14 DAY TRIAL // Grand Theft Auto 5, Dying Light, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, Driveclub, and many other big games have received a wide array of content updates since launch that have brought forth new features, from the online heists or extra modes to better mechanics. Unfortunately, in recent times, quite a few patches have ended up causing more harm than good by introducing glitches and errors.
Patches have always been a great aspect of the gaming industry, as even if titles had issues or errors at launch, through a simple update the developer was able to remedy glitches that passed through the quality assurance process.
Of course, in recent times quite a few developers consider patches as a safety net and rely on releasing them in order to fix a broken game on launch. Last fall there was already a high point for such a practice, as many big titles were affected by glitches and problematic periods at launch.
Chief among them was Assassin's Creed Unity from Ubisoft, but there were also problems with the multiplayer in Driveclub or Halo: The Master Chief Collection. All of them were big games coming from huge corporations with extensive quality assurance and testing departments. Unfortunately, the rush to debut the games ahead of the winter holiday season took its toll and early adopters, not to mention loyal fans, were disappointed with the results.
Since then, quite a lot of different updates and patches have been released for these big titles, and in quite a few situations, things turned out a bit worse than they were before the new fixes were implemented.
Only last week did two major updates launch and they brought alongside them new problems for developers to try and fix with, you guessed it, another patch.
GTA 5's online heists brought new adventures and errors
Grand Theft Auto 5 was the prime example, as after a very long time since its debut, the online heists were brought into the game as a free update. The new adventures went live at the beginning of last week across PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One, and the multitude of delays were pinned on Rockstar's desire to deliver a stellar experience without any problems.
Unfortunately, right after the patches went live, many users started reporting all sorts of errors, starting with a particularly nasty glitch that modified the faces of their online characters. A workaround was quickly brought forth by Rockstar, but unfortunately, many other issues were still present, from hard-to-destroy cars to purchased vehicles disappearing altogether. For these errors, Rockstar has released a small update across most platforms, but results are still unconfirmed.
Dying Light also has some issues after patch 1.5
Dying Light got a major update last week as well, which took it to version 1.5 and included the oft-requested Hard mode, which brought tougher zombies, less resources, and all sorts of new challenges. However, for PC users, a surprise challenge was added, in the form of framerate issues. Many users reported experiencing worse performance after the patch was applied and, so far, developer Techland is silent on the issue.
Patches and updates, especially those that bring new content to the game in the form of fresh modes, extra features, and other such things, are awesome. However, without wanting to sound entitled, I think that developers need to perform a better quality assurance process on them, especially if they have lots of resources at their disposal.
It's hard to ask for testing from a two-man indie company, but when you think that Rockstar owns a myriad of global teams, expectations rise appropriately and these developers should hold themselves at a higher standard.
