31-01-2001 12:27									#1
	CONSUMER ACTION: A Declaration of Disapproval, Intend to Return or Refusal to Buy Get a bigger avatar today!

January 30, 2001? Nope. April, 1999.

Just take a look at some of these gems. I simply cannot express how much time and money I saved by having learned my lessons about Activision 2 years ago. If you weren't around here back then or didn't buy CtP 1, you can be excused. But to the rest of you: Do you get it yet?

Back in the CtP 1 days, I actually got the game as a gift and REFUSED to play it as a kind of (admittedly weak) one-man protest. This time I did even better. I DIDN'T BUY THE GAME OR ASK FOR IT AS A GIFT...LOL

CONSUMER ACTION: A Declaration of Disapproval, Intend to Return or Refusal to Buy
http://apolyton.net/forums/Archives...2-7-000810.html

CONSUMER ACTION: A Declaration of Disapproval, Intend to Return or Refusal to Buy II
http://apolyton.net/forums/Archives...2-7-000904.html

"Pilot Error": How to make your company look even more lame. Activision Up Close.
http://apolyton.net/forums/Archives...7-7-001160.html

ACTIVISION: Treat paying customers like beta-testers, and you are doomed to fail.
http://apolyton.net/forums/Archives...2-7-000796.html
[This message has been edited by yin26 (edited January 31, 2001).]

	31-01-2001 13:07									#2
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

By the way, I actually DID send all those comments to as many places as I could find. Not one response. Not one. So my advice to anybody looking to send complaints this time around:

Your strongest hope is suing them for misrepresentation. As has been said, the box promises things (like MP support) but doesn't deliver. Activision should be FORCED to reimburse your money AND pay some punitive damages, since this kind of sleaziness is clearly a habit for them. Similar efforts have failed with Origin, however.

I, however, am blissfully uninvolved this time around having known precisely what would happen. Oddly enough, some other games from Activision are actually quite good. It just must be this CtP crowd that they hired from various back alleys somewhere causing all the problems.

Then again, that "official" Activision response pretty much sums up the company, doesn't it? Any "CtPhants" looking to chime in this time?

	31-01-2001 15:23									#4
	Tired of ads?

ah yin, you're the best civ3 forum moderator we ever had(the fact that you are also the only civ3 forum moderator we ever had is not important), but dont you have something better to do?

most of us have moved on: the creation forums are busy, we've got some cool ai/diplo/graphic mods even sprites coming up every day! so please, leave us in our own "misery", we dont need anyone screaming "i told you so"

	31-01-2001 15:26									#5
	Put an end to popups!

Yes, but I told you so! Seriously, it's so funny it a pathetically sad sort of way. And I AM the best Civ3 Forum moderator---EVER!

	31-01-2001 15:53									#7
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

CtP Crowd = The People responsible for putting out CtP2 the way it was. Now c'mon, how can you argue with me on that? They messed up...AGAIN! So tragic.

	31-01-2001 15:57									#8
	Put an end to popups!

By the way, if somebody wants to send me a copy of CtP2, I'll gladly download the mods and send some money to Wes if they are any good. But Activision 'aint getting ONE RED CENT!

	31-01-2001 17:54									#9
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

It's got a really nice box though

	31-01-2001 20:03									#10
	Put an end to popups!

Allways the gracefull one, eh TacticalGrace?

	01-02-2001 05:16									#12
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

Yin, I remember you carrying on over CTP1 way back when. But really, CTP2 IS better in its own way. As far as I'm concerned, the only problem with the design of the game is the AI is stupid. But the mods take care of that. The 'bugs' in the game aren't design faults, but should've been fixed by Activision. But if they wanna drop it, I gotta live with the bugs, and I will. Geeze, it's only a game. But a game I can change to suit me. That's why I'm modding, so I can play MY type of game. BTW, I thought CTP1 was good too. So no need to "told you so" me cuz I disagree with you................................. now.

------------------
Author of Diplomod. The mod to fix diplomacy.

Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

	01-02-2001 06:30									#13
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

So you guys are crying over spilled milk because . . . .?

	01-02-2001 09:35									#14
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Um, I'm laughing actually. I'm glad some people like the game, but in general you have to admit that we could see the failures coming. I'm also fascinated by the gamer's buying mentality. Usually it runs like this:

"Damn, I'm gonna be more careful next time I think of rushing to buy a game."

...2 seconds later...

"What? CtP3 is out?! Can I pre-order?"

All of this just goes to show me that we, the gamers, can never make computer gaming companies (the run-of-the-mill ones, like Activision anyway) take us seriously because we don't take ourselves seriously. We fuel the very irresponsibility and abuse from gaming companies that we all wish would go away.

Simply put, Activision knows a vast majority of gamers have short memories and deep pockets. The CtPs of the world will live on...just more material for comedy, I suppose.

	01-02-2001 12:33									#16
	Full PM-box? Change here!

About Lemmings:

quote: Lemmings are good swimmers, but many drown trying to cross rivers and lakes. And they get eaten by trout. Others move to places where there's little food and starve. In some places, great swarms of lemmings have moved over wide areas of land to the sea, then plunge off cliffs and drown. But it's not animal suicide. The mass deaths are accidental.

	02-02-2001 10:27									#17
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

I got my subscription copy of PC Gamer (Uk) today and was intrigued to see that a month after giving it a pretty positive review (unsurprising on a couple of days play) they had it in their "Recommended" feature as well as #1 in their TBS rankings. On principle I emailed them (and PC Strategy Games, my other favourite) a summary of all the more concrete points raised in the Patch 2 wishlist. A weak AI is one thing to refuse to patch, but bugged gameplay and unstable multiplayer is another. I believe magazines have a responsibility to warn their readers about this sort of thing, even if they do get egg on their faces for giving it a good review a month earlier.

	02-02-2001 05:15									#18
	Got spare money?

I agree with you, but sadly it never happens. That's another lesson I learned: NEVER trust the review that comes out relatively soon after a game's release. For unless there's some glaring issue, the true nature of the game simply can't be seen after playing it once or twice. Some magazines are reputable enough to put out a review after thoroughly testing a game, but most want to be out there with the first review so they can sell more reviews. The result of that is ovbious.

So what I always do now is watch the forums and read the player reviews...AND I wait about a month or so before buying a game (assuming the player comments are good enough). For example, I didn't buy Baldur's Gate 2 until two weeks ago. I read the player reviews at Gamespot and got a VERY realistic sense of the game's strengths and weaknesses before deciding to buy.
[This message has been edited by yin26 (edited February 01, 2001).]

	02-02-2001 05:26									#19
	Get a bigger avatar today!

We'll see who waits before buying Civ III...I know I will, but will you?

	02-02-2001 10:18									#22
	Got spare money?

Yin..... i am one of those who bought CTP1... hated it.... refused to buy CTP2 ..... pirated it off the net..... played it for about 5 days..... hated it..... deleted it off my small harddrive..... glad i didn't waste another 65 dollars on more crap from ****ivision... oops activision

	02-02-2001 12:27									#23
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Nice work! Activision deserved to be treated that way (sorry, but some companies scream, "WAREZ ME!"). If more people took that attitude, maybe the wheat would separate from the chaff much faster.

Now let me just say, you should ALWAYS buy a game you enjoy (even if you played the whole thing on WAREZ first), since this is other important element: Rewarding GOOD companies for their work.

	02-02-2001 16:50									#24
	Inflate your Upload Space

I agree, Imran. You learn to recognise companies which can be trusted to produce a quality game or at the very least keep patching until it works. Both Black Isle and Firaxis have a near perfect track record in this respect. Activision have caught me out several times and absolutely will not regain my trust. I'll be buying Civ III on the day it is released (even ordering from the US if the UK release is significantly delayed) but would wait for any future CtP product to bed in for at least a month before choosing whether or not to buy.

I'm just disappointed that some obviously talented programmers, artists and designers have ended up with their names associated with a game that could have been so much better if only a little more time had been devoted to the final testing and tweaking.

	03-02-2001 01:20									#26
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

It just must be this CtP crowd that they hired from various back alleys somewhere causing all the problems.

how obvious it is that you dont know what you're talking about....


Well, count me as one of those VERY unsatisfied customers. The game has never gotten beyond around 20 turns before hard locking my computer. Doubly bad is that I just spent $1400 getting a new computer so that I could play Zeus, because of that company's decisions regarding the non-ability of running that game. It seems that sometime, someplace, somehow these companies MUST be held accountable. If I, as a worker in my company, ever did such sleazy, shoddy work I'd be fired. How is it that a s/w company can just dump the people who made them what they are. We're supposed to be, as consumers, right (what happened to "the customer is always right"? ) or in this case dissatisfied/disillusioned. I don't want my money back, I want the game to work, period. If the company can't understand that I don't see why they're in business.

	03-02-2001 09:04									#29
	Got spare money?

Yin26, I found your topic delightful. It is highly amusing to see MarkG on the defensive! I haven't even bothered downloading CTP 2 yet, and I don't think I will actually.

Bkeela.

	03-02-2001 09:55									#30
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Game stability from one system to the next is a gamble with any game, from my experience. I never was able to get past SMAC's NeedleJet bug, yet I never have had to even re-install Ctp1 despite a few HUNDRED crashes caused by my mod work.