Interesting topic on a day full of fail for digital game distribution. Empire: Total War on Steam has done an excellent job of reminding gamers that while Gamestop sucks, it is better than taking several days to download a game.

Only 20% downloaded, and the rate has been dropping for hours. I'm under 100kps when I get a connection at all.

Shame on Steam and shame on Creative Assembly for not enabling preloads.

I ordered this through Steam, but it didn't pre-load. Now the manual install is giving me a horrible 330kbs, when I normally get steam downloads @ 1mbps.

Did anyone else get it to pre-load? Was there something I was supposed to do?

Yeah, in solo. I can only get to the second mission before it will give a system hang, requiring a cold restart of the PC. Despite the complaints people have about Vista, this is the first thing I have seen in 14month of using Vista 64 that can completely hang the system.

Take a trip over to Relics support forum, and you will see people complaining of not your run of the mill bugs (features not work, slow graphic performance) but of system hang bugs. The number of posts is stunning - there were over 50+ new threads of such bugs just in the past 24 hours.

It seems some people have no issues, and others nothing but. There is a couple of threads of what to do when you hit system freeze bug 'A' (disable all audio, replay mission) then people are good for a couple of missions until they hit system freeze bug 'B'. And so on.

DoW2 seems like it would be cool, but it's very buggy. Unplayable for me, and on their forums they are getting hit with like 50+ new subjects of new bugs. A lot of people figure out work arounds on their own, just to hit another bug a few more missions in...

There is no campaign, story, or scripts in the game as it stands even with the Entrenchment micro-expansion. Iron Clad and Stardock have hinted in various interviews and forum posts that a campaign is coming in a future micro.

As for skirmish not being able to keep anyone interested... Well, that's all I play (no MP) and I have probably spent over 200+ hours on it over the past year. It's rare for me to spend more than 10-20 hours with any game before I get bored. SINs is one of the best strategy games of all time, IMO. Right up there with the original 'Reach for the Stars', 'Empire' and 'Starcraft'.

In additional news, All Aspect Warfare is expected to hit stores in November, 2023. It will feature amazing 2002-era graphics, and have more bugs than Starship Troopers.

Guys... Come on. Don't make this about Hanbit failing their 'Western' Customers when they never had the rights to begin with! They seem to be decent enough to continue supporting their customers even when the 'Western' licensee tells theirs to FO.

When you ask why Hanbit doesn't offer to also support 'Western' customers I think it's because A) They don't own the rights B) The rights owner hasn't been willing to transfer the rights to Hanbit for free.

If you need to get grumpy, get grumpy at Namco.

Speaking of WofLK, does anyone know if there are going to be midnight store openings for it like there was for TBC?

I bought it when it first came out, and really loved it. I still play it on and off, but the lovin is tapering off. Even the best of games get old after a while.

I will be more excited when that booster pack of theirs comes out.

I suspect that this isn't something that only Mythic does, but most if not all developers/publishers to some degree. The problem is where the line is drawn – are only coders important, or are Network Engineers who maintain the network infrastructure important too? Without either you have no MMO.

Mythic's mistake was publicly responding to the drama. This would have been an non-news item if they just ignored it.

Poo! Upon actually reading the Press Release, this service is ONLY being offered for:

“Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09,” “Star Wars: The Force Unleashed,” “Fable 2” and “Gears of War 2.”

Oh Well.

Love it! I have Amazon Prime, and I use Amazon for a frightening amount of stuff that I buy. This is actually cheaper for me because there is no shipping fee, no tax, and no premium fee. It's cheaper to buy from Amazon than the local store.

It looks like it will not work for Spore though, given that title 'ships' on a Sunday. I've been wondering if even local store will have that title on Sunday.

With the Overlord IP doing well, I guess this means we will never see Age Of Wonders III.

We have been reading the community feedback

Great! Thanks! My Feedback: Include more than one new PowerStruggle map. kthx

I was excited about this release, but $30 and all you get is one more powerstruggle map? No thanks.

"Might be interesting as an alternative if you could only tweak some environment variables, rather than edit the creatures directly."

Ahh, that would be Will Wrights other game: SimEarth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sim_Earth

This comment was edited on Aug 11, 15:54.

I would like to try it. In my view Open Beta's are the new demos. I would like to get some idea if I like the game or not before I buy. I realise a Beta is not the real deal, but it's better than nothing...

Glad I was lazy and haven't gotten around to installing the open beta...

So what happens if you make it to 70 (or 65, whatever) in ten days and decide not to upgrade after the trial? Do the levels magically disappear?

I would imagine not; you probably just don’t have access to any content to match you new lvl.

I love the bit where the guy says artists will make $$$ through touring. He obviously has never toured. You have to be Depech Mode or someone to make $$$ at it.