The Last of the patches.

[Timstone]

When I was reading the chatlogs for the Last chat with Aaron. I noticed you guys talking about one Last patch for SE IV Gold. Is this true, will there be one Last patch?
When will it be released and more importantly what will it fix/add?

[Ragnarok]

If there is indeed a patch in the works, of which I have heard nothing about, then it will not be released until after SEV is out, so that is after at least Summer of 2005.

[Atrocities]

Lets get the bug list going then. If there is to be one Last patch, we need to have as much FIXED as we can get. Any one here willing to lend a hand and help compile a concise list of bugs and must haves for a final patch for SE IV?

(HINT: The more people who support a patch, hopefully the more likely we can convince Aaron to do one.)

[Ed Kolis]

Bugs? OK, how about the bug with the new abilities added in 1.91, where the resource generation doesn't show up in the empire status screen?

[Ragnarok-X]

yep, thats indeed VERY good Ed Kolis. Thats very important for modding and i really hope it gets fixed !!!

[PvK]

I'd love to see another patch too, just to fix the few remaining gripes.

However regarding that chat log about one more patch - was it not the SE5 chat that happened right before the 1.91 patch?

PvK

[Ragnarok]

The patch has been out for a few months now, while the chat was just a few weeks ago. Unless Timstone read a chatlog from way long ago...

[Fyron]

Timstone said:
When I was reading the chatlogs for the Last chat with Aaron. I noticed you guys talking about one Last patch for SE IV Gold. Is this true, will there be one Last patch?
When will it be released and more importantly what will it fix/add?

There was no mention of a new patch for SEIV in the chat logs of a few weeks ago. 1.91 was the final patch that was discussed about a year ago in the first round of chats. Check the dates. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Makinus]

where i can find these "chatlogs"?

[Fyron]

From what used to be the #se4 web site. Now #SpaceEmpires. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

http://seirc.spaceempires.net/archives.php

[Timstone]

Woops! Okay, my mistake. But why wouldn't Aaron do one more patch. I can think of some things I would love to use in SE IV.
And besides AT and Ed already spoke of bugs. They are not allowed in SE IV!!
But I'm sorry to cause this consternation among you guys. I should have checked the date.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

He can only work on one massive program at a time. At the moment, that is SE:V.

[Ruatha]

IMO SE IV is a finished game and should never be patched again.
Do SE V instead.

[Ragnarok]

I agree with Ruatha. Even when SEV is out he will be patching the bugs out of it for awhile. I see SEIV as a completed game as well and that it is bug-free enough for me. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[DeadZone]

I just wished our alien friends would come down and give Aaron a hand so he can get it done faster (lets face it, with everything he intends to put into it, he cant know the meaning of sleep)

[Baron Munchausen]

What people are not considering here is that SE V is the patch for SE IV!

Think about it. Do you really think MM is starting over from scratch to make such a huge program as SE V? There's a sort of running joke among programmers that they are always working on the same program all of their lives because they always tend to implement the same 'understood' solutions to problems in whatever program they are working on. In this case he's going back and attacking the same problems with a better idea of what he is doing. Yes, he is also producing a lot of new code for new features but the same basic underlying problems have to be handled in any 4X strategy game. I'm sure that SE V will be close to 50 percent SE IV code when it finally comes into beta and not a whole lot less than that when it is actually released.

[Timstone]

Hmm... I really like your way of looking at things Baron. Yes, I can live with that.
Thanks for this great piece of philosophy. Thumbs up for you! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[Phoenix-D]

It wouldn't surprise me at all if the underlying ship movement code was the same from SE3-SE5. Except for the additions to deal with simultanious mode.

[Fyron]

This is why Aaron always refuses to make SE3 or SE4 open sourced after the release of SE5. SE2 is fine, since it was coded in a different language, so nothing was really portable from it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Q]

Still I would appreciate a Last patch for SE IV as there are still bugs around. Especially large combats with more than 1000 ship crash frequently after the end/closing of the combat window (at least on my computer) giving "access violation at address 00CFF759. Read of address 00CFF759" or something similar.
And there are blocked AI ghost fleets, wrong cargo loaded to AI ships forever, zero AI population colonies where never a population transport is sent to, the AI trying to make stellar manipulations with cloaked ships over and over again without getting the idea to decloak the ships first. Just to mention some bugs that come into my mind.
I played quite a long time the final Version of SE III and I have encountered no bugs there. But SE IV is certainly more complex.