Very nice analogy.

Even if that same company had a history of good customer support and respect for their customers' intelligence? ...and if that same company proceeded to fix the issues reported after release as quickly as humanly possible?

A lot more slipped through our testing than should have. I've taken responsibility for that here. But I see a tremendous amount of negativity and a fair amount of hyperbole from people who don't own the game and may not be familiar with us as a company. I regret that the release had problems, but we're proceeding in good faith to fix every reported issue and released the first official update already.

We're far from perfect, but we have always done our best to be fair to our customers and treat them with respect.

M-F is one of about three dozen games we've released. Given that too many issues got through to release and we took responsibility for that, I think that for most people, the effort we are putting into resolving the issues with M-F proves that we have good faith and value our customers.

Regards,

- Erik

Fair enough, it followed so closely to the "standard template" of these types of discussions that my initial thought was not that it was purely neutral advice. I feel that if it was meant in an advisory fashion, he could have sent a PM rather than use words like "fraud" both here and on our public forum.


I realize there is some reflection on us as a whole. I've seen some very active commentary in that direction however, to the degree that I was getting concerned that there was some effort to make sure there was reflection. We've never dodged the issues here, we are instead working to fix them. Frankly, I've just never seen a project before with this many people rooting for it to fail and figuring out how to respond to that without alienating neutral observers has been quite a challenge.

Regards,

- Erik

I think the problem here is that the idea that the multitude of issues that have been posted (and sometimes locked) on your forum are HIGHLY unlikely to not be noticed by your beta testers at Matrix Games. The fact that this game was released with so MANY issues stretches credibility of the beta testing process, and makes people think that you just released it to just make what money you could off of those previously loyal customers. The fact that you offered no demo, and are reneging on a published refund policy is absurd.

Dutch,


Actually, we very rarely lock threads. The M-F forum has been the exception to that rule and largely because of some posts from folks in this community. In general, discussion on our forums is quite open and we have no problem with customers criticizing our products. If you check our forums you'll find many critical threads, most with developer and Matrix follow-up at some point to discuss and address the issues.


Fortress Europe is a big black eye, which is also at this point four years in the past and has not been repeated.

I'm not sure what teaseware you are discussing with respect to Combat Leader.

Our titles are not overpriced. The average price of a game in our store (digital download) is around $30-$35.

We have taken a good look at Maximum-Football and as I've said before, we will support it, improve it and I hope that folks will keep an open mind regarding that process.

Regards,

- Erik

I guess you guys we're right all along.
Matrix is evil and upon closer inspection of the screenshot they even have a kiddie porn link on there Euro store.

OMG!!!!! whoever took the screenshot was about to click on the link. YOU SICK BASTARD!!!!

Eaglesfan,


I agree. Frankly, I'm amazed at the issues that slipped through. The _only_ explanation I can think of for it is that the last week of quick iterations after the gold announcement created most of these. Otherwise, I have no explanation for it.

You can consider me a liar if you want, but we did not have the vast majority of these issues - or any of the serious ones - on a known issues list before release. In fact, many of these were in previously tested and solid areas, so I have to assume they broke relatively close to release. If we learned any lesson from this, it's to always be willing to take the PR heat and delay an additional two weeks to a month for testing if you have to make a post-gold change. This was the first time we had a post-gold change and delay, so we were making decisions daily on whether it looked good based on testing or not while feeling a significant amount of pressure from our customers and frankly the raging discussions here to release and have the discussion move to the actual game.

In hindsight, we should have been willing to take more flak from the forums in order to allow for more final gold testing. It was not an easy position to be in, but there was no decision to release with these issues, they were simply unknown to us.


Here I just have to disagree with you.

First, we had no opportunity in terms of development time to create a demo. What exactly would you demo for this game - the PDS? The Canadian Game? Perhaps the Indoor? Making a good demo for M-F is probably a two month project.

We announced before release there would be no demo, there was no confusion on this point.

Regarding the refund policy, that's simply not true. As far as all of us knew, our refund policy had not changed in five years and we abided by it. I can still pull it up exactly as I expect it to be on most of our stores, including the US store that the vast majority of sales went through. Once I saw that there were some store servers that were actually showing a different policy, I posted here and on our forums to acknowledge it. At no point was it our published policy, as far as any of us at Matrix knew. Finding out what happened there is what our discussion with DR will be about.

Regards,

- Erik

Mr. Madison, what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

It's called having a sense of humor
I think they have them on sale at Walmart

Damm I just peed on myself for laughing so hard

First off, I must say that I applaud Erik's chutzpah in coming over here. That speaks volumes to me right there.

This is why first Solecismic, and more recently Grey Dog and OOTPDev, have all landing on a policy of telling folks that "it will be released when it is ready." This will annoy the more immature/juvenile fans in the short-term, but in the long-term, you can greatly decrease pressure-to-release. Look back at the things that y'all posted about release dates. (They were mocked, deservedly so, at http://maxfoot2.ytmnd.com/ among other places.) No one forced you to post that stuff, but they ended up making you look like the Iraqi Minister Of Information, quite frankly, posting "definitive" comments over and over again like "a February release is certain," etc. Those kinds of definitive comments come back to bite you in the butt when you can't deliver. It seems a far better business practice in the indy strategy/sim genre to say very little other than "this is what we're working on" until you're ready to release a demo (prior to the game's release). And, for goodness' sake, do NOT PROMISE FEATURES UNTIL THEY HAVE BEEN TESTED AND ARE WORKING!!! I'm not saying that y'all did that, but OOTP and BBCF both have had major post-release issues due to promised features not making it into the game for several months, or even never making it in at all.

Bottom Line: No one forced y'all to continue making definitive statements, but you did, many times, and that's what caused you to feel the pressure that you speak of.

--Ben

Erik is definately a stand-up guy so far as I have always been able to tell.

Are they customizable senses of humor? I'd like the ability to laugh at the Three Stooges, understand all of Dennis Miller's humor and despise Bob Saget..

I definitely sympathize with you here. There are dozens of things that look so obvious that are caught within an hour of release that made it all the way through the beta process.

No matter how you structure the beta process, people test the game differently than they play it. One change I made with the last development cycle, which I think helped a lot, was that I stopped testing myself about a month before the release. I only played the game, and I was able to structure a couple of play sessions in MP form with the beta group that were extremely useful. The only testing I do late in the cycle under this structure is to test a fix I just worked on.


I have to call b.s. here. It took me about an hour or two to create my demo, and in this case I don't see that much difference between products. Here's what you do:

1) Remove key functions that won't be used. Just take out the code entirely, so there's nothing that can be hacked. For example, I comment out all the functions related to end-year processing and the amateur draft.

2) In my case, I remove everything pertaining to a single season after week 2, and ensure that the schedule can't move past week 2. In your case, since so much of the game is the on-field activity, you would limit games to one quarter, and you'd start the clock with two minutes to play in the first quarter and probably remove schedule movement entirely.

3) To save download size, only include one stadium. Comment out code related to customizing uniforms and functions you're confident are shown off properly in screen shots.

4) Add an end screen informing the prospective customer where he can buy the finished product.

Remember, you don't have to maintain your demo as thoroughly as the finished product. If there's something serious affecting game play, sure, you make the fix in both places (usually by just copying over the file and redoing the "crippling" of that file if necessary) and update the demo. And it is a bit of a hassle to maintain the extra code tree, but not much because what you're really maintaining is the cripple process.

Of course, people will still complain that the demo isn't long enough - it's not a perfect solution. But at least you've given them a taste for the feel of the game, and they have enough to decide for themselves whether they want to make a purchase. Including a lot of screen shots on the web site is also a key, because you want the demo and your web site to work together to channel the eventual purchase.

Someone else called this a 'good' analogy? Please. In one case your ingesting something into your body and putting your very health on the line, in the other case your spending entertainment dollars like at a movie or concert. No comparrison at all.

Speaking of movies, one director's efforts I thought I would never want to see again...Oliver Stone...but he is the first to bring a very important subject to the big screen (9-11) so I will withhold judgement until I see some reviews.

Another director's efforts I see every one of (Speilberg) but after reading reviews that his latest movie Munich attempts to give moral equivalency to the terrorists it is one I won't be seeing anytime soon. Point here is every individual effort stands by itself.

I am not quite sure what you are saying.

dola...

I mean I get the part where you say it is a bad analogy, but I don't get your Oliver Stone and Speilberg comments.

Bubba: To second your point, I won't watch the new Pink Panther.

I think he's saying that Clinton caused 9/11 and Spielberg hates the Jews.

But what all this has to do with Snakes On A Plane is a mystery.

You and Hell Atlantic should hook up. You guys share the same brand of humor :D .

I thought it was awful how he made fun of Schindler's lisp.

I love this thread. It has evolved so many times in its short life span. I must discover the DNA strand for this thread.

A meal is entertainment, same as movies, games and music. You're rather dramatic comparison of food to some form of breakthrough Kimo treatment is the worst comparrrrrrison of all. Further, comparing a $5-$10 movie to a $18-$80 (the Matrix price range) purchase devalues your additional commentary.

Quality, long term fixes, and general adherence to customer service can be quite accurately determined by previous game releases. Companies with a track record of releasing slop are unlikely to turn themselves around, companies which abandon a game after a poorly executed patch or two, will probably do the same again.

Matrix has a good reputation for fixing things, but as I've said before, a very mixed release track record. I have enough of their games to not buy the next one until fixed, especially as reviewers of these games tend to get gushy over companies like Matrix and ignore release bugs.

This games release has definitely put me in the camp of waiting for a couple months after a Matrix game release before purchasing it. If I ever will buy a Matrix game after the fiasco. I can't tell you how disappointed I am in this release (if not completely surprised after the many release date changes), because this is exactly the type of game I always wished would be released. I guess I'm still waiting.

PureSim
 

Well guys, all I can ask is that you keep an open mind when it comes to PureSim Baseball 2006. One of the things I have really enjoyed about signing up with Matrix is the fact that I retain 100% creative control, I have a deciding vote on when it ships, and I have the flexibility to include the PureSim community in the testing effort. These guys treat me like a professional, and I appreciate it.

Matrix has provided me with great support around getting the game into production, documentation, distribution and other areas as well. So while you may feel the M-F situation was not great, I can say that I think the Matrix/PureSim relationship is a perfect combination.

I hope you'll all give PureSim 2006 a fair shot, and I hope you'll enjoy it.

Shaun

Shaun, speaking as a PureSim05 customer, I have to say.. this fiasco with Matrix (in all it's flavors, no single one thing) has made it so IF I buy it, it'll because of you and not them (and I was a pretty good supporter of Matrix, having done several positive reviews of their products).

They have some bridges to rebuild with folks, and that'll take time.

Shaun's product definitely deserves a look. I own OOTP and played the free versions of PureSim and I generally liked PureSum better.

Point taken. My intentions were to help you out, but I can see how I should not have posted to the public forum. I did not want to breech ethical obligations and raise the specter of creating an attorney-client relationship with you by sending what could possibly be misunderstood as legal advice via a personal form of communication. Hence, I simply posted in the public forum the general advice that you may want to talk to a lawyer.

I should have just kept my mouth shut. I am sorry, and you have a PM to this effect at the Matrix forums.

Do you have the final definitive vote on when it ships, or just a vote in that decision?

Shaun:

My impression is that Matrix struggled to pick up a ball that had already been fumbled badly. They've made some mistakes with M.F., no question, but they were dealt a lousy, lousy hand, considering the game's history coupled with the online personae of both Winters. Frankly, the hoops I had to jump through in order to register Puresim2006 and get patches were pretty annoying, but not enough to be a deal-breaker for me.

How about this?

You eat at a restaurant and have the worst dinner that you ever ate. No food poisoning, just flat out lousy food. Do you go back next week to try a different item off the menu or go somewhere that you know you'll like the food?

Personally, I've dealt with Matrix Games before and while it wasn't something that really stands out to me, it also wasn't a previously negative experience. This experience will definitely make me think twice about getting something from them until I have heard EXTENSIVE reviews or had the chance to try out a demo.

This will have the same affect on me that Tournament Dreams had on me for 400 Studios, from which I didn't buy anything again.

The mistake Matrix has made here is to continue to be associated with Winters and MF at all. They should have pulled the plug entriely a long time ago. Erik is getting dragged down by Winters because he's a good guy and isn't willing to drop this piece of crap off at Winters' door where it belongs.

Refunding anyone who asks for it is the right move here, and I imagine it is the move they will make on Monday. You guys posting about lawsuits come off as arrogant as Winters himself.

Again, I'd like to second Bubba's point.

and

Philip Roth writes his own novels.




Fing timestamp!

Sorry, didn't realize it was that complicated. Stone and Speilberg are their own brands, like a Matrixgames. And their movies are their products, like the games that Matrix makes.

I suspect that you are in public education.

LOL....More people need to appreciate this humor.

Ah, but am I a Virgo or a Pisces? Do I like long moonlit walks on the beach or would I rather snuggle in front of a roaring fire? Would I ever ask my wife to submit to labiaplasty, or do I prefer that whole 'Wild Orchid' look?

I find your suspicions FASCINATING. ;)

Wow, the only thing this thread is missing is a GIF of a chimp shooting a gun

Nothing against Shaun, but Puresim never has been my cup of tea. His association with Matrix has nothing to do with why I wouldn't purchase his product. It just never grabbed me.

Except for the fact that Matrix doesn't make the games, they handle the marketing and distribution. So in this instance, Stone and Spielberg are the developers, and a company like Buena Vista or Castle Rock is Matrix.

Dola,

To Shaun, I'm definitely going to give PureSim a spin. I've always preferred the single player manager mode in PureSim to the way OOTP does it. I've got to see and make a decision on each and every pitch, not just when the count is 0-0, or a foul with two strikes. :)

So let's see.....

Solecismic, Gary Gorski, Shaun Sullivan, Marc Vaughn and Erik Rutin have commented in this thread. All we need now is Arles and David Winter and the thread will be complete. We even had druez in this thread, so might as well have Joe Stallings comment as well. :)

Has Mac Howard posted in here yet?

hay guys whats going on up in this maximum football thread page 67 on the default posts-per-page setting

hay umpy i mean pumpy

This idiotic thread is still going?

Makes you wonder why the thread-killer thread got destroyed, and this one is embraced by a lot of vets that pushed for TK to go.

You are such a fucking whiney bitch.

ROTFLMAO @ Schmidty

Don't forget Brian (HR).