soon as possible when it's out. I agree with ShadowMoses though - I fear they might just abandon the whole thing.

[Gorath]

Just saw this on WoG: Goto www.gothic3.com and look at the JoWooD logo ...

[narpet]

I must be missing it... what are we supposed to see?

[Gorath]

Nothing. :gorath:
Even the link to the JoWooD forum is missing on the German page.

[narpet]

That's potential bad news... but Gothic 3 is still listed at the Jowood website, so it's hard to guess what that means.

[Cleric]

The JoWooD forum link seems to be on both language pages now. It's on the left side under "Community".

[Gorath]

I don´t see it on the German page. But anyway, the publisher´s logo is missing. That´s very unusual. Maybe it means nothing though. It could be a simple technical problem.

[rasmuslarsen]

It could be a simple technical problem.

Let's hope it is. It would be really sad to see Gothic 3 without another patch :tears:

[Maylander]

That's one of PBs weaknesses - compared to companies like Obsidian they hardly ever update their site on what's going on.

[Gorath]

So far JoWooD Community Manager Johann Ertl and PB art director Ralf Marczinczik posted on the subject of the removed JoWooD logos. Neither said that this was an accident.
(all transl.)
Ralf said: "I only noticed the disappeared logos when reading the [WoG] forum.
I suspect infos about this will come from JoWooD in the next days. (... A few general sentences about contracts and confidentiality clauses....)
Sorry - thus no further infos from our side on the logo story."

Ivan Ertlov wrote, in response to a rather ironical post suspecting he probably knows more about it: "(... I´m not involved in this ...) As Ralf and KaiRo already wrote, there are commintments not necessary to "concealment" but at least to remain silent about ongoing agendas, which also can´t avoid to stick to.
But I hope, too, that everything will be cleared up transparently ASAP."

Both definitely doesn´t sound like "Ups, I pressed the wrong key during a page update." Nobody denied that something is going on.

[Gorath]

Another post by Ivan Ertlov, this time at the JoWooD forum. He also doesn´t like the current information policy, which he admits he is responsible for in the public part of the JoWooD forum. Part of the current policy reg. G3 seems to be only to disclose things - or rather "consider infos for disclosure"; his posts was a bit fuzzy ;) - which he know for sure. And currently his knowledge of things he can say with 100% certainty "is unfortunately limited".
What he can say for sure is: ">>The patch will come.<<, but I&#180;ve said that before often enough. "

[Dez]

Thanks for the effort Gorath. I don't like the "uncomfortable silence". :|

why is it so freaking difficult to inform the fans.

[Moriendor]

I have a gut feeling that this might maybe be related to a takeover of JoWood and that someone removed the logos because JoWood will be part of a bigger entity soon(?)
I'm not sure what company would be desperate enough to shell out its hard earned cash for the wreck of a publisher that JoWood is :biggrin: but dumber things have happened in business history so I guess that it may be a possibility.
Though a simple divorce of JoWood and PB seems more likely, of course.

Guess we'll find out soon if this is something serious or not since JoWood is a public listed company at the Vienna stock exchange and thus obliged by law to send out notices about serious business matters.

[Ionstormsucks]

In any case I think we'll see another patch. I have to admit that I am not the biggest Gothic fan in the world, but I found it very couragous that the guys from PB admitted that what they released (Gothic 3) was crap. Somehow I have the feeling that these guys are honest fellows who will do their best to release another patch.

[Cleric]

I'm hoping for another patch as well.

Regarding all the intrigue, who can say. Maybe PB got a new publisher for future projects.

[Morticia]

I think if a patch comes out soon, it would be a small one, as the biggest bugs are already fixed. Gothic3 is crap anyway, they should concentrate on the expansion (if any).

I hope for Gothic4, though :) The domain is already bought by the PB, hopefully they get another publisher too.

[Bartacus]

Strange that for the English page the link to Jowood still remains.