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First Person Shooters (Games) XBox (Games) Entertainment Games

Wolfenstein Xbox Map - Downloaded Or Unlocked? 55

Posted by simoniker from the quick-downloads-and-heightened-suspicions dept.
Thanks to EvilAvatar for pointing to a Boomtown.net article discussing whether the new Xbox Live-exclusive Return To Castle Wolfenstein maps released a couple of days ago were actually downloaded. It seems the size of the files downloaded from Xbox Live were way too small to have been an actual level, despite the official press release indicating it was a "downloadable map", so it's possible the maps were on the game disc all along, and all that was downloaded was an 'unlock levels' message. The Boomtown article puts its own spin on this: "Providing these levels as a sweetener for Live Subscribers would be all very well, if extra development - over and above that of the game itself - is involved. But if the levels are already developed and present on the disk, then the publishers are inviting flak from the many Xbox gamers who don't have broadband."
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Wolfenstein Xbox Map - Downloaded Or Unlocked? More

Wolfenstein Xbox Map - Downloaded Or Unlocked?

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  • Invite to hacking (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Torgo's Pizza ( 547926 ) on Monday June 09, 2003 @04:52PM (#6155393) Homepage Journal
    This is just a plain invitation to hacking if I ever saw one. Any bets on how long it will take to figure out a way to "patch" the game to unlock the levels already on disk (assuming this is true)? Even better yet, if there are already levels hiding on the game disc, will it take very long to figure out a way to "unlock" these extra levels?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Anybody else feel like.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by NanoGator ( 522640 ) on Monday June 09, 2003 @05:00PM (#6155503) Homepage Journal
    ... this is just another blatant tar and feathering for MS? I might have taken this article more seriously if it was made out like the game felt incomplete without those levels.

    Sorry, no sympathy here. Non XBOX-Live subscribers wouldn't have gotten the levels anyway if the maps weren't on the disc. Pardon them for saving you the download time.
    • I think the point was that Microsoft is misrepresenting this as a "feature" when in reality all you're doing is downloading a code that lets you access the levels that are already on your disc.

      I'm sure when Microsoft said "downloadable levels!" people did NOT think this meant "download a small key that unlocks some files already on the game disc."

      Maybe this is the way Microsoft wanted it, so they can claim they never meant you downloaded the actual levels...
      • "I think the point was that Microsoft is misrepresenting this as a "feature" when in reality all you're doing is downloading a code that lets you access the levels that are already on your disc."

        Assuming that MS (actually this'd be Activision) never ever makes a downloadable map, then I'd say you're right. However, it's really not that clear. 8 blocks (roughly 128k, if I did my math right. Corrections appreciated.) is a LOT of information to say "okay, unlock this map."

        So what can be stored there? We

  • Unlockables vs New Content (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MBCook ( 132727 ) <foobarsoft@foobarsoft.com> on Monday June 09, 2003 @05:04PM (#6155536) Homepage
    There is a big difference between Unlockables and New Content. I don't think they would be getting any heat if they has simply said "Plus new level(s) will be unlockable with X-Box Live!", instead of saying that it was brand new and downloaded. If you make unlockables, you should make a way for people w/o X-Box live (like those w/o broadband) to get them. You should be able to go to a website to get a password, send in a postcard, or have some special code that you enter at the main menu that gets published in game magazines when they announce that a new level can be downloaded. Now in this case it seems a bit pointless to release a multiplayer map to people who in all likely hood don't play multiplayer nearly as much as those who have X-Box Live. But if it was something like The Sims and they had furniture that couldn't be unlocked, I could see a big fuss over that.

    Still, none if this would happen if there were just clear up front. Now if they DO start to make levels that are ACTUALLY DOWNLOADED then that's fine with me too.

    PS: All of this is on the assumption that it's not downloaded, because if it is then this whole argument is moot since the article is moot.

    • "I don't think they would be getting any heat if they has simply said "Plus new level(s) will be unlockable with X-Box Live!", instead of saying that it was brand new and downloaded."

      You realize that this entire argument suddenly goes moot when they do make a new downloadable map.

    • Re:Unlockables vs New Content (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Guppy06 ( 410832 ) on Monday June 09, 2003 @06:10PM (#6156276)
      "If you make unlockables, you should make a way for people w/o X-Box live (like those w/o broadband) to get them."

      I'm a little torn myself. One of their competitors (and my personal favorite), Nintendo, has games with "unlockables" that involve plugging in a Game Boy Advance, sometimes with an associated GBA game. While I of course have a GBA, I'm sure there are people out there that have a GCN but no GBA (probably similar to the number of people who own a Virtual Boy, but bear with me) that aren't able to, say, play the original Metroid game in Metroid Prime. The packaging doesn't announce this (simply a vague reference to "links to Metroid Fusion"), and so it's also possible to buy Metroid Prime without knowing this, but should Nintendo really make it possible to unlock GCN game features without a GBA?

      Part of me wants to say that the customer more or less knew what he was getting into when he bought the product. And the game is complete and useable in and of itself without this "bonus" map. Should the publishers be obligated to their customers that don't spend the extra money on other products to unlock these features? Should Devastator only have been sold as a set instead of six individual Constructicons with an "unlockable feature?"

      Right now I'm leaning towards letting Xbox players have this without broadband, but only because there's a difference between being able to buy a GBA/Transformers/etc. and being able to buy broadband.
    • "PS: All of this is on the assumption that it's not downloaded, because if it is then this whole argument is moot since the article is moot."

      I find it interesting that they're assuming that a small file = no game content. Textures are the memory hogs, not the mesh of the map. The textures were probably on the disc and they just sent down the vertices. 128k can hold a LOT of vertex co-ordinates. Gee, imagine them trying to keep map sizes small so you could easily transmit them over the internet and sto
    • They can (and have done, and are planning to) publish extra content for xbox games through the official xbox magazine (it includes a cd every month).

      In the next couple of months, the cd will include a patch and a couple of extra maps for unreal championship.

      In the past, extra content for Dead or Alive (the fighting game, not the swimsuit issue) was published this same way.

  • Maybe it was a patch needed to run the maps... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by seigniory ( 89942 ) <bigfriggin.me@com> on Monday June 09, 2003 @05:14PM (#6155655)
    Just like /. to go off and assume the worst.

    Maybe the maps were buggy and to save d/l time they put the incomplete maps on the disc, and the patches to the map on XBox Live.

    XBL is still a fantastic service. The fact that MS runs it should in no way detract from that.
  • They advertised a certain number of levels that you get with the game, plus a certain number extra that you get with XBox Live. This is called an incentive- yes, an incentive to get you to spend your money on XBox Live. I don't see a problem with this, so long as they advertise it as such- which I feel like they did.

    The exact way in which that extra content becomes playable to you is a design detail- not something to get all riled up about.

    • Re:What's the problem? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by mythr ( 260723 )
      ...but... but... please, think about those poor 56kers!? Why shouldn't they be able to unlock it too? ;)

      I'm with you on this one, man. Though I'd normally take any opportunity to tar and feather Microsoft and its affiliates, this is hardly newsworthy. The fact is that most were more than satisfied without these extra levels, and are just looking for a reason to be the martyr o' the day.
      • "The fact is that most were more than satisfied without these extra levels, and are just looking for a reason to be the martyr o' the day."

        It's also a fact that the 130 or so KB that were transferred could easily have held a map. The textures were probably on the disc. Why it's more likely that the 130KB was spent telling the XBOX it's okay to open a map on the disc escapes me.
    • "This is called an incentive- yes, an incentive to get you to spend your money on XBox Live."

      But you're lumping the people who won't spend the money on Xbox Live with the people who can't spend money on Xbox Live. Why should the people who happen to live too far away from their ISP be marginalized?
      • Because, for all you know, the added cost in developing those levels was spent with the idea in mind that it would be recouperated via XBox Live proceeeds. There may have been / probably was an incentive given to the developers by Microsoft for this. So, your argument of "they're already there, it's unfair to not let certain people play them" simply isn't valid: without this pricing model in place, the levels probably wouldn't have been created to begin with.
        You're complaining about it because you have
      • Because they still knew what they were buying going into the game. If you don't (or can't) get XBL, you can't get the extra level. That's it. That's how it was advertised and that's how it works. It's not like Microsoft pulled a bait-and-switch.

        This wouldn't have made the news if it wasn't from Microsoft. This story was simply an excuse to start MS bashing. In my opinion, the only even potential wrongdoing was the distinction between "unlockable" and "downloadable" and if you really feel that Microso
        • This story was simply an excuse to start MS bashing.
          And how!

          On a serious note though it wouldnt have made a story if it was from most other companies. But neither do the single murderes, Serial killers on the other hand make the news. (M$ is constantly using dirty tricks so show them up for the evil doers they are.)
        • I think what gets people mad about this, is the fact that the "downloadable" content schtick that MS assured everybody would be a primary focus for x-box live content is continuing to disappoint.

          When you promise people "new levels", if they have x-box live and then those "new levels" turned out to be on the disk in the first place, this angers people. You can liken it to getting a "super-sized" meal at mcdonald's only to find that the extra fries were hidden in a false bottom in the fry box all along.
          • "You can liken it to getting a "super-sized" meal at mcdonald's only to find that the extra fries were hidden in a false bottom in the fry box all along. "

            Either way, McDonald's still went through extra expense to make those extra fries whether you paid for them or not.
            • What!? Are we talking about the same thing here?

              That is why at times I hate using metaphors, some people don't understand them and then try to stretch them too far...

              • "That is why at times I hate using metaphors, some people don't understand them and then try to stretch them too far..."

                The point is that in your metaphor, McDonald's still paid for the ingredients + preparation of the extra fries, whether the customer bought and ate them or not. Activision put money and time into making those map levels.

                That help a little? I'd go into more detailed, but I'm on meds right now and am worried that if I type much longer I'll be really confusing. ;)
                • That's not at all my point. My point is that customers get angry when they find out that they are not really getting something "free"

                  MS promises "hey look, free maps if you join" Joe Six-Pack gets live and says "cool new maps" Later he finds out that the maps were always there. Joe is Mad.

                  What MS is doing isn't wrong per se, it's just misleading. "Downloading" a new map is not the same as "unlocking" a new map even if the end results are the same.
      • But you're lumping the people who won't spend the money on Xbox Live with the people who can't spend money on Xbox Live. Why should the people who happen to live too far away from their ISP be marginalized?

        But you're lumping the people who won't spend money on a boat with the people who can't spend money on a boat. Why should the people who happen to live too far from the ocean be marginalized!

        In other words, who cares? You aren't automatically entitiled to things. If you can't get something because o
        • "In other words, who cares?"

          I would hope Microsoft does if they ever intend to break even from this financial nightmare. We're not talking about a boat trailer here; games that rely too heavily on a system add-on will be doomed to the same fate as Sega CD games, and the last thing they need is to have their sales hampered by geography as well as lackluster sales.
          • Because, dear God, an addon map as a bonus for people that bought a service from them is relying overly much on their Live service! Especially considering the fact that the game was complete and whole without the add-on level!

  • Dreamcast did the same thing (Score:5, Informative)

    by ragingmime ( 636249 ) <ragingmime&yahoo,com> on Monday June 09, 2003 @05:55PM (#6156101) Homepage
    I remember Sonic Adventure 2 for Dreamcast doing the same thing... there were costumes and menu themes that you could unlock by downloading files from the game's website, but each file was only 1k and so they must've been just "unlock this" messages. I think there were some new go-kart courses that you could download, too, but those weren't actually included with the game... you really did download those. Granted, there's a lot more space on the Xbox's hard drive than there is on a Dreamcast VMU... Sega at least had an excuse to offer files like that.
    • The Dreamcast modem was also included for free, the browser was included for free, and it connected to your ordinary dial-up service for free, so that unlockable was really just an incentive to go see the ads on their site. This makes the Sonic Adventure unlockables quite reasonable. This unlockable is a sneaky trick that claims to be possible only because of the expensive X-Box Live technology, which isn't even available to people in areas without broadband unless they fake it using a network sharing a di

  • reminds me of something else (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Frac ( 27516 ) on Monday June 09, 2003 @06:26PM (#6156435)
    "But if the levels are already developed and present on the disk, then the publishers are inviting flak from the many Xbox gamers who don't have broadband."

    Kinda like getting the "early peek" of unpublished news if you're a slashdot subscriber?

    Christ, deal with it - you pay extra for Xbox live, you're rewarded with extra levels. You pay for slashdot subscription, you're rewarded with banner-free pages and early peeks of articles. Same difference!
  • That's something of a rhetorical question, whose answer can be found [a href="http://games.activision.com/games/rtcw_cons o le/index.html"]here[/a]. There were a couple of outside development teams involved but my point here is that the game was released under the auspices of Id and Activision, and that any potential criticism should be directed their way as well. If there is some sort of skullduggery here, Id/Activision would clearly have been involved.

    Of course, there should be no criticism at all unt

  • Meh, this is such a non issue. The main attraction of Xbox Live is to compete against other subscribers. The "downloadable" content is a bonus.

    So Wolfenstein doesn't actually download anything? Who cares. Nintendo has been doing this for a while and nobody protested.

    Consider Animal Crossing: You get the game, then get a GBA + link cable + e-reader (that plugs into GBA) so you can buy a pack of cards (on top of all that) that "adds" new functionality to the game.

    Why do we accept this? Because consol
  • The map is only FOUR blocks, not eight.

    "Barn", the extra map, weighs in at four blocks: Is that possible? I highly doubt it. By comparison, the extra maps in MechAssault range from 627 to 2104 blocks. Hell, even your standard Wolfenstein profile weighs in at more than twice the size of Barn.

    But really, does it matter? The multiplayer maps are inaccessible to the single player or the single machine (you can't do multiplay on the same box, only co-op). It's purely a Live incentive to get people to play
  • Can't those files on the cd be accessed in any way?

    I mean wolfenstein is quake3 based game and it's maps and all are .pk3 files, which is a normal .zip file that can opened up easily and seen what's in there. That map would have to be in one of the .pk3 files of the xbox edition.

    In many cases there are some interesting file inside the .pk3 files, not only in mods, but also in the shipped .pk3 files (developers configs and such stuff for example).

    Thenagain I'm not at all familiar with xbox or what one can
  • Perhaps the maps weren't quite complete when it came time to release to manufacturing but weren't worth holding the release up for. So they dumped whatever version they had on the game disk so they could just issue a small patch later to put the fixed maps live.

    I'm not sure if I believe this or not. If they'd already implemented an after-the-fact level patch system (and it'd be a sensible thing to do) then this would be a no-brainer. But if they hadn't, it would be a lot of work to save everyone a bit of d

  • Been there, almost tried that (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Chelloveck ( 14643 ) on Tuesday June 10, 2003 @07:39AM (#6159757)

    Back a few years now, when I worked for a company programming console games, someone suggested that we make a game with add-on capabilities. As I recall, it was going to be a PlayStation game in which you could build your own monsters. The add-ons were to be new monsters and monster parts. We had to come up with a way to distribute the add-ons. One idea was to store them on memory cards. Another was to put them in the main game, and only distribute the unlock codes on the cards.

    I'd argued against the unlock codes. I figured that players would be pissed when they found out that all the "add-on" parts were on the disc that they had already paid for, but were locked away until they paid extra for a key. Actually buying new content is psychologically different from paying again to unlock something you already have, even if the end result is the same. For example, how many of you would have felt cheated if, say, C&C had had expansion maps on the main disc which you had to buy an unlock code for? But how many of you happily plunked down another $25 each for the expansion packs?

    The monster game was never made, but I'm happy to see that at least some gamers feel cheated, just as I'd predicted.

  • Do these games not have a license that states that the game media contains additional data that is inaccessible to the user without the purchase of an additional Xbox Live license, or some such clause?

    Apart from the alleged activation vs. download issue, I would think it reasonable for someone to assume that anything on the purchased media was for the use of the user who licensed the media, unless stated otherwise. Like the earlier french fry analogy, the fast food franchise would have to disclose that th

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