Another Insult to the EU

[zandadoum]

hello downtine, meet my xbox

[Mandrax]

server maintenance doesn't always necessitate a client update.

 

but according to the sticky it seems they are going to start staggering the maintenance times...eventually

 

You are reading it a bit wrong. They have previously stated that the current window they have chosen is off peak for EU customers, therefore we are going to be stuck with it.

[CovenantOfDeath]

To all those men who are unable to understand the simple concept of Time Zone.

 

1) Open your house' door

2) Go to the nearest Bookshop

3) BUY A WORLD MAP

 

And Yes we're complaining not for different concepts about customer service.

 

We're doing it BECAUSE WE'VE A DIFFERENT CUSTOMER SERVICE.

[Neptunius]

Wont be long now to they direct this topic to another thread.

 

Thats their way to "shut" people up.

[excentric]

The real problem is that the downtime lasts for 8 hrs .. then there's 2-3 more hours "emergency" downtime. How on earth can Bioware spend over 10 hours patching small things like fixing a Darth title , I do not know.

But if they really plan to spend 8-12 hrs a time on these small fixes, they need to start much earlier for the EU.

I can't even imagine when they will rollout a new planet for example ? when will the EU servers come up ? 11 pm ? Then we loose a whole day of gametime. We already got max 2-3 hrs to play on a given patch day with the fail extended ones, which I do expect we will see alot of.

[ScartStorm]

Most people in Europe is kinda at school / work until 4PM anyways.

 

Schoolkids have their Christmas vacation till Monday. Didn't know that?

[chavoda]

Im not to fuzzed about it, sure I cant login and play but eh its a game not something super important just something I do for fun..

 

that said, 99% of all mmo's have split servers timezones, they update each timezone in thier best suited downtime.(in a lot less time) cost are nothing, the argument that it cost money is complete ********, sure we haven't payed a subscription yet but thats incl in the box prize. and 1.5million*$15 is a lot of money.

 

Its a simple -fact- that they dint care or think about this (to me small) issue, if they would care they would have explained the reasons to do it the way it is now.

 

But eh, its a game, I play mmo's way to long and getting to old to get all ARGG about it If I get annoyed by it I simply stop paying /shrug.

[zandadoum]

my wife works on an important website.

 

developing and tetsing a patch on test servers: X amount of time. 1 day, 1 week, 1 month. doesnt matter

 

applying the patch on the production servers: 5 minutes... until stuff goes wrong ofc and they have to roll back or hotfix and do extra hours xD

 

but 8h. for a game patch and 4h+ because it WILL go wrong... bioware certainly did NOT do their homework...

Edited January 3, 2012 by zandadoum

[DrDoom]

Its a simple -fact- that they dint care or think about this (to me small) issue, if they would care they would have explained the reasons to do it the way it is now.

 

They did:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=808791#edit808791

 

But people tend to ignore/disregard/don't care about what BW says and prefer to go mental over a non-issue instead.

[ArSo]

ok lets say they decide to not take down servers for the EU till the night time. Guess what, during the whole day before the night time in the EU, you guys were not able to play anyways because your client software does not match the server software.

 

See, everyone in the world has the same client, so when they patch the game, both server and client need to be patched. So if you have the new patch but your servers do not have the same patch, you will not be able to play.

 

See, this is why all servers have to go down at the same time. They decided to do something better for their player base by allowing them to play on servers in the US or the EU, perhaps to play with friends or play on servers that thare better for their playing time, ie US player who plays during a the prime time of EU.

 

They are even not allowing everyone to test future patches by connecting to test server with different patch level. You can enable it in the launcher.

 

Please fail more

[Ikkio]

They did:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=808791#edit808791

 

But people tend to ignore/disregard/don't care about what BW says and prefer to go mental over a non-issue instead.

 

We don't ignore/disregard/don't care. We disagree. There is a critical difference. A global service it may be, but a well designed one it certainly is not.

 

If you can name another paid-for service that takes its service down during the day for a decent proportion of its client base and still says it's a good idea, let me know.

[RetroRayner]

People really miss the point, so EU maintenance is during the day when most are at school or work, yet North America are mainly asleep. I can gurantee there are thousands if not tens of thousands of EU players that play during those hours every day.

[PANZERBUNNY]

Ah, that's probably why nobody knows about it. Do better dude, we rely on you guys to be the better people of North America, you sounded just like your cousins to the south, hence the mistake.

 

Nobody knows about it! haha!! You are truly out to lunch!

 

^^^^^^

Above sig....it is totally right!!!

Edited January 3, 2012 by PANZERBUNNY

[zandadoum]

People really miss the point, so EU maintenance is during the day when most are at school or work, yet North America are mainly asleep. I can gurantee there are thousands if not tens of thousands of EU players that play during those hours every day.

 

and thousands if not tens of thousands US players who would like to play in their maintenance hous too. your point is?

[jeimon]

I do agree with the OP.

It's a matter of quality of service.

[Pekuu]

For some of us in Europe that maintenance ends at 6/7PM. It would be nice that they would separate the US & EU maintenance times. But in the end, what does it matter if the servers are down during off-peak daytime hours in Europe.

 

What does it matter even if you wouldn't be allowed to play for a whole one day during the week? I love this game, I play it 15-20 hours a week, but when the servers are down I go and do something else, clean my home, read a book, spend time with my wife, do some work related stuff at home, go out for a walk or go work out at gym etc.

 

Seriously people, do something else, and come back to game when the servers are online. It's actually sad if you fit your life around this game, not the other way around. Video games are a fun way to spend time, but if it's the major content in your life it's actually a sign of addiction.

 

And I'm not saying that you all are addicts, but if people had the same passion to protest against some real problems in the world, that they have with this whole EU maintenance thing, this world would actually be a lot better place to live.

 

Lastly, I'm a paying customer too, but I rather see the problems fixed in the game than play this game with a ton of bugs. If the current maintenance suits the devs best, then it suits me.

Edited January 3, 2012 by Ellvaan
Removed under public notice (last line was quoted later as rude)

[Mephismo]

oh nice, the "get a job" defence.

 

They simply disrespect the whole EU with this maintenance time, because it states "we do whats best for the EU customers and everyone else has to live with the consequences".

 

If they countinue to treat me as a 2nd rate customer, as a nice low maintenance byproduct that donates money, i will simply stop paying them.

 

 

 

Also, every other major mmo has this under control and isnt bothering their Eu customers with daytime server downtime, so stop the poor excuses.

 

What’s the big deal here ?

They told you about it and it’s the same for all of us.

If it bothers you that much do as you say, unsubscribe and good riddance.

[jeimon]

...

As for BW/EA not wanting to have their teams working at inconvenient times, well they seem happy enough to do this on their US servers. Furthermore they are a professional company not a charity.

 

You can harp on all you like about people whining but the bottom line is that a lot of EU player simply don’t think that BW/EA current practice represent either good customer service in its own right. They also don’t think it represents an equal level of customer service compared to what the North American customers are provided with.

 

Finally, what is more likely to fall under the definition of whining? EU players posting about their dissatisfaction over an issue that has an effect of a service they are paying for. Or NA posters reading and replying negatively to these posts, even though the posts and the reason for the posts has no effect on them.

 

this.

very well said. thanks.

[iorlas]

For some of us in Europe that maintenance ends at 6/7PM. It would be nice that they would separate the US & EU maintenance times. But in the end, what does it matter if the servers are down during off-peak daytime hours in Europe.

 

What does it matter even if you wouldn't be allowed to play for a whole one day during the week? I love this game, I play it 15-20 hours a week, but when the servers are down I go and do something else, clean my home, read a book, spend time with my wife, do some work related stuff at home, go out for a walk or go work out at gym etc.

 

Seriously people, do something else, and come back to game when the servers are online. It's actually sad if you fit your life around this game, not the other way around. Video games are a fun way to spend time, but if it's the major content in your life it's actually a sign of addiction.

 

And I'm not saying that you all are addicts, but if people had the same passion to protest against some real problems in the world, that they have with this whole EU maintenance thing, this world would actually be a lot better place to live.

 

Lastly, I'm a paying customer too, but I rather see the problems fixed in the game than play this game with a ton of bugs. If the current maintenance suits the devs best, then it suits me.

 

In case of TL;DR:

 

Stop crying and go do something else during the maintenance, the servers will be up again later.

 

Good for you you're happy with it so..why are you bothering to post?

[Ikkio]

Are you really trying to use historical military exploits as a way of excusing your rudeness? This lacks both logic and respect to the people who lost their lives fighting. I shall say no more about that as I think it’s in bad tastes.

 

You claim that people are “whining” without full comprehension of what is involved in server maintenance. You have no clue as to what level of understanding individual posters have on the subject.

 

As for BW/EA not wanting to have their teams working at inconvenient times, well they seem happy enough to do this on their US servers. Furthermore they are a professional company not a charity.

 

You can harp on all you like about people whining but the bottom line is that a lot of EU player simply don’t think that BW/EA current practice represent either good customer service in its own right. They also don’t think it represents an equal level of customer service compared to what the North American customers are provided with.

 

Finally, what is more likely to fall under the definition of whining? EU players posting about their dissatisfaction over an issue that has an effect of a service they are paying for. Or NA posters reading and replying negatively to these posts, even though the posts and the reason for the posts has no effect on them.

 

Case, rested. Nice one.

[Ibuki]

Most of EU players are used to a localized downtime. Blizzard did it. Other companies did it, too. BioWare's service is bad compared to these competitors.

 

The point is: If an European gamer is unsure whether to play (e.g.) World of Warcraft or SWTOR, he'll probably go for WoW since that's where the better service is right now. The free month expires in about 17 days. I'm sure many potential customers will decide against BioWare because of their two-class society.

 

BioWare argues that European players can access US-Servers and vice versa. I'm pretty sure that the number of Europeans playing on US-Servers is vanishingly low compared to Europeans affected by the downtime.

 

This downtime politics can't remain a permanent condition. On long term it will kill subscribtions. Add the downtimes and Europeans will lose whole weeks of playtime within a year. It's just plain bad.

Edited January 3, 2012 by Ibuki

[Ellvaan]

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[captainmerkin]

it doesnt matter what time, when, where, how maintenance is being done there will always be people screaming about the injustice of it all.

 

I would suggest you go dig your arse out of the computer chair, stretch your legs, have a wash, pick the cornflakes and dried snot out of your forming beard and go do something else for a short while.. maybe even apply for a job

 

I will be sat here in the office getting annoyed with the world whilst the server maintenance takes place in working hours

[zandadoum]

Stop crying and go do something else during the maintenance, the servers will be up again later.

 

well i must play devils advocate for a second here.

 

not everyone in this or the other hundreds of threats is whining about not being able to play their currently favourite game.

 

some (and i would fall under this cathegory) are complaining about the FACT that EU customers are second grade customers who lose a full day per week, while still paying the same money the US players are paying.

 

it's not about not being able to play, it's about customer rights and customer service. i know i know we all accepted the tos and eula, but it's just a kick in the balls every week.

 

hell, i am working while maintenance is ongoing, i couldn't care less, as i am not able to play anyways. it's the fact IF I WANTED to play, i could not.

 

blizzard had the same problem, but they fixed it within the first year, doing the maintenance on separate schedule (they can, because the gameclient is different per zone) AND improving the total hours needed.

 

HERE IS THE THING:

 

- the average US player (i know there are exceptions) pays for 30 days and IS ABLE TO play 30 days, because he's gonna be sleeping while maintenance occurs.

- the average EU player (i know there are exceptions) pays for 30 days and IS ABLE TO play 26 days, because maintenance occurs in middle of the day (and pray to god it's not extended like last weeks)

 

yeah. school, work, whatever should be occuring during that time. well, when did last maintenance end? 7PM? i was back from work 3h. already. and i am from a southern country. in northern countries they start working much earlier and get home earlier.

 

again: i don't know about the rest. i am not complaining about not being able to play. i am complaining about the fact an US based service is once more, pissing on us EU people.

but in the end it's our own fault. if we could sue a manufacturing company for not writing in their manual that it could kill my hamster if i tried to dry it in the microwave, then we might be getting somewhere. as for now that's only possible in the US. we europeans need to get used to demand our rights more and as for now, this is only happening in a few countries.

[PANZERBUNNY]

Case, rested. Nice one.

 

If it was ONE game where I see the same thing over and over there would be a difference. I see and have seen this SAME complaint over and over and over. Horse has been kicked. To death.

 

THAT is a whine. I see the EU whine in EVERY game I play online where downtime effects their game play.

 

Not all of it is invalid, don't get me wrong, but the timezone maintenance cry from across the pond is as old *** MMO's themselves.

 

We get dinged by it as well. Its necessary. If they were to rotate downtime so certain people take turns getting it, it would be a step that would simply complicate the routine. It stays the same time, all the time so people can plan around it and expect it. Start messing that up and it will cause even MORE whines.

 

Also, not saying that NA gamers aren't full of idiocy and suffer from some form of complaining plague, because they can.

 

There are patterns in the whining. Accept it. You are proving it right.

 

 

P.S And please enlighten me about "consumer rights", because I'll break some news to you....they are few and far between.

 

You bought the product. It works. It is as advertised as "online play may differ". You know the reality of the situation when it comes to online games....they could shut the servers down for a week if they wanted too and not give you any free time. (it would be stupid not to compensate time, but they could.)

 

The customer isn't always right.

Edited January 3, 2012 by PANZERBUNNY