DUST Search - PSA: Patch Days and what to expect!

Vespasian Andendare wrote:

After reading through several posts about patch woes, I really wanted to take a moment and write up a PSA on patch days, what they really mean, and what your expectation should be.

First, please don't read this like I'm writing high-and-mighty. I just want to explain some finer points to players who may not be familiar with "typical" MMO patches, a category which I'm sure many a Dust "traditional" FPS player falls into.

Ok, so patch days on an MMO typically introduce new features, objects, shinies, etc. into the game. In a traditional MMO, say World of Warcraft, this would mean new bosses, weapons, etc. How this applies to Dust is that we'll get new weapons, maps, equipment, etc. Features of the game will expand (new matchmaking), while we may get new or reimagined weapons or equipment (scanner!).

BUT, patch days are notorious for having LOTS of problems! This is typical! It doesn't mean that CCP has crappy programmers or they didn't bother to test it or they wanted it to fail or whatever tinfoil hat theory we come up with. It all boils down to how the game is developed vs other, "traditional" shooters:

In a "traditional" shooter like Call of Duty, the developers start by spending a lot of time building the game, testing it, polishing it, etc. and end with the game's release. Then, once the game is released, it is essentially "on autopilot" while the Devs begin that process all over again for a new map pack or a new game altogether.

In Dust, however, the development table is more akin to a traditional MMO than it is to a shooter like Call of Duty. Really, what this means is that MMOs go through a smaller initial release but instead of the Devs stopping work on it and shifting development toward a new expansion or game, they continually update their work through mid-cycle patches. Patches sometimes bring new features, which we got this time around with new matchmaking and maps, and normally include minor adjustments. But due to the "ongoing work" nature of an MMO, Devs will test their patches and get them "ready," but sometimes it is hard to predict how the changes will actually work, given that they can't shut the game down for several weeks to test it. The patch still may include issues that they'll be able to continually "hotfix," or apply a small fix to a bug that popped up when the patch hit the server. In 1.4's case, you can see hotfixes for the matchmaking and squad deployment issues. Again, THESE ARE NORMAL! In an MMO, it's not as important that the "disc copy" of the game is 100% (and, honestly, its not even common now that disc games are 100% when shipped). Once the patch is applied on patch day and goes live, issues map pop up, and hotfixes are issued for the next few weeks to get that patch into a good place, then the Devs go to work on the next patch and then expansion, etc.

So, knowing how patches work in an MMO context--mainly that MMOs represent an ongoing work--it is normal that patch days bring in with them problems to the game, and our expectation as players should be to realize these things happen and that the dev team is committed to getting their game in a good place.

Just a bit of history but patch days used to take whole MMOs offline for several days or bring in game-breaking changes that Devs would scramble to get fixed in the following weeks. I guess as some of us have played MMOs for a while, patch days are routine events for us, and we realize how they work and set our expectations accordingly. As an MMO player, I realize that patch day problems will be fixed, just given a few days to a week or so, and that unlike my expectation that (AAA title) will be shipped in pristine shape, I know that MMOs are continual works in progress that get love over time.

To my "traditional" FPS friend, though, he didn't understand why "the new map pack" caused so many problems until I explained to him in very much the same way I explained to you above. Once he realized that Dust is an ongoing work, and that Dust-as-an-MMOFPS means that there will continually be development and interation on it, I think it clicked with him how cool it is that there'll always be new things and changes happening in Dust.

I hope this clears a little of the patch day confusion up to our traditional FPS friends. Please just bear with the issues you notice in the patches guys, as problems they create will be fixed. It's just hard to forecast sometime how a patch will affect the game when it goes live, since they can't turn off the game for several weeks to test it out, like they could with a game that's "on autopilot."


Author	Thread Statistics \| Show CCP posts - 1 post(s)
Korvin Lomont United Pwnage Service RISE of LEGION 133	Posted - 2013.09.06 09:10:00 - [1] - Quote Vespasian Andendare wrote: After reading through several posts about patch woes, I really wanted to take a moment and write up a PSA on patch days, what they really mean, and what your expectation should be. First, please don't read this like I'm writing high-and-mighty. I just want to explain some finer points to players who may not be familiar with "typical" MMO patches, a category which I'm sure many a Dust "traditional" FPS player falls into. Ok, so patch days on an MMO typically introduce new features, objects, shinies, etc. into the game. In a traditional MMO, say World of Warcraft, this would mean new bosses, weapons, etc. How this applies to Dust is that we'll get new weapons, maps, equipment, etc. Features of the game will expand (new matchmaking), while we may get new or reimagined weapons or equipment (scanner!). BUT, patch days are notorious for having LOTS of problems! This is typical! It doesn't mean that CCP has crappy programmers or they didn't bother to test it or they wanted it to fail or whatever tinfoil hat theory we come up with. It all boils down to how the game is developed vs other, "traditional" shooters: In a "traditional" shooter like Call of Duty, the developers start by spending a lot of time building the game, testing it, polishing it, etc. and end with the game's release. Then, once the game is released, it is essentially "on autopilot" while the Devs begin that process all over again for a new map pack or a new game altogether. In Dust, however, the development table is more akin to a traditional MMO than it is to a shooter like Call of Duty. Really, what this means is that MMOs go through a smaller initial release but instead of the Devs stopping work on it and shifting development toward a new expansion or game, they continually update their work through mid-cycle patches. Patches sometimes bring new features, which we got this time around with new matchmaking and maps, and normally include minor adjustments. But due to the "ongoing work" nature of an MMO, Devs will test their patches and get them "ready," but sometimes it is hard to predict how the changes will actually work, given that they can't shut the game down for several weeks to test it. The patch still may include issues that they'll be able to continually "hotfix," or apply a small fix to a bug that popped up when the patch hit the server. In 1.4's case, you can see hotfixes for the matchmaking and squad deployment issues. Again, THESE ARE NORMAL! In an MMO, it's not as important that the "disc copy" of the game is 100% (and, honestly, its not even common now that disc games are 100% when shipped). Once the patch is applied on patch day and goes live, issues map pop up, and hotfixes are issued for the next few weeks to get that patch into a good place, then the Devs go to work on the next patch and then expansion, etc. So, knowing how patches work in an MMO context--mainly that MMOs represent an ongoing work--it is normal that patch days bring in with them problems to the game, and our expectation as players should be to realize these things happen and that the dev team is committed to getting their game in a good place. Just a bit of history but patch days used to take whole MMOs offline for several days or bring in game-breaking changes that Devs would scramble to get fixed in the following weeks. I guess as some of us have played MMOs for a while, patch days are routine events for us, and we realize how they work and set our expectations accordingly. As an MMO player, I realize that patch day problems will be fixed, just given a few days to a week or so, and that unlike my expectation that (AAA title) will be shipped in pristine shape, I know that MMOs are continual works in progress that get love over time. To my "traditional" FPS friend, though, he didn't understand why "the new map pack" caused so many problems until I explained to him in very much the same way I explained to you above. Once he realized that Dust is an ongoing work, and that Dust-as-an-MMOFPS means that there will continually be development and interation on it, I think it clicked with him how cool it is that there'll always be new things and changes happening in Dust. I hope this clears a little of the patch day confusion up to our traditional FPS friends. Please just bear with the issues you notice in the patches guys, as problems they create will be fixed. It's just hard to forecast sometime how a patch will affect the game when it goes live, since they can't turn off the game for several weeks to test it out, like they could with a game that's "on autopilot." Well coming from a software development QA department I can't completly agree. Patch days are normally only a problem if there is no QA or bad projectmanagement (leading to bad QA). Unfortately it has become common sense to release half ready software so called banana software to customers. In that regard Software development is quite unique. The possibillity to fast patch errors has lead to a metality that does not quality very high in the development cycle. Having more than 10 years of practice in software develeopment I know that Quality is the first part that gets sacrified when the release date is near but the software not ready.