Rip is right about the installing, reinstalling. If you guys have problems crashing... delete the game, obviously make sure you have it backed up in itunes. After you reinstall.... open up GC and sync your stats, then play from GC. It should work. I'll have to check to see if online is working better later on. I definately know how to sync stats for both my devices now, which is very cool.... always by opening GC first and then syncing stats. On a positive note, I saw in the description for the latest update, that more content is coming..... Very awesome news!!! Keep up the good work Trigger Fist !
John, do you know if the Gamecenter issue is resolved with iOS 6? Also, what's the average amount of players do you have online daily? I'm an advocate for this type of gaming on iOS and I feel it's the evolution of gaming. Are you getting the numbers you need to justify continued development on this platform?
As far as I can tell, Game Center is good for leaderboards but I'm not sure if they will support 8 player or more matchmaking any time soon. Developers need a custom solution for that. It's still early for Lake Effect. Continued development on the platform is justified (especially because the market is still growing). Private message or email me if you are a dev and are looking for a more complete answer than that.
John (at Lake Effect): Just wanted to throw my hat in here. My experience with GameCenter matchmaking in pretty much every title is absolutely ####ing terrible – Apple really needs to get their GameCenter API shit together, because outside of leaderboards and achievements, it’s garbage. At this point it should be trivial for developers to drop in sophisticated matchmaking for several players, voice chat, and more with just a few lines of code, but Apple is really dragging their feet on this. As such, I’d love to see you guys go with your own solution in the meantime. You guys have built an incredible game, don’t let Apple’s shitty API’s drain your playerbase’s patience because it’s really not your guy’s fault and all the jerks in this thread threatening to abandon the game are missing out if they do. I really fell in love with your game, you guys are brilliant. I firmly believe this game can be iOS’ first Counter-Strike style hit, but it’s going to take a flawless implementation of matchmaking and a LOT more marketing(!!!!!!!) before that can happen. But the point is, the game is here. The fundamentals are phenomenal. You’ve just gotta get it from the 90% it’s at now, to 110% by the time the holiday season is in full swing. If you can do it, you’ll have an awfully big hit on your hands! Please send me a PM, I have an extensive iOS QA background, a handful of test devices, and enough local friends to organize good testing sessions. I would love to help you guys out in any way I can.
Just did the reinstall. Now the game cant be opened at all. Tried also on my itouch 4, could play the tutorial, and then cant open the game at all..
Follow the steps in my first post on page 84. It WILL work. The crash after tutorial and no sound has only happened on updated apps. It does not happen on a full clean install from iTunes. It sounds like the update crash problem you're talking about there. It has to be deleted and reinstalled. Be sure to follow the steps in order to save sync. And be sure you're sync is up on gamecenter. Do NOT remove gamecenter from both devices. For even clearer instructions, page 68 onwards has loads of posts and info on updating and synching. I recommend reading them. I can't really re post them every time without cramming up the thread with previously posted info.
Despite only ever playing on my iPad. And making sure my stats were synced to Gamecentre, upon reinstalling... Mostly nothing syncs back. Have tried every piece of advice from earlier in the thread, and nothing. Gamecentre still has all the achievements I've earned, and some of the leader boards, (just couldnt get it to record anything other than gunner XP) but nothing else. 4 and a half hours of my life playing this game. wasted. Forget about extra content. Fixing these progress wiping bugs should've been a priority no? I like this game and the devs seem like good people, but I'm not going to give any more time to a game with bugs like this. Look at the screenshots. What about that syncing makes any sense whatsoever? Its synced gunner and streak but not total?
So if I have yet to download this game will it work? I'm running an iPhone 4s. Seems like a lot of people saying the game is just crashing upon launching? What happened??
The crash issue is related to updating the game. It's irrelevant if you're progress is synched to gamecenter as upon reinstall, it resyncs unlocks and xp to device. It doesn't happen to clean iTunes installs.
If your other xp levels were on the individual leaderboards in gamecenter, it would sync when opened from gamecenter. It is not an instantaneous sync. All data takes both a decent data connection and a bit of time to sync. There are numerous individual leaderboards. Global kills Global xp Rifleman xp Gunner xp Scout xp Rank. These are the important ones. This has been made very clear many times. Being ranked on these on gamecenter, that is what will sync. If they are there and they haven't synched, delete, reinstall and open from within the gamecenter app itself, not from the games app icon is the solution to synching. If your xp data, as I listed above, is not on gamecenter, that is what the first update was put out to fix and it did exactly that. And as you say, not all of your data was on gamecenter so you were using version 1.0. It has been made very clear, many times, what data needs to be there and how to sync. Plus saying the developer is only working on content and not working on fixing bugs couldn't be more incorrect. The bugs are more related to gamecenter than to the game itself. If the game had no sync or iCloud, as many games do not have, you'd have nothing to complain about because there are no bugs directly related to the game itself. Even the update crash is a gamecenter related communication problem. There has been two updates since launch so criticising a developer for not working on a fix is unjustified and incorrect. If all they did was fix bugs and not add content, I suppose that'd be another reason to complain. Does every game you have save data and allow you to delete, reinstall and start right back up where it was before you deleted it? Well, from the thousands of apps and games I've downloaded, I can tell you that number is very small. It's an awfull shame you lost four and a half hours having fun playing an enjoyable game. Having four and a half hours of fun being a waste of time is somewhat confusing though. Unless of course you didn't enjoy the game and if that's the case, I don't know why you played for four and a half hours anyway. Losing a bit of progress is not the end of the world. Four hours is not a lot of time to invest in a quality game. Plus at this stage, the sync issue is well and truly solved. Pointing out a problem that the developer has fixed and then critiicising them for working on new content as opposed to bug fixing is a bit ridiculous. Especially considering they are working very hard to sort out any possible further gamecenter issues. Anybody consider that possibly the issue is Apple's fault for not developing Gamecenter? Or maybe making matchmaking more efficent? Or simply using that massive server farm in North Carolinfom for more than iCloud? No, of course not. It's always the developers fault. Apple, of course, never makes a mistake. Next time, you might want to direct some of your criticism at the manufacturer of your device and the way they implemented and under developed gamecenter. Now you know why most developers run a mile from it and why those that have it end up having to supplement it with tailored server solutions to try and make it work.
Trigger Fist lifetime summary: Beta Test: - No crashing - All leaderboards, achievements, and matchmaking worked in Apple's Sandbox/Test Server environment. Release v1.0 - No crashing, great reception, 5 star reviews etc... - Only issue: somehow not all the leaderboards went "Live" on Game Center - Contacted Apple: told the only way to fix it is to submit an update. - Made insignificant tweaks to weapons etc and resubmitted. Release v1.01 - Leaderboards did all go live. (<-- this allows data to be saved remotely) - Random people experiencing crashing upon update but not on fresh installs - Seems like devices are not updating properly - Contacted Apple to see if it is possibly on their end - To attempt to correct a potentially corrupt file on the iTunes Servers, submitted update v1.02 - Some people lost progress - Received 1 star reviews for crashing and lost position on the App Store (i.e. lost revenue) Release v1.02 - Game still crashing on update. Fresh installs still work. - Apple is still looking into it Future outlook: - Downloads are slowly recovering - Many users are being supportive (THANK YOU!) - New users are not experiencing issues. - Looking into ways to bring more users to the game. - Learning from our mistakes. - Continuously working to make it better. - Creating more content
Their own matchmaking would require their own servers. Or some kind of tailored back end server solution. ie. A lot of work. A lot of time.
Thank you very much for that timeline John. Hopefully it will make it very clear to the naysayers that you, Eric and the rest of the team have done absolutely everything correct and that the gamecenter issues are not the developers fault. Again the game is great in every way as far as I'm concerned. I also think it has showed up the shortcomings in gamecenter that Apple needs to sort out. I hope the harshness of the critics doesn't put ye off and that the continued support of many of the others is encouraging.
Just want to reiterate that this game is amazing and I will be playing it a shit ton no matter how long it takes them to get it right. Lake Effect, you guys are brilliant game designers and I <3 you.
(but if you release this game for Android, you're dead to me. It'll just get pirated, no one on Android buys anything. Please do not waste your time and money supporting a broken ecosystem, and instead invest that energy into making your iOS product better. I assure you, you will end up with way more revenue in the end that way. Trust me, I know from experience here.)
First off all: I like your game really. But Things have to be changed: - I never managed so far to play against humans via match making. Very sad. - Upgrade progress is too slow, at least by a factor of 20. I am level 10 and playe 15 matches in a row, but the red bars basically do not have moved. I cannot even say IF they have moved. Do I have to pay a dollar every time now, I want to get a new item? I don't understand... But anyway: fun and unique game!
No, you absolutely do not need to pay another dollar every time, or anytime. The iap is just for those that want to unlock items early. It is totally unnecessary and takes the sense of accomplishment away from levelling up. If you look at the summary page after a match, you will see the xp each class of soldier earns from a match and the total global xp that goes to rank, skill unlocks and some weapon unlocks. If you use a scout only in the match only the scout will earn xp. If you use each soldier, rifleman, scout and gunner, each will earn xp related to the number of kills they get. That xp will go towards unlocking the next main weapon in that particular class. The xp for each class and match xp is added up and goes towards unlocking the next item in the rank/global xp slot. Iap is purely for those in a hurry to unlock. It will not hinder your progress if you dont buy iap. The iap is not necessary to continue the game or to unlock items. Xp will unlock everything. The xp does go slow though. This is to avoid unlocking everything early and give you a sense of personal achievement when you do unlock items normally. It helps the longevity of the game. Plus the game is not meant to be easy or one of those play for a while, unlock everything, get bored, delete type of games. It is meant to offer long term entertainment.
