Some serious issues with the latest patch

[Marberi]

I purchased the game (Mac version) on Sunday, I tested it thoroughly for a couple of days and had no problems whatsoever. But after downloading the latest patch yesterday and restarting the game today, I've been having all kinds of problems.

1. Game keeps crashing at every turn: whenever I try to load a created league and whenever I try to load a quickstart game (the latter being a recurring issue I've been having since v.11, btw).

2. Backup functions are not working properly. I've tried restoring the 2 leagues I created that keep crashing and neither file worked properly, as both kept crashing too! I realize the files may be corrupted, but I put too much time and effort in those 2 just to lose all of it just like that. And worse, what caused said corruption of the files and, will this keep happening every time I create a new league and reload it?

3. The home/away jerseys function, while very cool, is clearly causing problems, as the loaded home jerseys keep reverting to the default and there's no way to update player pictures.

Frankly, I'm afraid of continuing to test the game, because things are getting to the point where I don't know what other bug will cause a crash, a glitch or some other problem that won't allow me to enjoy OOTP at its full capacity.

I would appreciate any help or guidance as to how I can get in touch with someone who can work with me to solve this issues, so that I don't have to cancel my license and request a refund.

Thanks in advance.

[Aumakua]

Originally Posted by Marberi

I purchased the game (Mac version) on Sunday, I tested it thoroughly for a couple of days and had no problems whatsoever. But after downloading the latest patch yesterday and restarting the game today, I've been having all kinds of problems.

1. Game keeps crashing at every turn: whenever I try to load a created league and whenever I try to load a quickstart game (the latter being a recurring issue I've been having since v.11, btw).

2. Backup functions are not working properly. I've tried restoring the 2 leagues I created that keep crashing and neither file worked properly, as both kept crashing too! I realize the files may be corrupted, but I put too much time and effort in those 2 just to lose all of it just like that. And worse, what caused said corruption of the files and, will this keep happening every time I create a new league and reload it?

3. The home/away jerseys function, while very cool, is clearly causing problems, as the loaded home jerseys keep reverting to the default and there's no way to update player pictures.

Frankly, I'm afraid of continuing to test the game, because things are getting to the point where I don't know what other bug will cause a crash, a glitch or some other problem that won't allow me to enjoy OOTP at its full capacity.

I would appreciate any help or guidance as to how I can get in touch with someone who can work with me to solve this issues, so that I don't have to cancel my license and request a refund.

Thanks in advance.

Ditch the MAC

[Charlie Hough]

Quickstarts are usually not compatible with future versions. So if you're using a quickstart that was created before OOTP 14, I wouldn't expect it to work.

You may have managed to corrupt your backups or original league files, so the game can't restore from them.

But, in the end, I agree with Aumaka. If you're going to play any sort of serious computer game, you need to use a PC. Macs are made for creative professionals (graphic designers, page layout specialists, musicians and composers, etc). Apple has never made gaming a priority, so games will always have problems due to lack of support from both sides. It's more trouble than it's worth.

[Marberi]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Quickstarts are usually not compatible with future versions. So if you're using a quickstart that was created before OOTP 14, I wouldn't expect it to work.

The problem's with v.14's quickstarts. I haven't tried loading older ones.

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

You may have managed to corrupt your backups or original league files, so the game can't restore from them.

Yep, I had already thought of this possibility and have deleted those 2 leagues (original and backups, both).

Funny thing's that both files had been working like a charm till I installed the latest patch last night…not to mention how painful it was to see all the time I devoted to creating those leagues go down the drain, right in the middle of the 2 seasons (and that's not even counting a Smoltz's no-no through 7 in a historical league vs. the Phils that I lost in one of the countless crashes I've had so far).

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

But, in the end, I agree with Aumaka. If you're going to play any sort of serious computer game, you need to use a PC. Macs are made for creative professionals (graphic designers, page layout specialists, musicians and composers, etc). Apple has never made gaming a priority, so games will always have problems due to lack of support from both sides. It's more trouble than it's worth.

Yeah I hear you. I've been a Mac user since the mid-90's, so I know how quirky these computers can be with games.

But see, the problem is that I've been playing OOTP on a Mac since 2008 and I've never encountered these many problems (and as serious as to not be able to play the game at all!) before. Add to that the fact that the game was running as smoothly as a babe's behind before I installed the patch and you can see that the problem does not lie on my using a Mac.

Besides, you can't make a certain product available to your customers unless you've made absolutely positive that it's working properly. If OOTP won't run smoothly on a Mac, then perhaps OOTP Developments shouldn't make the Mac version available to the public, at least till they've made absolutely certain that it's working properly.

Well, I've spent all day trying to solve this problem to no avail and I'm certainly not about to "ditch my Mac" because of this lol!

So I think I'll ask for a refund and leave it at that. Frankly, I'd rather go back to previous versions (11 is my favorite) than to have a faulty game that I can't even play for 5 mins. before it crashes.

Thank you very much for your reply, Charlie Hough and also, for your mods site: a terrific replacement for the old Padresfan's site!

[akw4572]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Quickstarts are usually not compatible with future versions. So if you're using a quickstart that was created before OOTP 14, I wouldn't expect it to work.

You may have managed to corrupt your backups or original league files, so the game can't restore from them.

But, in the end, I agree with Aumaka. If you're going to play any sort of serious computer game, you need to use a PC. Macs are made for creative professionals (graphic designers, page layout specialists, musicians and composers, etc). Apple has never made gaming a priority, so games will always have problems due to lack of support from both sides. It's more trouble than it's worth.

Um, in the end, OOTP 14 is made for macs. I have a Mac. If the game is advertised for Macs, it should work for Macs. I'm not having a problem with the game, but that answer is way off base. To the OP, keep at it, contact tech support, I'm sure they'll help you out.

[Marberi]

Originally Posted by akw4572

Um, in the end, OOTP 14 is made for macs. I have a Mac. If the game is advertised for Macs, it should work for Macs. I'm not having a problem with the game, but that answer is way off base. To the OP, keep at it, contact tech support, I'm sure they'll help you out.

Exactly. If the game's made available for Mac, Windows and Linux, then it should run properly in all 3 systems. No excuses.

I too wasn't having any problems with the game in Mac till I installed the latest patch (got the game on Sunday), like I said before. So obviously, the problem is not the Mac version, but something else entirely.

As for Tech Support, I went to the site, registered, received confirmation on my registration, tried to access the site (several times), refreshed and all I got was a blank page. I read on another thread that we should clean our caches before trying to access the TS forums because OOTP just changed servers and I did just that…to no avail.

I'm trying to contact OOTP support as we speak and hopefully, will finally get a reply. Not giving up just yet. Thanks for your reply.

[BIG17EASY]

Owning a Mac has nothing to do with it. I have a Mac and have been playing OOTP since I bought it 2.5 years ago. Maybe there's something wrong with your machine, but it's not because it's a Mac. Those suggesting so should stop because you're potentially misinforming other Mac users who are considering a purchase or upgrade to OOTP14.

[Marberi]

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

Owning a Mac has nothing to do with it. I have a Mac and have been playing OOTP since I bought it 2.5 years ago. Maybe there's something wrong with your machine, but it's not because it's a Mac. Those suggesting so should stop because you're potentially misinforming other Mac users who are considering a purchase or upgrade to OOTP14.

Absolutely correct.

I've been playing OOTP on a Mac since '08 and I had never had any problems before. So obviously, the problem is not the Mac version and it's important to make that perfectly clear, yes.

As for my machine, I thought the same, so I'm running v.11 as we speak (just to make sure that the problem's not here) and it's running as smoothly as it always has. So it seems like that's not the problem either.

[endgame]

Originally Posted by Marberi

Absolutely correct.

I've been playing OOTP on a Mac since '08 and I had never had any problems before. So obviously, the problem is not the Mac version and it's important to make that perfectly clear, yes.

As for my machine, I thought the same, so I'm running v.11 as we speak (just to make sure that the problem's not here) and it's running as smoothly as it always has. So it seems like that's not the problem either.

While I agree we should not jump quickly to judge the Mac's prowess for utilizing gaming software, I would like to take exception or at least clarify your position on not having problems before, specifically with the quickstart when you said, "1. Game keeps crashing at every turn: whenever I try to load a created league and whenever I try to load a quickstart game (the latter being a recurring issue I've been having since v.11, btw)." Those were quickstart problems? OOTP problems? Version problems? Or were they similar to your current problems?

[Charlie Hough]

Originally Posted by akw4572

Um, in the end, OOTP 14 is made for macs. I have a Mac. If the game is advertised for Macs, it should work for Macs. I'm not having a problem with the game, but that answer is way off base. To the OP, keep at it, contact tech support, I'm sure they'll help you out.

My post was not an "answer" and had nothing to do with explaining a particular problem or whether OOTP Developments is responsible for anything. No one is making excuses.

Yes, if a developer releases a game that is supposed to be compatible and fully supported for Mac, then the user should be able to expect that it works well and that there aren't major problems. Guess what? It rarely works that way. Instead, the products often don't work well or work the same, and there are problems. I'm pointing out the obvious, consistent, widespread issue that I've seen universally across numerous gaming titles for the past 20+ years.

If people insist on owning a Mac, then they will have problems with games, licensing issues, patch support, etc. I have never meet a Mac gamer that did not suffer from these problems. And it's because the support for Mac is almost always lacking compared to the PC versions of games.

Some of the biggest selling games with armies of developers and support systems fail when it comes to Macs. Smaller developers sometimes do worse. It's because Mac is a secondary platform for gaming, a secondary platform for programming, the audience is vastly smaller than the PC audience, and, therefore, Macs are often an afterthought or get minimal resource dedication. It's simple math. Mac's market share of the personal computing market is about 5%. So it's going to get about 5% of the resources and dedication from developers.

We can blame it on the developers all we want, but remember the old saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result? If you keep using a Mac for games and expecting the games to work seamlessly and to not have various issues due to lack of support and resources, then you're going to be disappointed.

I've seen it countless times with dozens of products. The complaints are always the same. So, while the developers are to blame for the issues, the users are doing themselves no favors by sticking to hardware and an OS that will always be doomed to weaker support from developers.

You can agree or disagree, you can like it or not like it, but I've got over 20 years of evidence and millions of forum posts from all over the Internet to provide overwhelming proof that this is a commonplace problem that plagues many gaming titles.

I stopped using Macs in the mid-90s because I got tired of the poor games selection and wasn't going to suffer through the nonsense explained above. Plus, I could get anything I needed for productivity or creative applications from a PC. That solved everything for me.

But if you'd prefer to keep slogging through it and waiting for responses to support tickets, waiting for patch fixes, and trying to find those rare Mac users that can help you, then, by all means, keep right on going. We all make our choices in life, but I don't have time to waste on being disappointed.

[Marberi]

Originally Posted by endgame

While I agree we should not jump quickly to judge the Mac's prowess for utilizing gaming software, I would like to take exception or at least clarify your position on not having problems before, specifically with the quickstart when you said, "1. Game keeps crashing at every turn: whenever I try to load a created league and whenever I try to load a quickstart game (the latter being a recurring issue I've been having since v.11, btw)." Those were quickstart problems? OOTP problems? Version problems? Or were they similar to your current problems?

To answer your questions:

Quickstart problems I had only encountered in OOTP 11, which I was able to solve w/o the need to call on Tech Support, fortunately.

And no, that was nothing like the problems I'm currently experiencing. My current problem is just one actually, and it's very simple:

The game is not working at all.

Never mind the quickstart crashes. The game's crashing at every turn, like I said before. Cannot use the new "away jerseys" feature because if I do, the game fails to recognize the home jerseys, reverts to the default and it won't update player pictures. The game crashes in the middle of PBP, every time I try to make a substitution, making it impossible to actually "play" a game.

That's why I opened this thread. Because the situation's unlike anything I've experienced with any of the previous versions of this game that I've purchased and since I hadn't been unable to contact Tech Support, I thought I may get some guidance, advise or useful tips or catch the attention of some OOTP Dev. team member who could lead me in the right direction.

[Cinnamon J. Scudworth]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

I stopped using Macs in the mid-90s

This, and your statement about Macs being for "creative professionals" (which has also not really been true for at least 10+ years -- Apple basically ceded that niche they were stuck with the G4 processor for several years past its competitive life) really should discourage you from making blanket statements about the Mac platform.

In any case, it's a completely unhelpful response in the context of a game like OOTP which has pretty minimal spec requirements and a strong record of working fine for Macs.

[zroberts1991]

I think the OOTP staff is incredible and one of the best when it comes to customer service and patching their games.

You're right that macs aren't the greatest platform for gaming, but I've been running OOTP on my mac for years and the game had crashed on me maybe three to four times.

I've had the game crash more this version on me than all previous years combined, actually its crashed more on me since this patch has been released then ever before.

Its a great game but for some reason this years version is unstable on our operating system compared to all other years. I understand the argument about Macs not being a gamer platform, but OOTP has really been the only game I've ever played and its always worked fine for me on my Mac so I never saw a reason to get a PC.

It is frustrating for us that a product that has been so stable for so many years suddenly isn't.

I actually just lost game one of the world series because the game had just crashed on me when I had a 4-0 lead in the 9th inning. Had to replay the game and lost, sure it could've gone the other way but its never fun replaying a game, especially one you had already won. I have my game set to save once every week now due to the instability when I always used to have the auto save feature enabled just once a year.

[silvam14]

I think the only thing that would be detrimental to having a mac is that there may not be as many users who can help them as I assume most use PCs.

That is all

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

My post was not an "answer" and had nothing to do with explaining a particular problem or whether OOTP Developments is responsible for anything. No one is making excuses.

Yes, if a developer releases a game that is supposed to be compatible and fully supported for Mac, then the user should be able to expect that it works well and that there aren't major problems. Guess what? It rarely works that way. Instead, the products often don't work well or work the same, and there are problems. I'm pointing out the obvious, consistent, widespread issue that I've seen universally across numerous gaming titles for the past 20+ years.

If people insist on owning a Mac, then they will have problems with games, licensing issues, patch support, etc. I have never meet a Mac gamer that did not suffer from these problems. And it's because the support for Mac is almost always lacking compared to the PC versions of games.

Some of the biggest selling games with armies of developers and support systems fail when it comes to Macs. Smaller developers sometimes do worse. It's because Mac is a secondary platform for gaming, a secondary platform for programming, the audience is vastly smaller than the PC audience, and, therefore, Macs are often an afterthought or get minimal resource dedication. It's simple math. Mac's market share of the personal computing market is about 5%. So it's going to get about 5% of the resources and dedication from developers.

We can blame it on the developers all we want, but remember the old saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result? If you keep using a Mac for games and expecting the games to work seamlessly and to not have various issues due to lack of support and resources, then you're going to be disappointed.

I've seen it countless times with dozens of products. The complaints are always the same. So, while the developers are to blame for the issues, the users are doing themselves no favors by sticking to hardware and an OS that will always be doomed to weaker support from developers.

You can agree or disagree, you can like it or not like it, but I've got over 20 years of evidence and millions of forum posts from all over the Internet to provide overwhelming proof that this is a commonplace problem that plagues many gaming titles.

I stopped using Macs in the mid-90s because I got tired of the poor games selection and wasn't going to suffer through the nonsense explained above. Plus, I could get anything I needed for productivity or creative applications from a PC. That solved everything for me.

But if you'd prefer to keep slogging through it and waiting for responses to support tickets, waiting for patch fixes, and trying to find those rare Mac users that can help you, then, by all means, keep right on going. We all make our choices in life, but I don't have time to waste on being disappointed.

I respect your opinions, Charlie, as you're a very helpful member of these forums. But this is not a Mac problem and the proof is simple -- there are tons of people using Windows-based machines who are having problems, as well. While you're right that Macs are not the best machines for gaming, OOTP is text sim, not a high-end game like World of Warcraft or Call of Duty or anything like that. Read through these forums and you'll see tons of people using Windows who are complaining about crashes. In fact, the biggest "complaint" from a Mac user until this thread has been that people can't find the folder with game data because it's hidden.

I'll also second Cinnamon's post that Macs ceased to be niche products years ago. Not only has the functionality come more in line with Windows, which makes them much more user-friendly, but (aside from high-end gaming), they've become superior in many ways except for price. And there's a reason an iMac costs more than a Windows desktop, and more importantly, there's a reason LOTS of people are willing to pay the price to buy one.

By the way, here's an article from a year ago that shows Apple desktops as the only major brand increasing in market share, which was at 12% in the second quarter of 2012. http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2079015

[Ty Cobb]

Originally Posted by Aumakua

Ditch the MAC

Can we PLEASE avoid another infantile round of platform wars? Ditch the attitude.

[Marberi]

Just got an email from OOTP Tech Support, informing me that there's a bug in the latest patch for Mac. Fortunately, Andreas has created a special debug to solve the problem.

I want to thank all users who contributed with ideas and suggestions to help. Gotta love this game, its creators for their thorough dedication and this community for always sticking w/each other, despite the difference in computer ideologies & preferences

[endgame]

Originally Posted by Marberi

Just got an email from OOTP Tech Support, informing me that there's a bug in the latest patch for Mac. Fortunately, Andreas has created a special debug to solve the problem.

I want to thank all users who contributed with ideas and questions to help. Gotta love this game, its creators for their thorough dedication and this community for always sticking w/each other, despite the difference in computer ideologies & preferences

Great news, Marberi. Thanks for sharing. Guess my only question at the end of this is, why haven't we experienced an onslaught of Mac users with similar issues? I'd have expected that.

Regardless, glad there was a solution and it came quickly for you. And big shout out to Tech Support for staying on top of it.

[Marberi]

Originally Posted by endgame

Great news, Marberi. Thanks for sharing. Guess my only question at the end of this is, why haven't we experienced an onslaught of Mac users with similar issues? I'd have expected that.

Regardless, glad there was a solution and it came quickly for you. And big shout out to Tech Support for staying on top of it.

Thanks, endgame. Needless to say, I'm thrilled that a solution could be found, and so quickly besides!

Haven't tested the new patch yet (just getting back from lunch) but I'm looking fwd. to a full weekend of testing, starting tonight after work

On the email, TS told me that they have received similar reports from other Mac users (which is what prompted Andreas to work on debugging the thing in the first place), but I guess they just haven't posted them here in the forum.

As for OOTP Tech Support, those guys/gals are just like the game itself: first rate, beyond the shadow of the doubt

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by Marberi

Thanks, endgame. Needless to say, I'm thrilled that a solution could be found, and so quickly besides!

Haven't tested the new patch yet (just getting back from lunch) but I'm looking fwd. to a full weekend of testing, starting tonight after work

On the email, TS told me that they have received similar reports from other Mac users (which is what prompted Andreas to work on debugging the thing in the first place), but I guess they just haven't posted them here in the forum.

As for OOTP Tech Support, those guys/gals are just like the game itself: first rate, beyond the shadow of the doubt

Did Andreas say when the new Mac patch would be out? Or is it out already and I missed it?