Well:Neverhoodian said:
A. It's a little late for that
B. they stated flat out that they scrapped that demo and started over from scratch.
Gearbox and Sega sued over Aliens: Colonial Marines, both Companies Respond
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A. It's a little late for that
B. they stated flat out that they scrapped that demo and started over from scratch.
Did you miss every bit of news about this game? It has nothing to do with not liking the game,it has to do with the companies involved showing pretty much purely false footage of their game,blatantly lieing to anyone who watched their demo about what the game would be like.Also,the virgin nerd thing? Very classy,never seen that joke before.SweetLiquidSnake said:
*Edit*
Muffled rap music? Yes I would love that captcha,tired of hearing rap blasted so loud the the base makes everything in my house vibrate...
You can't expect footage from early in development to be representative of a final product, because big changes can and do occur during that development process (e.g. Bioshock Infinite took on a different visual style after some early footage was released; same thing happened with the original Borderlands come to think of it). If you set that kind of precedent then you simply won't be seeing any footage of a game until it's nearly ready for release. We don't want that, do we? You also can't declare that a final product must be "better" or "at least as good as" footage released from early in development, because that would be impossible to define.
The trouble with A:CM isn't that they had this early footage, it's that they didn't put out any real footage later down the line. Of course, they're within their rights to withhold stuff like that. In a better world, not having up to date footage at a time of release would be suicide for a company, because everyone would smell a rat. They'd be looking at that embargo and thinking "hang on, why isn't there any footage for this game yet? Maybe they're trying to hide something. Tell you what, I think I'm going to wait at least 24 hours after release before buying, so I can watch a bit of footage on t'internets and get an idea of whether it's worth my money". But alas, this is not the world we live in.
The trouble with A:CM isn't that they had this early footage, it's that they didn't put out any real footage later down the line. Of course, they're within their rights to withhold stuff like that. In a better world, not having up to date footage at a time of release would be suicide for a company, because everyone would smell a rat. They'd be looking at that embargo and thinking "hang on, why isn't there any footage for this game yet? Maybe they're trying to hide something. Tell you what, I think I'm going to wait at least 24 hours after release before buying, so I can watch a bit of footage on t'internets and get an idea of whether it's worth my money". But alas, this is not the world we live in.
If Bioshock Infinite shouldn't be sued for false advertising, neither should Aliens: Colonial Marines. In my opinion, Bioshock Infinite fell much shorter of what was advertised than Colonial Marines did. Just compare all those E3 trailers to what we actually got. The first video is a brief summary of the changes. See the timestamps I provide below for the last two videos for more specific examples:
-No long-range combat scenarios over large, sprawling levels (second video & 8:30-end of third video).
-No airships being summoned into battle (8:26 & 10:06 of third video). Only one scripted battle in final product where it can only be taken out from inside instead of the option of taking it out from the ground (implied by the health bar at 10:27 of third video).
-No combat related Elizabeth powers to supplement Booker(7:15 & 7:57 of second video).
-Nature of Elizabeth's powers have changed. They no longer affect her health (8:11 & 9:14 of second video).
-Drastically reduced "decision moments" in game and now they affect absolutely nothing in game (4:15 & 8:08 of third video).
-Not moving through a "living city" as was promised (5:47 of second video & 5:45-8:10 of third video)
-No lootable containers with a variety of items but the player can only choose one (1:48 of third video).
-Vigor bottles had a limited number of "charges" (third video).
-No interacting with the Vox in real time which can instigate an attack or not depending on how you handle them (5:45-6:50 & 8:15 of third video).
-Vox propaganda nowhere near as impressive or prevelant as advertised (7:37-8:06 of third video).
-Comstock's design and role is drastically different. He is a young man instead of old (5:40 of third video) and in the 2011 footage they are trying to find him so he can help Booker and Elizabeth (13:34 of third video).
-Nature of Booker's "job" is different. He was going to be able to free Elizabeth and still complete the job (13:34 of third video).
-Elizabeth's "complex AI" in final product didn't produce any character building moments that the player could have possibly missed (0:57, 1:15 & 1:35 of third video). What we got instead was just Liz leaning up against stuff and walking like she is on a tightrope with her arms out to the side sometimes.
I am not sure if I missed anything. Sorry if I did, but composing this post has taken long enough as it is.
-No long-range combat scenarios over large, sprawling levels (second video & 8:30-end of third video).
-No airships being summoned into battle (8:26 & 10:06 of third video). Only one scripted battle in final product where it can only be taken out from inside instead of the option of taking it out from the ground (implied by the health bar at 10:27 of third video).
-No combat related Elizabeth powers to supplement Booker(7:15 & 7:57 of second video).
-Nature of Elizabeth's powers have changed. They no longer affect her health (8:11 & 9:14 of second video).
-Drastically reduced "decision moments" in game and now they affect absolutely nothing in game (4:15 & 8:08 of third video).
-Not moving through a "living city" as was promised (5:47 of second video & 5:45-8:10 of third video)
-No lootable containers with a variety of items but the player can only choose one (1:48 of third video).
-Vigor bottles had a limited number of "charges" (third video).
-No interacting with the Vox in real time which can instigate an attack or not depending on how you handle them (5:45-6:50 & 8:15 of third video).
-Vox propaganda nowhere near as impressive or prevelant as advertised (7:37-8:06 of third video).
-Comstock's design and role is drastically different. He is a young man instead of old (5:40 of third video) and in the 2011 footage they are trying to find him so he can help Booker and Elizabeth (13:34 of third video).
-Nature of Booker's "job" is different. He was going to be able to free Elizabeth and still complete the job (13:34 of third video).
-Elizabeth's "complex AI" in final product didn't produce any character building moments that the player could have possibly missed (0:57, 1:15 & 1:35 of third video). What we got instead was just Liz leaning up against stuff and walking like she is on a tightrope with her arms out to the side sometimes.
I am not sure if I missed anything. Sorry if I did, but composing this post has taken long enough as it is.
You said it better than I could.WoW Killer said:
While I do believe GB should be sued, it should be done by Sega, not some disgruntled customer. Even if the demo footage was blatantly misleading, it was still classified as a work in progress and thus a successful lawsuit over it would effectively ban all footage and info for games that are still in development, due to how much can change from what early footage or info tells. Imagine if someone sued Valve for radically changing TF2 from what the early screenshots shown. People really need to stop putting their hatred of a company over the potential repercussions of actions like these.
As for why I think Sega should sue GB, there's good reason to believe that not only did Gearbox not work on the game for most of development, but that some of Sega's funds may have went towards a different game entirely. Even if the latter's not true, being paid for a project and pawning it off to other developers instead definitely seems like a case could be made there.
EA learning from other's mistakes? Have you not heard of SimCity?Smeatza said:
Captcha: blah blah blah
Well, 2 things:
First, Borderlands 2 was awesome. This isn't a justification for A:CM but just saying, crucifying the entire studio for a single fuckup, no matter how massive, is a bit unfair. This isn't like BioWare, where we really should've seen ME3 coming after the grand "fucketh thou" that was DA2. Based on what the DA Wiki says about DA3, BioWare's releases are going to get worse before they get better (more mages vs templars, no archdemon yet again...) By comparison, gearbox has a very full plate (or...had, anyway) between BL2, this, and one other game I forget now, and only A:CM sucked. I mean, even the DLC for BL2 is pretty nice. Not Citadel quality but better than any other ME3 DLC, IMO. I'm just glad they seem to deliver fuckups in singles instead of combo packs like BioWare now.
As to the BioShock Infinite comparison above, I'm almost finished with it (taking my time, heh) and I'm happy. Part of this may simply be that I've never played the pair of original games. Accordingly, I don't expect the Rapture-like architecture and whatnot that many of the previews of the game had that clearly didn't make the final cut. The time travel issues that everyone has - aside from the fact that Infinite doesn't HAVE ANY TIME TRAVEL (quantum physics, guys. not time travel) - don't bug me, and the renaming of plasmids to vigors and the other nitpicks are really problems that I can see would be annoying, but are much less so for me because, again, not a returning vet from the previous installments. In fact, I think my only real complaint about Infinite is that the controls are terrible. Part of this is me getting a new laptop with bad arrow keys, but I can't stand any game where they expect me to bind iron sights to a keyboard key. Sure, this can be remapped, but it's sticky, and even when you disable sticky crouch/sprint (which I actually want enabled anyway) the zoom remains sticky. I found myself using a carbine the ENTIRE GAME because it was the most accurate weapon I could use without zooming, and zooming was a complete and total PITA.
Anyhow...as for A:CM, I do wish people wouldn't sue them. I was angry over ME3 but the whole FCC thing just seemed kinda extreme. The truth is, even if this goes to trial, they win, and they get a big ass verdict, we're talking MAYBE $2m on a game they probably spent well over $50m developing and that will probably sell over $100m. The truth is, no amount of lawsuit is going to prevent this game from making money.
If you really wanna fix this, a boycott is the only answer. This will ONLY work if you hit them in the checkbook, and a lawsuit just can't hit them hard enough. It's going to take THOUSANDS of people who outright refuse to buy the next Aliens game EVEN if it turns out to be good. Once they sink $50m into development and 1 year later haven't even recovered $30m of that investment, THEN you'll get your message through.
Of course, that would require that you NOT play a game you'll probably like until a year after release.
But when DA3 comes out you can bet your ass I won't be buying a copy. It'll be multiple good releases in a row before they ever see a penny of my money again.
First, Borderlands 2 was awesome. This isn't a justification for A:CM but just saying, crucifying the entire studio for a single fuckup, no matter how massive, is a bit unfair. This isn't like BioWare, where we really should've seen ME3 coming after the grand "fucketh thou" that was DA2. Based on what the DA Wiki says about DA3, BioWare's releases are going to get worse before they get better (more mages vs templars, no archdemon yet again...) By comparison, gearbox has a very full plate (or...had, anyway) between BL2, this, and one other game I forget now, and only A:CM sucked. I mean, even the DLC for BL2 is pretty nice. Not Citadel quality but better than any other ME3 DLC, IMO. I'm just glad they seem to deliver fuckups in singles instead of combo packs like BioWare now.
As to the BioShock Infinite comparison above, I'm almost finished with it (taking my time, heh) and I'm happy. Part of this may simply be that I've never played the pair of original games. Accordingly, I don't expect the Rapture-like architecture and whatnot that many of the previews of the game had that clearly didn't make the final cut. The time travel issues that everyone has - aside from the fact that Infinite doesn't HAVE ANY TIME TRAVEL (quantum physics, guys. not time travel) - don't bug me, and the renaming of plasmids to vigors and the other nitpicks are really problems that I can see would be annoying, but are much less so for me because, again, not a returning vet from the previous installments. In fact, I think my only real complaint about Infinite is that the controls are terrible. Part of this is me getting a new laptop with bad arrow keys, but I can't stand any game where they expect me to bind iron sights to a keyboard key. Sure, this can be remapped, but it's sticky, and even when you disable sticky crouch/sprint (which I actually want enabled anyway) the zoom remains sticky. I found myself using a carbine the ENTIRE GAME because it was the most accurate weapon I could use without zooming, and zooming was a complete and total PITA.
Anyhow...as for A:CM, I do wish people wouldn't sue them. I was angry over ME3 but the whole FCC thing just seemed kinda extreme. The truth is, even if this goes to trial, they win, and they get a big ass verdict, we're talking MAYBE $2m on a game they probably spent well over $50m developing and that will probably sell over $100m. The truth is, no amount of lawsuit is going to prevent this game from making money.
If you really wanna fix this, a boycott is the only answer. This will ONLY work if you hit them in the checkbook, and a lawsuit just can't hit them hard enough. It's going to take THOUSANDS of people who outright refuse to buy the next Aliens game EVEN if it turns out to be good. Once they sink $50m into development and 1 year later haven't even recovered $30m of that investment, THEN you'll get your message through.
Of course, that would require that you NOT play a game you'll probably like until a year after release.
But when DA3 comes out you can bet your ass I won't be buying a copy. It'll be multiple good releases in a row before they ever see a penny of my money again.
Just a couple points for a few people in the thread.
Showing work in progress footage of your game will still be fine even if the suit is successful if you:
1. Have disclaimers prominent on it.
2. Update your advertisements as the game changes.
Aliens Colonial Marines did neither of these. They flat out said the demo was gameplay footage and never retracted that or released new advertisements that reflected the product people would buy.
The suit isn't that the game changed during development. The suit is that advertisement didn't match up to product.
Hell if they hadn't released the demo at all they would have been fine.
Showing work in progress footage of your game will still be fine even if the suit is successful if you:
1. Have disclaimers prominent on it.
2. Update your advertisements as the game changes.
Aliens Colonial Marines did neither of these. They flat out said the demo was gameplay footage and never retracted that or released new advertisements that reflected the product people would buy.
The suit isn't that the game changed during development. The suit is that advertisement didn't match up to product.
Hell if they hadn't released the demo at all they would have been fine.
There's no fucking way they can call that demo a work in progress. Not when the final game was so much worse, and there was no warning that they weren't able to turn that experience into a full game. Those were full on lies, and they need to pay for it.
Oh wow, it's been years since I saw this video last!Neverhoodian said:
- Yeuck, what a hideous "hive city" design. I'm glad Bungie scrapped that idea and went with high-tech skyscrapers instead.
- Single-shot Battle Rifle? Now we know where Reach's DMR came from.
- Chief doesn't once reload those SMGs...
- The "big gun" idea was switched with the Scarab, but returned in Halo 3.
- The fly-by Longsword bombing looks just like the scene in Reach where the Corvette gets taken down.
- Attacking the convoy of troop transports did get used in Halo 2, albeit in a different section.
- Did Halo 2 have hijack animations?
- I'm almost sad they took out combo attacks, they look sweet. Would have been OP as hell in MM though.
- That highway section seems to have inspired that Halo 3 ODST level.
[edit]
I agree though that games companies need to be held responsible for their hype and pre-release promises, and their failure to live up to them. Possibly actually suing isn't the right direction, but I'm all in favour of kicking up a huge stink, dragging the offending company's name through the gutter and boycotting future titles.
A lot of games these days have fantastic marketing, a mediocre product and insultingly sparse or simply nonexistent post-sale support (case in point: Halo 4) and publishers need to be shown that this isn't the license to print money that they think it is. Discerning customers WILL complain, WILL take their money elsewhere, and WILL create negative publicity. Piss off the fans at your own risk.
Doclector said:
This video sums it up: it was false advertising, plain and simple. Saying "it's work in progress, guize!" just doesn't cut it - it's meant to at least be a faithful representation of what you can expect in the final game, not wildly exaggerated graphics and physics that then get downgraded in the final product.
The "work in progress" disclaimer was originally intended so that people would excuse a few glitches or dodgy textures in the demo that would be neatened up for release. It was never meant to be a cheeky loophole to allow devs to show pre-rendered "gameplay footage" with James Cameron production values, snare a few thousand more preorders, and then release a substandard game with a clear conscience.
Actually, that isn't false advertisement. False advertisement requires radically different functionality between what is shown and what is delivered. Entertainment products have, thus far, never managed to be held accountable simply because when you go to see a movie, the result is that you see a movie. The difference between your expectation of quality and your perceived quality is subjective and therefore has never been subject to laws designed to protect consumers from false advertisement.TheKasp said: