About GP4 Bugs!!!!

This is for all those who think that the bugs in Grand Prix 4 are all Geoff Crammonds fault.

Crammond and his production company are responsible for the Game engine, i.e the part that allows you to drive the car around the track, Physics, Car models, Track models and so on.

Infogrames through its subsidiary Microprose was responsible for packaging the game, giving it ia 3d graphics engine and menus and so on. Now many people complain that Geoff made a crap game and Geoff shouldn't have released it like it is and blah blah blah to you people I say please shut up. The bugs in this game are mostly related to the areas of the game for which Mr. Crammond had no direct responsibility, the graphics engine. I've read constant complaints about this game on these forums. My copy crashes sometimes and yes it is frustrating. But almost every other software package I've ever used crashes too. Sure the game engine itself isn't perfect but I challenge anyone to show me one that is. (please don't mention F1-2002 yes I have it and no it is not as good). Every game almost every piece of software ever released has bugs and we deal with it. Did you know that winxp was released as a stable OS costing $200 with over 56,000 reported bugs!!!! It is impossible to produce perfect bug free code more than a few lines long and GP4 has hundreds of thousands of lines.

So complain about the game to the right people - Infogrames. Crammond has had little responsibility for most of what causes us players so much frustration. He might have programmed Grand Prix and Grand Prix 2 by himself but he sure as hell didn't do this one on his own. Those of you who think it is easy to fix a bug or implement a feature then you obviously know nothing about about software development.
Many people said that the feature in GPXPATCH like the speed and time feature should have been implemented in GPx series. As the details required to display this information is contained within the game it should not have been too strenuous a task for the creators. Perhaps the license from the FIA didn't allow it. The EA series uses current 2002 teams and drivers, while GPx uses last years details. Maybe that is the terms of the license that they have from the FIA. Do you genuinely believe that Crammond et co want to be selling a product with old teams and data while the competition has the current teams???? I may be wrong about this point but I don't think so.

And one final point to you who complain that the game is too hard on your computer, that the frame rates are too low I honestly don't see where you are coming from. I have a 3 year old AMD athlon 600Mhz and I recently invested

No, can't agree with you.

The complete name of the game is: "Geoff's Crammond Grand Prix 4" and NOT "Grand Prix 4".
If I buy a car, let's say a Mercedes Benz, and some components are faulty or low quality you cannot argument: "It's not produced by us so you can't blame us for it, blame the maker of that particular piece"
Ehi Mercedes, it's your brand on the car.
Ehi Geoff, it's your name on the game.
Ehi Geoff do you know what "quality control" is?

If he's not completely slaved to greed he shouldn't have allowed to use his name on a game so buggy.

"If you have problems with your peformance then maybe it is your PC and not the game. Try updating your hardware drivers to the latest spec".

Sorry, but this is not true. The game crashes, slows down, performs poorly or (as in my case) doesn't started (yeah, i sold it) at all when all other games (even most demanding ones) perform flawlessly. My system is absolutely OK.
The game is crappy. Why games like UT, Castle Wolfenstein and so on run with no probs and this one was one hell of a mess?

I agree with Luca, completely.

Ah ho preso il volante e va a meraviglia sotto XP
Ti devo sempre un Duron 900

I agree with you tis... although Geoff has his name on it, certain things are out of his control. Only F1GP and GP2 were his real creations.

You lie and you cheat.

Era un 2800XP+ LOL

im just split between the too :P

---

To Luca,

You have used the metaphor of the mercedes incorrectly. Geoffs work does not make up the most part of the game. More man hours of work went into the Graphics than any other part of the game. Geoff is only responsible for a small part. He is more like the man who designed the transmission for the Mercedes. The transmission might work fine but if the wheels fall off and the doors don't close properly then the car is faulty. Do you blame the man who designed the transmission when you have a problem with the car?????? Mercedes in your case is in fact Infogrames.
Sure his name is associated with the game so that people purchasing the game know that he is involved in its production. Why hide that fact if people are fans of his work. But that is not to say it is all his own work. Take Tony Hawks skateboarding games as an example. If they were crap and buggy would you go on the offensive against Tony Hawk and say he made crap games???????? I don't think so. His name is merely associated with it as he helped with the production and it makes the game more recognisable.

A bit of information for you. Geoff signed a contract with Microprose(Hasbro then Infogrames) to help produce and publish GP3,4,5. Infogrames want a return for their investment today and not tomorrow. So he is given deadlines as every developement team is. He produced his part of the work and the Microprose team done theirs. So I will repeat what I have said earlier - The part of the game that causes everyone so much hassle is the 3D engine. Blame Microprose for that.

Do you honestly believe that Geoff is responsible for every part of this product. If the advertising posters were crap would you criticise Geoff for that too????? If you do then thats your choice but you are very very wrong. Just take a look at the credits for the game. I have no idea how many Microprose or Simergy people were involved(I don't have access to the game at present) but If you look you will see many more involved from Microprose.

A good real-life analogy would be the Hyundai Scoupe with "Handling by Lotus", where Infogrammes is Hyundai and Geoff Crammond is Lotus. Need I say more?

it runs fine on my Athlon 1800 with a GeForce2 mx 200 card. Good frame rate, no slowdowns and 1024 * 768 resolution. I have 640 meg of ram but it is just crappy pc133 ram. I use windows 2000 and haven't had any complaints with it running correctly. doesn't even heat my CPU anymore than a session in nascar 2002.

gp4 is half the game it should have been


geoff ought to find a backer thats prepared to wait until the products finished before releasing it

look at gp2 as a example, there was no need for a patch for that






LS's Tip of the week
ESSENTIAL OILS aren't essential unless you're an engine, a gearbox or a twat

This story.... I don't think there is an innocent, just guilty.
Geoff, at least it seems to me, is trying to sell us the same old stuff over and over.
The core of the game engine is still from GP2. The guy has just been sitting on his laurels a bit too long.
So what did he really do this time. AI? Outstanding, but with huge flaws: did you ever notice AI cars which spin waiting 4 laps hanging on a kerb to get back on track?
Austria: I saw a Minardi doing that for 4 (four!) laps.
Europe: I crashed onto Coulthard lingering on a kerb behind a blind curb: I was first and him second the previous lap. He was trailing me by 38 secs. So how long did he wait there?
Have you ever noticed the alarming penchant for going in the gravel when the AI is lapped at certain spot on some tracks? I saw 4 (four!) of them doing that while I was lapping them at 180° (Magny Cours).
Will he ever fix that? Go figure...he wasn't aware of A bugs...
At least let's hope he was of B C D E F and so on.

No arguments please black flag gets closer than anything.

Backers like that don't exist. Welcome to the real world.
You can't compare GP2 to GP4. That is crazy, technology is so much more advanced now days.

It's not the same engine since GP2, and by stating that you think it is means you have no idea about games programming or programming in general and what it takes.

Although I will add a couple "issues" onto your list.
1) I raced in the rain last night, pouring down - except the sky was nice and blue with a scatter of fluffy white clouds.
2) I got contacted in a corner and my car flipped. Then I got turned up the right way and was able to continue racing...

I think the Mercedes metaphor is exactly right. If the door handle breaks on your mew Merc, you don

Luca is right.

Anyway besides polemics,don't you find a paradox that on every GP4 world forums everyone after couple of months talk mostly about present heavy bugs instead of speaking 'bout fast laps,setups etc..??????????

Geoff and friend have to think a lot about that

Boomy

P.S. Noi italiani tra tanti difetti che abbiamo abbiamo però la capacità di cercare di reagire alle inculate,e questo è positivo,IMHO

look at gp2 as a example, there was no need for a patch for that

I remember GP2 was delayed 6 months to get it out in a finished state, which sadly doesnt happen anymore with games.

As hard as it may be, Geoff really does need to do what the developers of Duke Nukem Forever do.... "Done when its done"

Tis is one hundred percent correct in all of his statements. This forum has degenerated into something that we should be ashamed of. Might as well call it a "Barbie" forum because a lot of those using it are like little girls.

We have a great game people enjoy it for what it is, complain to infrogrames, ok. Get a list of complaints/bugs together (such as Morbid did). Be proactive but stop harping on the same points over and over. I bought a thrustmaster force feedback GT steering wheel and I have to say that combined with GPxPatch 3.10 the game is the best driving game I have experienced. Appreciate it for that!

I agree that editing the thing could have been made more accessable to all, in fact I would have included a car and texture editor had I been producing the game, but hey its not going to happen soon so accept it.

You sold the game?! Well then why dont you go to another forum and bother some others? Cya!

Boomy.....I think your arguments are valid (at times), but at the threat of being boomed out of the forum, you should get a life. Either enjoy the game for what it is (ok have a laugh at the occasional funny bug) or don't play at all. If you do the latter don't bother coming here champion because we don't want to here complaints from disgruntled ex-pat GP series gamers.