heh.. this is ridicoulus. Most people KNEW that the game would be compressed to 40 mb, so why the high expectations?
We all agree that the 40 MB size limit is the culprit for the bad quality voices,
BUT
the choppiness is not related to the file size limit, it's only Telltale's fault, and should have been addressed BEFORE releasing the game for the Wii, not AFTER, specially if updating an already released game is difficult, as Will is supposing.
It's always better to delay release a few days (or weeks!) than to release a poorly finished product. It gives you a very bad image, even if your game is actually good. Most people upset with chapter 1 won't bother buying chapter 2 even if you resolve the issues, just because of the bad experience they had.
The Wii might be "underpowered" but that's not an excuse to release a game with these issues. The rest of the Wii catalog runs on this underpowered machine as well.
Sorry, I really don't care at all for the "underpowered" bit. I'm not into "fanboyism" I just remembered that from the other thread. But the point I wanted to make is that this Wii release has been rushed and should have been more polished before release. I know (or at least assume) the Wii programmers did the best they could within their timeframe, but I think it was a bad decision to ship it without looking into this issue further.
Edit: As I said above, I don't care about the hardware argument in the other thread, but while reading other gaming sites, I just found these articles. It seems some of them have gone through the trouble of creating articles out of the little chit-chat in these forums. A bit sad, really.
- Made a story out of a silly argument in a forum as if it was Telltale's official statement
- Or they copied/plagiarized an entire article from another gaming website, telling the same story
Well, I'm glad I downloaded the WAD directly and didn't buy for this. Then again, I just deleted it from my Wii even before reaching the panflet at the boat scene.
Delete my post or ban my account if you may, as you'd probably feel like I'm a pirate. Then again, if I have bought this game before trying it, I'd feel that you owe me my 10 bucks back, because it's a completely disaster of a game.
There are not excuses - part of releasing something for some platform is the ANALYSIS stage. So, how did you analised that it was possible to release in under 40 MB and considering the Wii hardware, if even we simple users see that it's quite a limitation?
Hope some heads are cutted out of this. I'll try to spread "the word" everywhere I can about what "you have done".
Just to quickly get this out of the way: The Wii's lack of power is a FACT. Retail games like Mario Galaxy run smoother because they don't have to uncompress such tightly compressed graphics on the fly. A 9 GB DVD and a 40 MB download aren't comparable.
While Monkey Island runs even worse than Banjo-Tooie did on N64, it's still perfectly playable. The opening is probably the most worst part in both framerate and voice compression, but it gets better after the opening credits (though I'm not very far yet). The faults are definitely noticeable, but no so much as to make the game unplayable. If you're on the fence and your PC isn't up to it, I say go for it. It's too bad the Wii doesn't have XBLA-type trials to see if the game's performance bothers you.
Now as for the actual problems, it's definitely a topic of discussion around the office, so I don't want anyone to think we are just ignoring it and hoping it will go away. We definitely aren't happy with the fact that not everyone is having an enjoyable experience.
Will,
If you can, you might toss that playing the game in mono causes the audio to pop and crack like crazy into the bug list. I accidentally had it in mono and was really unhappy until I found that out.
(Note, I've finished Episode 1 on my Wii, enjoyed it immensely, and look forward to Episode 2, especially if the 'hitching' is improved...)
Not even the most CPU-hungry audio codec should consume more than 15% of the Wii's processor time, so the most import factor for framerate is going to be how optimal their graphics engine is. Not to mention that 88 MB of RAM should be plenty of space to decompress things in advance.
The N64 comparison is good. That system had Star Fox 64 (12 MB), Perfect Dark (32 MB), and Conker's Bad Fur Day (64 MB), all games that pulled a good deal of voicework out of their cartridges using only a 94 MHz processor and 4 MB of RAM (8 MB for Perfect Dark). Oh, and then there's the N64 port of Resident Evil 2 which kept the voicework and the FMVs.
And the whole point is: IF TellTale's engine can't work in the Wii, if 40 MB is too little space or if you have to lower the quality of the game SO MUCH to push a release in such a mainstrem console, then don't release the game there or be prepared to be bashed from everywhere!
Maybe the money-hungriness in them made them "release the game anyway!" to the console, but the fact is that I don't even want to play with a free WAD file.
I'm glad I bought it for the PC and was about to buy it in the Wii also, but I first tried the free download and didn't even play the game for free because its unbereable!
I really liked the game and I think it's far from being unplayable, but I too have to say that the Wii conversion IS pretty bad. In addition to the mentioned stuff here I like to point out the tiny subtitles. You know, there are some people who still play on a CRT (the Wii doesn't support 720p anyway) and there are some people whose native language isn't English, so clearly readable subtitles are crucial for them. I just think the subtitles are a bit too small for relexed reading.
Is there a time frame on the potential fix? Also a good fix would just be to give people a store credit or discount to get the PC game. I'd even be happy to split the difference and take $5 off.
Add me to the list of people extremely disappointed by the Wii version of ToMI ep 1. I won't be buying another episode until I see thread with the subject "This episode runs MUCH better than episode 1!"
A lot of people are having trouble distinguishing between ToMI the game and ToMI the Wii port, and being able to criticize each individually.
The game looks great, and I really want to play it. It looks like Telltale did an excellent job in extending the MI series, and the writing and puzzles seem spot on.
The problem isn't with the game design, its with the technical side of things. The technical flaws noticeably detract from the game-playing experience, and I really wish that wasn't the case. I REALLY want to play ToMI on my platform of choice, but so far I haven't been provided an enjoyable means to do so.
I downloaded all 5 episodes of Strong Bad, another WiiWare adventure game developed by Telltale, and it had none of ToMI's problems.
Strong Bad ran at a decent fps and had good quality audio. None of the technical aspects of Strong Bad detracted from the game-playing experience, unlike ToMI ep 1, which is a technical mess.
WiiWare isn't the problem here at all. The same technical problems seen in ToMI can also be seen in the Wii port of Sam & Max season 1. For such a simple looking game (not saying that in a negative way at all), it ran horribly on the Wii. Framerate chugging all over the place and audio not sounding that great.
The problem is that Telltale seems to be having a lot of trouble in porting their PC games to the Wii, and the proof is in the pudding. Sam&Max was technically mediocre, Strong Bad was fine, and ToMI is unplayable.
Put more effort into your ports.
Please Telltale, make this right. Offer a free download of the PC version to anybody dissatisfied with the Wii port. You already got $10 from us, you have nothing to lose by offering a free download to those that could use it.
I thought I had mentioned this earlier in the thread, but apparently I hadn't! Anyway, for those of you who are pretty unhappy with things, please feel free to email me at support@telltalegames.com
Please raise the Wii Ware size limit from 40MB to something reasonable like 100MB. Keeping the Size at 40MB is crippling game developers and limiting the Wii Ware games to reach full potential. Tales of Monkey Island is a perfect example of how the 40MB cap has hurt developers. the games audio has had to be compressed to a point where it sounds awful.
changing the cap to 100MB is completely acceptable since you are now allowing users to store channels on SD Cards. I understand that games are still copied to the Internal Memory, but this is still ok in my book.
(My Name), Long time Nintendo and Monkey Island Fan.
Please raise the Wii Ware size limit from 40MB to something reasonable like 100MB. Keeping the Size at 40MB is crippling game developers and limiting the Wii Ware games to reach full potential. Tales of Monkey Island is a perfect example of how the 40MB cap has hurt developers. the games audio has had to be compressed to a point where it sounds awful.
changing the cap to 100MB is completely acceptable since you are now allowing users to store channels on SD Cards. I understand that games are still copied to the Internal Memory, but this is still ok in my book.
(My Name), Long time Nintendo and Monkey Island Fan.
Odds on, they'll do nothing, especially considering the controversy is manly due to the whole "iPhone > Wii" hoo-hah, and therefore only effects Telltale. That said, the limit is a relic of pre 4.0 firmware, and raising the limit is very possible, especially considering you could have a theoretical 64Gb in addition to the 0.5Gb the Wii comes with.
especially considering you could have a theoretical 64Gb in addition to the 0.5Gb the Wii comes with.
Fail. There is no addition at all. In fact, there is a "substraction". You have to stay far below 512 MB, because, like Will already stated, for starting an game from SD card, the game is temporarilly copied to the internal flash memory, on which you need enough free space for the game size.
Hello,
I appreciate your taking the time to share your request that the size limit on Wii Ware be increased. Rest assured that your email will be forwarded on to the appropriate department for further review.
Sincerely,
Bruce (Last name removed)
Nintendo of America Inc.Nintendo's home page: http://www.nintendo.com/
Power Line (Automated Product Info): (###) ###-####
Fail. There is no addition at all. In fact, there is a "substraction". You have to stay far below 512 MB, because, like Will already stated, for starting an game from SD card, the game is temporarilly copied to the internal flash memory, on which you need enough free space for the game size.
If PSP can handle running games up to 1.8gb directly from a memory stick, why can't Wii run much smaller games from SD cards?
The Wii could do that, but it's not implemented. And since they statically link the libraries into games, it would only work for games that were built after the functionality is implemented. That is why the current SD card loading function just copies the games: to bypass the need to update the games themselves.
The other potential issue is that SD cards vary in speed. If Nintendo implemented this, they would probably require that any games using this functionality run OK at the lowest SD card speed, rather than telling some customers that their SD cards aren't good enough.
Not to bring up the topic again, but I'm considering purchasing the later episodes. Despite the quality of 101 I still think the game is solid and I love TellTale.
Question: Has the quality of the last two episodes increased at all? No, please don't answer if you didn't notice quality issues in the first one. I did, and it's enough to prevent me from purchasing the next two episodes. For those of you that did notice the quality issues: Has TellTale improved the game at all for the Wii?
I can't speak from personal experience, but other people here have said the second episode runs a bit smoother than the first. But I don't think it's a huge difference and I'm guessing if the first episode's framerate bothered you then the second one will too.
Comments
Because all the other games that I have played that are compressed to 40MB run great (VC Games, Megaman9, Final Fantasy 4 After years)
We all agree that the 40 MB size limit is the culprit for the bad quality voices,
BUT
the choppiness is not related to the file size limit, it's only Telltale's fault, and should have been addressed BEFORE releasing the game for the Wii, not AFTER, specially if updating an already released game is difficult, as Will is supposing.
It's always better to delay release a few days (or weeks!) than to release a poorly finished product. It gives you a very bad image, even if your game is actually good. Most people upset with chapter 1 won't bother buying chapter 2 even if you resolve the issues, just because of the bad experience they had.
The Wii might be "underpowered" but that's not an excuse to release a game with these issues. The rest of the Wii catalog runs on this underpowered machine as well.
Edit: As I said above, I don't care about the hardware argument in the other thread, but while reading other gaming sites, I just found these articles. It seems some of them have gone through the trouble of creating articles out of the little chit-chat in these forums. A bit sad, really.
http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2009/07/30/iphone-more-powerful-than-wii-telltale-says-yep/
http://www.gamezine.co.uk/news/formats/mobile/telltale-iphone-more-powerful-than-wii-$1315183.htm
After reading those, I tried typing this and, wow!
http://www.google.com/search?q=telltale+iphone
Incredible what can come out of nothing...
- Made a story out of a silly argument in a forum as if it was Telltale's official statement
- Or they copied/plagiarized an entire article from another gaming website, telling the same story
Very "professional" of them.
Delete my post or ban my account if you may, as you'd probably feel like I'm a pirate. Then again, if I have bought this game before trying it, I'd feel that you owe me my 10 bucks back, because it's a completely disaster of a game.
There are not excuses - part of releasing something for some platform is the ANALYSIS stage. So, how did you analised that it was possible to release in under 40 MB and considering the Wii hardware, if even we simple users see that it's quite a limitation?
Hope some heads are cutted out of this. I'll try to spread "the word" everywhere I can about what "you have done".
Regards,
While Monkey Island runs even worse than Banjo-Tooie did on N64, it's still perfectly playable. The opening is probably the most worst part in both framerate and voice compression, but it gets better after the opening credits (though I'm not very far yet). The faults are definitely noticeable, but no so much as to make the game unplayable. If you're on the fence and your PC isn't up to it, I say go for it. It's too bad the Wii doesn't have XBLA-type trials to see if the game's performance bothers you.
Will,
If you can, you might toss that playing the game in mono causes the audio to pop and crack like crazy into the bug list. I accidentally had it in mono and was really unhappy until I found that out.
(Note, I've finished Episode 1 on my Wii, enjoyed it immensely, and look forward to Episode 2, especially if the 'hitching' is improved...)
The N64 comparison is good. That system had Star Fox 64 (12 MB), Perfect Dark (32 MB), and Conker's Bad Fur Day (64 MB), all games that pulled a good deal of voicework out of their cartridges using only a 94 MHz processor and 4 MB of RAM (8 MB for Perfect Dark). Oh, and then there's the N64 port of Resident Evil 2 which kept the voicework and the FMVs.
And the whole point is: IF TellTale's engine can't work in the Wii, if 40 MB is too little space or if you have to lower the quality of the game SO MUCH to push a release in such a mainstrem console, then don't release the game there or be prepared to be bashed from everywhere!
Maybe the money-hungriness in them made them "release the game anyway!" to the console, but the fact is that I don't even want to play with a free WAD file.
I'm glad I bought it for the PC and was about to buy it in the Wii also, but I first tried the free download and didn't even play the game for free because its unbereable!
A lot of people are having trouble distinguishing between ToMI the game and ToMI the Wii port, and being able to criticize each individually.
The game looks great, and I really want to play it. It looks like Telltale did an excellent job in extending the MI series, and the writing and puzzles seem spot on.
The problem isn't with the game design, its with the technical side of things. The technical flaws noticeably detract from the game-playing experience, and I really wish that wasn't the case. I REALLY want to play ToMI on my platform of choice, but so far I haven't been provided an enjoyable means to do so.
From another thread:
Please Telltale, make this right. Offer a free download of the PC version to anybody dissatisfied with the Wii port. You already got $10 from us, you have nothing to lose by offering a free download to those that could use it.
I also sent the following to Nintendo:
Please raise the Wii Ware size limit from 40MB to something reasonable like 100MB. Keeping the Size at 40MB is crippling game developers and limiting the Wii Ware games to reach full potential. Tales of Monkey Island is a perfect example of how the 40MB cap has hurt developers. the games audio has had to be compressed to a point where it sounds awful.
changing the cap to 100MB is completely acceptable since you are now allowing users to store channels on SD Cards. I understand that games are still copied to the Internal Memory, but this is still ok in my book.
(My Name), Long time Nintendo and Monkey Island Fan.
Never, EVER insult someone's Wii!
Fail. There is no addition at all. In fact, there is a "substraction". You have to stay far below 512 MB, because, like Will already stated, for starting an game from SD card, the game is temporarilly copied to the internal flash memory, on which you need enough free space for the game size.
I agree, but I figure if enough people say something, something might happen.
Hello,
I appreciate your taking the time to share your request that the size limit on Wii Ware be increased. Rest assured that your email will be forwarded on to the appropriate department for further review.
Sincerely,
Bruce (Last name removed)
Nintendo of America Inc.Nintendo's home page: http://www.nintendo.com/
Power Line (Automated Product Info): (###) ###-####
If PSP can handle running games up to 1.8gb directly from a memory stick, why can't Wii run much smaller games from SD cards?
The other potential issue is that SD cards vary in speed. If Nintendo implemented this, they would probably require that any games using this functionality run OK at the lowest SD card speed, rather than telling some customers that their SD cards aren't good enough.
Question: Has the quality of the last two episodes increased at all? No, please don't answer if you didn't notice quality issues in the first one. I did, and it's enough to prevent me from purchasing the next two episodes. For those of you that did notice the quality issues: Has TellTale improved the game at all for the Wii?