Ok, to some extent some of the problems with the release/patch are understandable. On PCs it is just not possible to account for all the possible hardware/software configurations (In some cases you can strongly urge users to download the latest drivers for their hardware). This has been admitted/acknowledged/ranted about by developers long before Spore. Fixing one thing for one group of people could break it for another.

What I propose is to take a page out of the books of past/present MMOs. Offer the patch to users before making a full release. This patch is completely optional, and comes with the warning that use of the patch could corrupt save files (and instruct them on how to back them up before installing) - and depending on the changes involved, disallow communication with the online sporepedia database. This could expose the patch to computing environments that would not normally be encountered in whatever internal testing procedures you have.

A separate forum would have to be opened specifically for discussion of the beta patch - the merits of any game play tweaks, and the reporting of bugs. Based on this feedback you can determine if the patch is ready for public release. Would this catch everything? No. But I'm willing to wager that a process such as this would have saved a LARGE NUMBER of us the problems the first patch has caused, while allowing those who could not reliably play (or even start) the game to see if the fixes work. And if they do, continue to play on the fixed version until it is distributed to everyone's game.

"How is this different than now?" some of you ask, "After all, no-one put a gun to your head forcing you to download the first patch."... While this may be true, the game opened up a pop-up informing us of the patch and it's game play tweaks - some of which *coughSpaceStageBabySittingcough* were asked for shortly after release. Few of us considered that the patch could so negatively impact our games which were running fine on max settings prior to the patch.

If the MMO community is any indicator, there would probably be no shortage of people willing to try out the beta patches. Heck, for example, in City of Heroes, there are plenty of people who play almost exclusively on the test server - knowing full well that at any point their characters could be rolled back, wiped, or their access pre-empted for closed beta testing.

Unfortunately this suggestion will probably never see the light of day here, considering this suggestion tends to require honest open discussion between the playerbase and the developers (I'm not asking them to respond to EVERYTHING, just acknowledge that problems exist and they are being worked on.) that just doesn't seem to exist here. The SporeMasters are a nice step in the right direction, but let's be honest, they are forum mods at worst; community managers at best (no offence guys ). A third party through which we talk "with" the Devs. Who have access to a slightly more in-depth knowlege base than us end users have.

no, if the public nothings wrong with this, and it dosent suck, patch - f's up as bad as it did and as common as it did then can you immagon a beta tested patch.

if the patch we got was held to gather with duct tape and bubble gum, then the beta is probbably held to gather with cow dung.

twobit wrote:no, if the public nothings wrong with this, and it dosent suck, patch - f's up as bad as it did and as common as it did then can you immagon a beta tested patch.

if the patch we got was held to gather with duct tape and bubble gum, then the beta is probbably held to gather with cow dung.

What? there'd be no difference in quality, just an extra layer of user protection. Consider if the game did not prompt you to download an install the 1.01 patch (yet) but it was available to download via the site. If the community OKs the patch (And by "OKs" I mean doesn't detect anything the likes of which sliped through the developers hands this time), then EA/Maxis/Whomever flips the switch that signals the game clients to start telling people to patch up.

If we did find that the beta patch reeked of what 1.01 currently does for a number of us, the switch stays off, and the devs start working on 1.01b. Meanwhile those who had stability problems with the base game (1.00) could attempt to install 1.01, as the boards seem to indicate that SOME people have no such problems and it actually fixed their game.

I suppose the only real difference is that the clients would not promt EVERYONE to download the patch as soon as the devs were done with it. That and an added community backbone (a new board) to relate this information to the devs. This Idea may also necessitate EA/Maxis removing the 3 install limit, or a way other than re-installing to remove a patch.

EDIT: Unless you're saying my suggestion would allow whomever develops the patches to become lazy, releasing any old patch to the proposed "beta" stage; letting the community and only the community deal with it. ... Not sure I dissagree... but then... I kinda had a laugh when I looked at the announcements today and thought "Oh goody, they're fixing their mistake!" and then realizing "Oh, wait... no... they're just patching the mac version... Is anyone even willing to download that after what happened to the Windows one? "