Halo 2 – Latest Xbox game to see patch

That was fast, but not unusual. Nice of them to give you something else to play all the same.

Does it scare anyone else that some day in the future, developers will be rushing games to the stores knowing full well that any issues with the game can later be patched online?

I didn't pay $50 a game and $10 a month to become a bug tester...

Fair point, but the difference here is Bungie are not fixing a bug, rather changing the way it works in response to user feedback. In the past we'd have had to lump it and deal with how the game worked - this way things can improve. Surely that is positive?

And that'll be the company line from now on.

There will never be any "bug fixing"... just pro-active response to user feedback.

Thing is, they spend £5,000,000 and 36 months to get it right in the first place. They employ QA, they show it to users and journos. It should be right when its released.

The patch thing is just an excuse for poor QA, like it has been in PC games for years.

One of the down sides to available online content then. I reckon we will only see more of this in the future, they had more than enough time to sort this out the first time round.

What happens, when like me, you dont use the XBox online?

Do without?

I thought so!

If you don't use your Xbox online then you don't need the patch.

In the future, ay?

For years PC games have been guilty of this. (edit: doh! just read Rod Todd's post stating the same)

Does anyone else recall Microsoft swearing that Live wouldn't affect game QA and patches wouldn't be distributed on the system? I might have dreamt it, but if so it was very realistic dream.

It only really affects people who use Live. There have been plenty of games that have needed a tweak to their Live implementation due to the way people use it.

Better than having no service whatsoever nearly *cough*PS2 network play*cough*...