Annoyances and Pet Peeves..., Vent off what you don't like about this game. Options

[mijito]

finally got the game after waiting almost a year...

load the game up and noticed that the wii remote warning screen looks awfully stretched... still hoping there's some in-game menu option or something as this is usually a system-wide setting but no luck... can't believe a 2008 game doesn't have this.

that and the choppy framerate was a bitter surprise after playing RF frontier which was definitely something else (I know it's kind of an unfair comparison but still) named the farm "choppy" after this...

Technicalities apart... this one's so much better than ToT that one can't help thinking all of us who got ToT should be entitled to this one at reduced cost, a rebate or something (kinda like the Win7>Vista thing)

other minor and not so minor annoyances:

- harvest "god" was changed to "king" so it's now Religiously Correct (same as PC but aimed toward religious nuts, guess I can see them saying there is/can only be one god... let's sue marvelous and natsume a la rockstar) yet the goddess' still a goddess :P... why oh why...

- removed some alcohol stuff (like RFF but not as bad, though)...

- "cleaned up" dialogues... Luna doesn't sound like her anymore...

- some dialogue it's waaaay cornier now (yes, it's possible).

- livestock riding issues: when you get off an animal and enter the house, or the fugue forest (not sure about the mines) it automatically enters the barn leaving you stranded, then when you whistle, you get another animal, especially annoying when you get on the horse which is very fast... get off it and do whatever and when you whistle to get back on it... you're on a cow or sheep (just a bit faster than running by yourself)...

p.s.: fall 16th and 5 bells. so far so good.

[Saffy]

I am a programmer. I work at a video game company, where I program games and test them on a daily basis. I may not be a complete expert since I'm new to the industry, but I have been coding for eight years and have worked on a number of small game projects. I understand the complexities and weirdness of code.

For simplicity's sake, I'll respond directly to a number of your comments.

But I'm not really complaining about that because like you said its only ever really been a factor in AWL and I honestly don't remember that much about ToT. Did time pass in doors in that game?

I played less than a week of ToT and hadn't noticed time passing in doors. Perhaps it did. My guess is even if they had the system in place, they probably chose to avoid it for some reason or another. I've personally only felt time passing inside worked for A Wonderful Life. That game (series) also made sure to implement a lot of efforts regarding time, such as seasons passing if you stayed out late. For that reason, I actually really liked how time passed. There's a lot of effort put it into it. Effort. It was relevant to the game.

But what I still don't get is the whole game being buggy for using tools. That still goes over my head because how can something they've been doing years now all of a sudden come up buggy in a new game?

Simple really, the game might mess up if you use a tool when a time-based event should happen. It might not sound like much. Oh, how could something simple like tools which they've done countless times mess up? It just does. Now, I'm not saying that they stopped time when using tools to prevent bugs. I'm just suggesting that if it were the case I could very well understand it. It can be quite amazing what bugs will cause serious errors. Some are really complex, while others are just buried or extremely rare.

I expect glitches and stuff from HM64. It was 64 and technology wasn't up to par back then. Glitches as severe as that most likely would not happen now.

Technology only serves to create more issues. When you make the platforms more complicated, there's a lot more code going into the game. The fact is games aren't as simple as they used to be. I'm sure there's a lot more code in place than HM64, which means many, many more errors can arise.

But I think in this day and age something like that should be easily fixable.

Easily Fixable - Nope. You never know what problems will arise, even if done countless times. It's silly.

So is it the case that something they've been doing for years in dozens of games can all of a sudden become a problem in another game

Yes, quite easily. I've seen some really strange problems in my time. You need to realize that code has a way of interfering with itself. You could add a simple feature that appears unrelated to something else, and next thing you know half the game doesn't work.

Is it because of the engine change? Even if that was so I'm sure its something they could have dealt with just like they did in previous games.

Possibly, if what we're referring to was actually the result of a bug.

It really comes down to time, resources, and priority. Maybe there was a bug that they simply had no time or people to fix. Maybe they had other more pressing deadlines to reach, and freezing time momentarily was an acceptable solution. Really depends on the severity of what might have been. If a problem existed.

Now I don't know much about programming but wouldn't that particular part of the games be fairly similar?

It depends on the engine. It could be very similar or it could not be. I'm sure a lot of their code is similar and easily ported from one game to another. But I'm sure they're constantly improving upon it at the same time too.

If so there should not have been something so buggy that it could not have been fixed for this particular HM like all the others.

So many bugs slip through either unnoticed or because they just aren't a priority. It's not uncommon for games to be shipped with dozens to hundreds of known issues. You just tackle the larger issues.

I realize I sound very nitpicky, but your calling the programmers lazy I personally took offense to. I can imagine a lot of work going into this game. I can imagine hard deadlines to push the game out. I'm sure the programmers and the rest of the team on the game put forth a lot of effort and time. I also get the impression they had a small team (despite what the credits say) making the game quite an accomplishment.