AM I the only one who feels insulted by the Batman: Arkham Knight situation as a PC gamer?

[spellbinder2050]

I've been following the Arkham Knight trailers and gameplay footage since last year. I'm planning to drop 1500 or so to upgrade my GPU/monitor, and this was one of the games I looked forward to playing.

Now, they've released a PC port that performs terribly and even looks terrible.

It's all over Youtube and online.I've seen the game go from 60 fps, to 150, back down to 35 fps, up to 70 again in under 5 seconds with a GTX 980 TI. Also, the game looks NOTHING like the trailers/gameplay footage we've been fed for the past year. It looks like Arkham City with slightly better lighting. The textures and animations look terrible.

And the fact that the game was designed with 30 fps in mind (clearly for the consoles) seems to make certain cut scenes look awkward/strange as they're running at higher frame rates on PC.

People can't even change the mouse sensitivity or unlock the 30 fps cap without going into the .ini file.

I've come to find out that Rocksteady outsourced the PC port to a company called "Iron Galaxy" (Source: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/392364-batman-arkham-knight-warner-bros-executive-pc-gamers-%E2%80%98a-bunch-of-babies%E2%80%99/)

(In other words, they didn't find it important enough to do it themselves).

Can a game studio REALLY be that out of touch with PC gamers that they don't know we hate fps locks and require the ability to change our mouse sensitivity? It's common sense. Do these programmers at "Iron Galaxy" actually play PC games? *smh and roll my eyes*
----------------------------------

I have two hypothesis':

1. They wanted to save time and money, so they release the console port without testing it properly, so the PC gamers themselves could in essence become the beta testers.

2. They deliberately distributed a bad PC port so the pirates could get their hands on a bad copy of the game. This would give WB the ability to patch it and re-release it, in a sense, with an update.


Either way, I feel insulted by the situation. Not only do they need to correct the performance issues, but they need to release a texture pack. It's already 2015, PC gamers have suffered enough at the hands of the game consoles' technical obsolescence.

 

[Larry Litmanen]

Well first of all it's been a few hours, come on give the devs some break here. If the game is still messed up in 2 weeks you will be spot on 100%.

The deal with remakes is some people say the game is too similar or others say it's too different from what made it a success.

I preordered Trine 3, the game will be ready in late 2015 at best. No one forsed me to, i did it and if the game is bad it's all on me, i could have waited and saw a real gameplay footage to make that buy or don't buy call.

Most importantly you complain about it being a console port but later complain about developer trying to catch pirates. That's why so many devs do console games, no pirates.

 

[Vice93]

People who preorder are really to blame though, and to be honest, kind of deserve this. People really need to stop paying for products they haven't gotten their hands on yet or know anything about.

Yeah it's a shitty port, and it's frankly insulting to all PC gamers out there, but what can we do? People are still gonna pre order and buy their games. It's been this way for a long time now. Even worse is the recent trend towards early access games, let's hope that's not going to start happening to our tripple A titles. It started small with pre orders after all.

The best solution would be have everyone cashing in their free refund, at least the ones who bought it on Steam. Those who got it from NVIDIA bundles are fucked I guess, and those clever enough to get the 40% discount from GMG I guess are fucked as well.

It's been a problem for a while, and it will keep happening - even though some of us do not support this kind of behavior from developers, the majority of us doesn't seem to care either way.

Edit: Youtube. Golden.

 

[spellbinder2050]

Well first of all it's been a few hours, come on give the devs some break here. If the game is still messed up in 2 weeks you will be spot on 100%.

The deal with remakes is some people say the game is too similar or others say it's too different from what made it a success.

I preordered Trine 3, the game will be ready in late 2015 at best. No one forsed me to, i did it and if the game is bad it's all on me, i could have waited and saw a real gameplay footage to make that buy or don't buy call.

Most importantly you complain about it being a console port but later complain about developer trying to catch pirates. That's why so many devs do console games, no pirates.

Yes dude, this would make sense .... if the game hadn't been in development for 3 1/2 years. How could you blame yourself for a game studio releasing a bad product? LOL Do you work for your money?

What made the Arkham games good is still there, what's not are the updated graphics.The game looks last gen with updated lighting. We deserve better than this man.

 

[jsgrant31]

It was a less-than-stellar launch for sure. On one hand, I thought Rocksteady had it together. On the other, I wasn't even surprised given what's happened this year and last. Although I suppose previous Arkham games have launched poorly and been improved soon after.

On to your hypotheses, my guess is WB was firm on the release deadline despite the game being unfinished. It's happened before. Who knows. I agree with Larry though to give it a week, which sounds quite bad. Ideally, games should be released in a functioning state, but it's commonplace now to buy games a week after launch when third-party reviews confirm it works. Sad, but after MCC waiting a week will be my approach as well. Preordering should never have gone this far.

 

[Vice93]

Most of us are fine with a few bugs, that's not the issue. The game is totally unplayable for the majority of the community. How is that in any way justifiable? There is a big difference between not being able to test every setting on every hardware combination and make sure everything is flawless, and releasing a game that's essentially identical to the console version, only with mouse & keyboard support. This is essentially all it is at the moment. Not okay.

 

[Larry Litmanen]

People who preorder are really to blame though, and to be honest, kind of deserve this. People really need to stop paying for products they haven't gotten their hands on yet or know anything about.

Yeah it's a shitty port, and it's frankly insulting to all PC gamers out there, but what can we do? People are still gonna pre order and buy their games. It's been this way for a long time now. Even worse is the recent trend towards early access games, let's hope that's not going to start happening to our tripple A titles. It started small with pre orders after all.

The best solution would be have everyone cashing in their free refund, at least the ones who bought it on Steam. Those who got it from NVIDIA bundles are fucked I guess, and those clever enough to get the 40% discount from GMG I guess are fucked as well.

It's been a problem for a while, and it will keep happening - even though some of us do not support this kind of behavior from developers, the majority of us doesn't seem to care either way.

Edit: Youtube. Golden.

Reason people preorder is sometimes you get a discount. I loved Trine 1 and 2 so much no way will Trine 3 be bad. But yeah if you preorder that's on you, we are all guilty.
I do it because i want to support the developer, that's why i am ok with early access games because these are fom smaller developers who do not have the money to go thru with the project.

 

[Vice93]

Yeah I know, some people pre order because they want to support the developer, it's the same way with early access. I guess if they accept their fate, this is okay. But the least you can do is refund, or not do it in the future if they screw you over. If people can't even do that, we are not going to get anywhere on this platform and this will always keep happening.

Pre order solely for the discount is retarded.

 

[Larry Litmanen]

Pre order solely for the discount is retarded.

Hey, we are called mentally challenged.

 

[spellbinder2050]

People who preorder are really to blame though, and to be honest, kind of deserve this. People really need to stop paying for products they haven't gotten their hands on yet or know anything about.

Yeah it's a shitty port, and it's frankly insulting to all PC gamers out there, but what can we do? People are still gonna pre order and buy their games. It's been this way for a long time now. Even worse is the recent trend towards early access games, let's hope that's not going to start happening to our tripple A titles. It started small with pre orders after all.

The best solution would be have everyone cashing in their free refund, at least the ones who bought it on Steam. Those who got it from NVIDIA bundles are fucked I guess, and those clever enough to get the 40% discount from GMG I guess are fucked as well.

It's been a problem for a while, and it will keep happening - even though some of us do not support this kind of behavior from developers, the majority of us doesn't seem to care either way.

Edit: Youtube. Golden.

lol Awesome Youtube video.

 

[sz0ty0l4]

First of all the game contains Denuvo anti-tamper so that's already a reason to avoid buying it. I refuse to support anything like that with my money. I rather not play it or i wait until it becomes so cheap it'd be stupid not to buy it.

The whole concept of this Denuvo sh1t is actually ruining the gaming industry. It makes devs and publishers think like " ohh we pay denuvo then don't care, it won't get pirated fast, so these stupid gamers will buy it anyway and we don't have to work on it" and that's actually why pig publishers just throw away and abandon their PC game ports to an independet and crap and cheap dev team like High voltage, or now Iron Galaxy with batman. I think it's probably a stupid marketing decision. it's easier for them to pay denuvo then release a crap game, than actually working on it and making people buy the game because of it's high quality.

But hey
Just look at witcher 3. it's a DRM Free game and it got 4million buys in 2 weeks and more than 1 million is the PC version in that.

Let me ask what will be next ? Denuvo 3.0 check through your webcam if it's you or your cat playing the game???
hell I really wish that company to just get destroyed, bankrupt, or whatever and it's founders to be poor enough to have to pirate games.

Don't get me wrong i don't support pirateing, not by 1 percent. I always buy my games and i respect high quality software developers. I just don't want to end up in a world where you need a finger print or retina scenner to play your own game on your own pc in your own house payed by your money.

 

[Vice93]

To be honest, I don't think this game is even worth pirating.

Edit: This though Imgur gif is worth a watch.

 

[sz0ty0l4]

On the performance side it's a technical disaster. I saw youtube videos.. 5960x 32gb ram gtx titan x lagging on 30% gpu usage and 29 fps, also looking a lot worse than ps4 version.... They totally ignored the PC version. They payed off Denuvo, payed off an independet programmer team to implement it and abandoned the game.

Hopefully everyone will ask for a refund. Then prices will fall drastically by the time they make the game run, if it's even possible. Maybe I will end up buying it from g2a or gamesdealdotcom for 10$

 

[spellbinder2050]

First of all the game contains Denuvo anti-tamper so that's already a reason to avoid buying it. I refuse to support anything like that with my money. I rather not play it or i wait until it becomes so cheap it'd be stupid not to buy it.

The whole concept of this Denuvo sh1t is actually ruining the gaming industry. It makes devs and publishers think like " ohh we pay denuvo then don't care, it won't get pirated fast, so these stupid gamers will buy it anyway and we don't have to work on it" and that's actually why pig publishers just throw away and abandon their PC game ports to an independet and crap and cheap dev team like High voltage, or now Iron Galaxy with batman. I think it's probably a stupid marketing decision. it's easier for them to pay denuvo then release a crap game, than actually working on it and making people buy the game because of it's high quality.

But hey
Just look at witcher 3. it's a DRM Free game and it got 4million buys in 2 weeks and more than 1 million is the PC version in that.

Let me ask what will be next ? Denuvo 3.0 check through your webcam if it's you or your cat playing the game???
hell I really wish that company to just get destroyed, bankrupt, or whatever and it's founders to be poor enough to have to pirate games.

Don't get me wrong i don't support pirateing, not by 1 percent. I always buy my games and i respect high quality software developers. I just don't want to end up in a world where you need a finger print or retina scenner to play your own game on your own pc in your own house payed by your money.

I actually didn't know about the DRM situation. Thank you for the updated info.

Also, for anyone that's interested, an excerpt from Forbes:

"UPDATE 2: It’s been revealed that the PC version of Arkham Knight was handled by Iron Galaxy Studios, a small 12-person team primarily known for their console work. Among other projects, they handled the Destiny port to PS3 and Xbox 360."

WB and Rocksteady really doesn't care about us at all. -_-

 

[Joseph DeGarmo]

Apparently, WB has suspended sales of the PC version of the game. This product recall shows that WB is aware of the performance and graphical issues and is trying to do something about it. At least give them a chance.

 

[Supernova1138]

Apparently, WB has suspended sales of the PC version of the game. This product recall shows that WB is aware of the performance and graphical issues and is trying to do something about it. At least give them a chance.

Between the bad PR and the Steam refund system, I guess WB decided to cut their losses and simply withdraw the game so they could redo the port from scratch. This is the first time ever that a triple A publisher has done a recall like this, and I hope it encourages them to actually have a finished game ready for launch day in the future. At the very least maybe they should just stop putting games out on PC if they hate the platform so much that they put almost zero effort into the PC port. Hopefully WB can find some way to not screw it up, though I'm sure they will find a way, I expect a slightly less bad PC port in the fall.

 

[Larry Litmanen]

Apparently, WB has suspended sales of the PC version of the game. This product recall shows that WB is aware of the performance and graphical issues and is trying to do something about it. At least give them a chance.

Between the bad PR and the Steam refund system, I guess WB decided to cut their losses and simply withdraw the game so they could redo the port from scratch. This is the first time ever that a triple A publisher has done a recall like this, and I hope it encourages them to actually have a finished game ready for launch day in the future. At the very least maybe they should just stop putting games out on PC if they hate the platform so much that they put almost zero effort into the PC port. Hopefully WB can find some way to not screw it up, though I'm sure they will find a way, I expect a slightly less bad PC port in the fall.

I agree, this whole thing could be a doublesided sword. On one hand this may force developers to make sure the game is fully functional, on the other they may say to heck with PCs and just do a perfect game for 2 systems (XBOX and PS4)

Be careful what you wish for.

If the company will take a big loss on this game they may kill the franchise, Crysis 3 (an excelent game in my opinion, worth every penny............best FPS i ever played) got bad reviews and bad sales and now we may not even get Crysis 4. Personally i think it is a major loss for gamers, Crysis 3 is what 2.5 years older than BF:Hardline and dare i say it is better in every way, from story to graphics to gameplay.

I am not saying a buyer who spends or preorders a game for $60-$70 should just take it and be silent, but there's a middle ground where you can give the developer a week or two to sort things out.

 

[Joseph DeGarmo]

Apparently, WB has suspended sales of the PC version of the game. This product recall shows that WB is aware of the performance and graphical issues and is trying to do something about it. At least give them a chance.

Between the bad PR and the Steam refund system, I guess WB decided to cut their losses and simply withdraw the game so they could redo the port from scratch. This is the first time ever that a triple A publisher has done a recall like this, and I hope it encourages them to actually have a finished game ready for launch day in the future. At the very least maybe they should just stop putting games out on PC if they hate the platform so much that they put almost zero effort into the PC port. Hopefully WB can find some way to not screw it up, though I'm sure they will find a way, I expect a slightly less bad PC port in the fall.

I agree, this whole thing could be a doublesided sword. On one hand this may force developers to make sure the game is fully functional, on the other they may say to heck with PCs and just do a perfect game for 2 systems (XBOX and PS4)

Be careful what you wish for.

If the company will take a big loss on this game they may kill the franchise, Crysis 3 (an excelent game in my opinion, worth every penny............best FPS i ever played) got bad reviews and bad sales and now we may not even get Crysis 4. Personally i think it is a major loss for gamers, Crysis 3 is what 2.5 years older than BF:Hardline and dare i say it is better in every way, from story to graphics to gameplay.

I am not saying a buyer who spends or preorders a game for $60-$70 should just take it and be silent, but there's a middle ground where you can give the developer a week or two to sort things out.

You forgot to mention that Crysis 3 is an excellent PC port and has excellent optimization, making use of all my eight CPU threads. It also had a smooth launch. CryEngine 3 is an amazing graphics engine.

 

[jsgrant31]

Apparently, WB has suspended sales of the PC version of the game. This product recall shows that WB is aware of the performance and graphical issues and is trying to do something about it. At least give them a chance.

This is interesting. Usually people, myself included, are blaming the publisher for pushing an unfinished game to release. It's happened before; I suspected it was the case here. If that's the case it seems weird that WB would push the game out just to recall it. Maybe they thought it wasn't as bad as it is.

Regardless, it's their best move IMO. 343i only worsened the situation when they left Halo MCC on the shelves (knowing it was completely broken) while consumers continued to purchase it.

 

[davmazin]

actually since morrowind people find the pirated better still with this trashy game even the pirated version is crappy cuz in a part when got a pirated version it ran better than the original, i got the batman game cuz of my gtx970 , and this game is one of the reasons i dont get original games cuz it forces you to have internet, it comes out with a lot of bugs and they treat the pc gamers as if we were trash or something oh well this game runs really bad still especially considering that its trowing too much data to the system ram so you need about 20gb or more ram for it not to shutter cuz the stupid shutter is not happening cuz the graphics or the game is too intense but because its not swapping in the memory correctly so your pc is always struggling with the loading of things