Starcraft 2 = Spore = lame

I just don't get it. I've played SC2 for 6 hours and I just don't get it. What's all the hype about? It feels like Spore = fail.
[edit] and as lame as HGL. That's why I posted it on my HGL blog, which is dead. Like SC2 will be, in a month.

The cake is a lie

Portal - Credits - Spoiler follows

Spoiler Alert!!!!! Spoiler Alert!!!!

Just for the sheer awesomeness!



Just finished it. And it's one of the best games I've ever played. Possibly the best.

Straits Times - Singapore - Hellgate: London O

Quoted by a poster in the Hellgate London Alliance IAH forums, this is apparently from the Singapore Straits Times:

"It's hell for gamers with Hellgate bug fix

Gamers up in arms after 'patch' offered to iron out bugs threatens to wipe out saved games of thousands
By Oo Gin Lee

UPROAR: The furore over the 'patch' has sent IAH, the operators of the multi-player PC game's South-east Asia server, back to the drawing board to find a better solution. -- PHOTO: FLAGSHIP STUDIOS

A SMALL piece of software that will iron out the bugs in a popular multi-player PC game called Hellgate London is causing a furore among its players.

If the 'patch' is installed by Infocomm Asia Holdings (IAH), the operators of the South-east Asia server of the game, it threatens to wipe out the saved games of thousands who have been playing the game since its launch two weeks ago.

The resulting uproar has sent IAH back to the drawing board to find a solution which is not so drastic.

Thousands of irate responses had been posted on IAH's website forums, with many demanding that the company rectify the situation, and some threatening to boycott it.

The backlash has dented the reputation of IAH, which set a milestone for Singapore as the first local company to operate a top-tier multi-player online game.

It has sold 35,000 copies of Hellgate to game distributors here and in South-east Asia. About 7,000 were sold to players here within the first two days of the game's release.

Mr Roland Ong, chief executive officer of IAH, said the problem arose because the South-east Asia game server was launched a day earlier than the ones in the United States.

The game was launched in the US with the patch already installed. The Singapore game was launched first without the patch and IAH did not anticipate it would cause problems later.

It turned out that the patch was incompatible with the saved games.

Yesterday, IAH said it was working round-the-clock with the US developers of the game, Flagship Studios, to resolve the problem.

Mr Bill Roper, chief executive of Flagship Studios, said: 'We have refused to accept a character wipe as a viable solution.'

He said that Flagship's engineers were currently implementing solutions that would not do this.

The new patch is expected to be ready before Nov 22.

IAH had initially offered a 30-day free subscription for gamers affected by the wipe, but gamers felt this could not compare with the hours they had put into the game.

While some gamers welcomed the news of a new solution, many remained sceptical about IAH's ability to deliver.

Software developer Mark Chang, 29, who has also put in over 50 hours of play into the game, was unconvinced: 'I have no more confidence in them. We will just have to wait and see.'" from Hellgate: London Official Forum

Hellgate Alliance Asia - No wipe - Good & Bad

Message from IAHGames CEO, Roland Ong:

IAHGames made an innovative effort, together with our partners Flagship and Hanbitsoft, to bring about successfully a World Wide sim-launch in South East Asia (SEA) of a large-scale Triple-A title, Hellgate London. This has never been done by other game operators at this scale and comes with challenges. Last week on our official forum we announced that due to difficulties in implementing the latest upgrade to the Live Game Service the upgrade could result in a Character Wipe, which would have deleted all in-game experience earned by gamers over the past 2 weeks. The problem was a result of SEA going LIVE simultaneously with the USA servers in Calendar time -- but due to the actual time difference, SEA actually released 1 day ahead of the USA. This resulted in a slightly different software build than the USA servers. The upgrade, known as Patch 0, intended to bring our servers to the same level as the USA. The complication arose because our database was already being filled with in-game data from our gamers, and this in-game data was a risk for corruption. However, because gamers were earnestly requesting us to avoid a character wipe, we delayed the upgrade patch, worked round the clock, and around the globe, for the solution. We are pleased to announce the solution today.

Hellgate Alliance

Terrific news for those who didn't want a wipe.... but no, wait....

They said they were going to wipe.... and so, many players, thinking their characters were condemned, deliberately messed up their characters in an act of of suicidal defiance - some people even deleted their characters in response to the news of the wipe. Oh boy. IAH messed up badly.

Terrible communication on their part.

This... is why they call it Hellgate.

Hellgate London - Is this the worst incident in online gaming?

Oh lol /cry Is this the worst incident in online gaming? - Hellgate:London Official Forum

Bugs & fixes for Hellgate:London errors

Two links to pages of bugs and fixes for Hellgate London (more bugs than fixes tho' atm):

Fixes for Hellgate:London Errors, Crash, bugs and common problems. | Gaming News Link

Hellgate London demo Error and bugs Fixes | Gaming News Link