Batman: Arkham Origins

[Zombipanda]

Of course not. I'm not saying the publishing companies don't do those things, as we both know they do. I'm saying massive amounts of corrupt save files on all systems the game was released for is a serious problem, and definitely something that should've been addressed. I'm also well aware it was ultimately the publishing company who put an end to WB Montreal releasing patches/fixes that the game still desperately needed. It was a failure on both fronts.

And it's a problem that was also present in the Rocksteady produced games. I lost my save file in Arkham City on three separate occasions. It's frustrating as hell, but it seems to be some inherent bug in the system that WB isn't particularly keen to pay to have fixed.

Arkham Origins or Arkham Knight is a rush job? I'm presuming you mean Origins, since there seems to only have been about a two year window on that game, as opposed to Arkham Knight, which will have had at least a 3 1/2 - 4 year window since Arkham City's release. Granted some of that time was dealing with a new engine and new consoles.

Yeah, I mean Origins. Knight is looking beautiful and has had a huge lead time. But they've mentioned in interviews that Knight was originally scheduled for release in the holiday season where Origins came out, which makes me think it was cranked out on very short notice so they could have an Arkham release on their financial calendar. If that's the case, I find the result pretty impressive.

I know some ran into glitches in AC, but I think it's fair to say the vast majority of those glitches weren't the game breaking corrupt save file problem so many have had with Origins. That to me speaks of a problem with how they wrote the code for the save file flagging system in terms of how it communicated with the console/PC memory. THAT'S my issue. I can forgive glitches, I can't forgive game-breaking bugs that require you to start your game entirely over, and likely run into the issue again, requiring yet another start over. The other issue is that it's an auto-save approach, which prevents being able to save at certain points intentionally (game like Mass Effect allowed that), which would've helped prevent the game breaking aspect of the save corrupt bug.

That's precisely the bug I had with Arkham City, repeatedly. It deleted my save data again and again, for no apparent reason. It strikes me that it must be a piece of code that WB Montreal inherited. That doesn't mean it shouldn't have been fixed, but RS made the same mistake.

 

[DIrishB]

And it's a problem that was also present in the Rocksteady produced games. I lost my save file in Arkham City on three separate occasions. It's frustrating as hell, but it seems to be some inherent bug in the system that WB isn't particularly keen to pay to have fixed. Yeah, I mean Origins. Knight is looking beautiful and has had a huge lead time. But they've mentioned in interviews that Knight was originally scheduled for release in the holiday season where Origins came out, which makes me think it was cranked out on very short notice so they could have an Arkham release on their financial calendar. If that's the case, I find the result pretty impressive. That's precisely the bug I had with Arkham City, repeatedly. It deleted my save data again and again, for no apparent reason. It strikes me that it must be a piece of code that WB Montreal inherited. That doesn't mean it shouldn't have been fixed, but RS made the same mistake.

The problem is it happened with far more frequency in Arkham Origins than Arkham City. When you inherit code for a game, you should also be aware of existing problems and address them. It seems WB Montreal didn't do that in regards to the corrupt save problem. Whether that's due to parent company WB not providing enough time, or more likely WB Montreal specifically not allocating resources and manpower correctly, in the end it's screwing over a large portion of their customers, and the decision not to release a patch to fix that issue was hugely disrespectful to their customer base. Why should people spend money on a future game by WB Montreal if that's how they address major problems with their games?

 

[Zombipanda]

The problem is it happened with far more frequency in Arkham Origins than Arkham City. When you inherit code for a game, you should also be aware of existing problems and address them. It seems WB Montreal didn't do that in regards to the corrupt save problem. Whether that's due to parent company WB not providing enough time, or more likely WB Montreal specifically not allocating resources and manpower correctly, in the end it's screwing over a large portion of their customers, and the decision not to release a patch to fix that issue was hugely disrespectful to their customer base. Why should people spend money on a future game by WB Montreal if that's how they address major problems with their games?

It happened pretty damn frequently in Arkham City too. I hit quite a few glitches, whereas Origins has run without a hitch for me. And Rocksteady had the keys to the kingdom, with plenty of development time, experience, and an engine they had built. If we're going to blame the studios, I think it reflects more poorly on RS than on WB Montreal.

 

[DIrishB]

It happened pretty damn frequently in Arkham City too. I hit quite a few glitches, whereas Origins has run without a hitch for me.

I never experienced a single glitch in AC. Experienced a few in AO, specifically the criminals that'd escaped from Blackgate that you needed to apprehend. I'd fight the group of hoodlums, and walk over to the guy that needed to be interrogated to complete that specific one. But the option to interrogate them wouldn't pop up.

There were also a few case files that didn't sequence properly, and I had to reload the game to get them to play out correctly.

And granted, those weren't big deals (well, the Blackgate escapees was until they apparently patched it), but the save corruption thing is horrible.

And Rocksteady had the keys to the kingdom, with plenty of development time, experience, and an engine they had built. If we're going to blame the studios, I think it reflects more poorly on RS than on WB Montreal.

I disagree. If Arkham Knight still has the save game corruption thing happening, then yes, then I'll agree. But for WB Montreal to inherit the code, work with it (and overall pretty well), and obviously get to know that code well enough to create the game they did, while STILL shipping a game with game breaking save-file corruption, that falls on WB Montreal.

They had to know about it from AC. They should've spent at least a little time addressing the problem. It shouldn't have been an overly complicated issue to fix. We're talking a pretty straightforward flag save system approach. If they chose not to address it, which seems to be the case, the fault lies fully with them and WB for setting a release date WB Montreal couldn't meet with a properly finished and tested game.

 

[wyokid]

I realized I still hadn't beaten this and am doing so now. Just needed to say that I absolutely love that the electric gauntlets turn his gloves purple.

 

[DIrishB]

I realized I still hadn't beaten this and am doing so now. Just needed to say that I absolutely love that the electric gauntlets turn his gloves purple.

I still have to check out the Cold, Cold Heart DLC and the AO-Blackgate game. Those will be Christmas presents to myself. Got so pissed after my game save got corrupted I stopped playing. I did beat the game and most of the collectibles, but had like 10 more Riddler challenges to finish and I'd have beat it 100% on story mode. So frustrating.

 

[wyokid]

That sucks man. The Wii U version of Arkham City had a glitch in the launch disks that made it so that Harley's Revenge would crash and send you back to the main menu. I had managed to avoid it the first run but I missed a single balloon. Crashes every time after. It also took me so long to get around to beating the main game by the time I experienced the glitch it was too late to get a free fixed copy. Stuck at 99% forever.

 

[SSJmole]

That sucks man. The Wii U version of Arkham City had a glitch in the launch disks that made it so that Harley's Revenge would crash and send you back to the main menu.

I never had that as I bought that launch


though I will say as I've said in the past I hope these games become more closed in. My favourite is still Asylum and each has been worse since (knight has a tank to make the already easy beat-em-up instead of stealth sections easier which is disappointing) to me AA>AC>AO>BG

 

[LastActionHero]

It is more of a Xbox 360's fault I guess.
You said you were fast travelling. Meaning that your Xbox was loading a new area map into its memory. Something went wrong (probably memory pointer misuse) and Xbox corrupted the game's save file.
There is no need to blame the game.

 

[DIrishB]

It is more of a Xbox 360's fault I guess.
You said you were fast travelling. Meaning that your Xbox was loading a new area map into its memory. Something went wrong (probably memory pointer misuse) and Xbox corrupted the game's save file.
There is no need to blame the game.

I've never had that issue with any other game on my 360. Ever. Or since, for that matter.

My point was that I wish they'd allow for multiple save files so in case such file corruption happens, you'll have recent back-ups (as most PC games and some console games--like DA-Origins or Mass Effect by Bioware) so your entire game isn't gone.

So, in that failure, it is the game's fault in terms of short-sighted design. I'd read dozens of other reports of the same exact thing happening on both Xbox 360 and PS3, so if that's the case, it seems they didn't streamline the file save process as well as they should've to avoid such problems.

It seems more of an issue with the way the game interacts with both systems' memory, causing a fair amount of save file corruption. That's something that should not only have been caught before release by QA, but also something that deserved at least a patch (beyond the number of other glitches--left permanently unresolved, no more patches) after release if they weren't going to fix it before release (which is an insane compromise to make but that's the world we live in now... companies sometimes releasing horribly glitches games and releasing patches after release to deal with the problems... unfortunately WB stopped Montreal from releasing anymore (still necessary) patches to fix the game's problems.

I enjoyed the game, and think overall WB Montreal did a good job. But there is an obvious issue regarding save file corruption on both console systems. That lies with the developers, not the system itself.