Moon

LOL! It's so perfectly suited as it applies to 100% of the people reading this, unlike some other comparisons. For example upgrades to forum software Martin

Hi huhr, this is how upgrades work, for every product that is upgradeable. We didn't invent this Someone buying a computer for the first time today pays only for that new computer, while if you bought a computer 5 years ago and are now buying a new one or buying a new component, you have "to pay more money" to have the same thing. But the person buying a computer for the first time didn't use it for those 5 years that you used yours. So the limited comparison you draw is flawed. Having said that... the Upgrades won't be expensive. And for the most part they will be optional, too. Martin

Thanks for the heads up. This should say "will be available" for now... I'll fix that shortly. Martin

The EU is bigger than the four examples I gave, but the Rest of the World including other countries is considerably bigger than the EU, of course. Purely in terms of population, that is, but that's the figure you used Sales in the EU are great, and have been continuously increasing in the past years. People who don't like the VAT they have to pay (which apply to anything you buy in that country, btw) can always opt for the download only option.

By default, you get one serial if you purchase "download" or "download&mail", with twice the number of activations. You get two serials if you purchase "mail only". If you need two serials for "download" or "download&mail", go to www.battlefront.com/helpdesk, click on "Submit Ticket", and we can help you.

Yes, but the right place to complain about that would be the Royal Mail discussion forum. Oh wait, they don't have one...

I'll crosspost my reply below. CW didn't have printed goods.

Oh, that's a bit of a long story. The main problem are the printed manuals and the tin cases, which would have to be shipped from the US to the EU warehouse because it's too expensive to have them produced in the EU AND the US separately. We had a lot of issues with EU customs in the more recent past, with huge inexplicable delays that make any kind of release schedule totally unreliable. Worst case, EU customers may end up having to wait 6 months on their hardgoods, because that's how long the last shipment we attempted got stuck! So the only viable option is to ship from the US. While this certainly is not as convenient for EU customers as when we ship from Germany, it isn't any different than it's always been for all other international non-EU customer (Canada, Australia/NZ, China... just to name a few of the biggest ones). Martin

Quote from the preorder page: You can of course wait until the game is released and then go for the download only option if you don't want to pay the UK Royal Mail fee or VAT.

The system requirements are already posted on the preorder page. In short, no changes. However, if your video card does not support shaders, they will be automatically turned off in the background. Phil can answer the more technical stuff about that when he's around, it seems a number of video drivers are broken these days.

Yes, this is the roadmap for the next 12 months. All of these are in active development already.

Since the beginning of the Combat Mission, more than a dozen years ago, customers have asked for the ability to keep their favorite games up-to-date with improvements made for newer games. After years of careful planning we are happy to announce that Upgrades are soon to be a standard option for Combat Mission customers. In regular intervals, we will release a totally new standalone game which includes a host of major and minor improvements that go way beyond bug fixes and tweaks to existing features. What sorts of features are we talking about? Read up on the new features of Combat Mission: Fortress Italy to see what we're talking about, because all those features are now part of the CMx2 Game Engine Version 2.0 standard. A few months after the new game releases, owners of previous Combat Mission games can purchase Upgrades to add those features to CM products they already own. The delayed availability is necessary to ensure that our small team has enough time to ensure quality control (especially backwards compatibility) before releasing them. Each distinct "family" of Combat Mission games only needs one upgrade regardless of how many Modules are already owned. New Modules (not released yet when an upgrade is available) will use features only found in the latest version, so existing customers must Upgrade if they want to use new Modules. Upgrades are backwards compatible with all battles and campaigns, no matter who authored them or which units/terrain are used within them. Some Mods will work without modification, others may need to be updated to take advantage of game engine changes. Once an Upgrade is released those features become standard for all new customers. Existing customers can purchase the features as a stand alone Upgrade for the game of their choice. The previous version of each game will continue being sold for some time, at a discounted price (and can of course be upgraded later on if desired). The new Upgrade concept offers customers, new and old, a variety of new purchase options. Existing customers can buy an Upgrade for a previous CM family they own on its own, or bundled with a new Module at a discounted price. New customers can either purchase the current version game at full price or the previous version at a discount. As always, we will continue to release free patches to fix technical problems and improve the performance of existing features as needed. Upgrades are not paid patches, but come with major new features that offer new functionality and game play elements. Unfortunately, we can not offer Upgrades for CMx1 games, CM Shock Force and Afghanistan. Too much has changed with the basic code, artwork, and file formats to make this practical since their releases to make backwards compatibility viable. So, what does this mean in concrete terms for you right now, playing Combat Mission: Battle for Normandy and enviously gawking at the Combat Mission: Fortress Italy feature list? It means that once CMFI is out sometime in August, we'll work on an Upgrade 2.0 for CMBN. You will be able to buy this upgrade (the price is not yet determined), install it and voila, you will have Combat Mission: Battle for Normandy v2.0!!! The upgrade will automatically work for the base game and the Commonwealth module. The next module in the CM:BN family (more about this in the coming days) will already be featuring CMx2 v2.0, and will *require* that upgrade. Questions?

Combat Mission fans have a lot to look forward to in the next year as the CMx2 game engine continues to produce games at an every faster pace. At the moment we have three games in active development and more planned. While we aren't in a position to make detailed announcements right now, we can tell you what the three are about (in no particular order): 1. CM: Battle for Normandy Module 2. This Module picks up where CM:BN and Commonwealth left off... with the September push out of France to the German border. The content centers around Operation Market Garden, though it covers more ground than just that. The game includes a number of new vehicles, formations, and new terrain models/textures. Adding new terrain, a first for any Module so far, ensures that you feel like you're fighting near Germany and not still back at the beacheads. 2. CM: Eastern Front 1. The first of four Eastern Front "families" starts with Operation Bagration (June 1944) and eventually covers through to the end of the war (May 1945). For many tactical warfare enthusiasts, this period is considered the most tactically interesting since both sides were at their peak of their military technology, organization, and experience. The scope and scale of the combat offers plenty of subject matter to explore. 3. CM: Shock Force 2. Our return to modern warfare is long overdue! Given how close Shock Force 1 was at predicting a conventional conflict in Syria, we're a little nervous about choosing a topic this time around. Especially because we've chosen to simulate a full spectrum conventional conflict between NATO and Russia in the Ukraine. This gives players a rich tactical environment to explore with the most advanced militaries the world has ever seen. Having said that, we hope the politicians aren't insane enough to try it for real. Even thought this is great stuff for a game, it's the last thing this world needs in real life. We have more games planned for 2013, however we are making no formal announcements at this time. These three mini-announcements should be enough to keep you busy for a while.

As you have noticed, there is a persistent crash bug in the 1.2 version of Combat Mission Touch which somehow managed to slip through the cracks, err, I mean Apple QA and beta testing. We have a fix that is being tested right now and hopefully can be submitted to Apple this week for a 1.3 update. Sorry about this. If you gave us a 1-star review because of this bug, fair enough. Please download 1.3 once it's out and don't forget to give us a fair chance to make up by updating your rating! Watch this space for when the update is submitted and approved (and you'll be notified via the AppStore as usual, as well, of course).

I forced approval after reading this thread. The missing stuff can be caused by non-standard characters I think, it seems that it was cut off after the ' Martin

Updated files go into the usual approval cycle. If you only update the description, it's automatically updated, I think, but files are not. Martin

Unless your computer breaks down every week, you can always ask for a reset. The reset limit is temporary, not permanent, we can reset it only so often in a certain period of time. You have the renting part backwards. You effectively only rent games from every online outlet out there that bind your game to it's online system. They can pull it at any time. We are one of the few where you actually own the game, can copy it etc. Once you have it, no one can take it from you. However, what you own is not the source code, but a license to use it. This is true for every piece of software out there with a commercial license. Our activation system enforces the limits set by the User Agreement that is part of this license that you purchase. Martin

You don't have to buy anything again. Simple submit a ticket as Bill mentions, and ask for a key reset.

Yup, this was mostly a technical update to add support for these additional devices. Various Android devices are up next, and we're also working on various Gameplay updates, but it's too early to talk about that yet. Martin

Wrong game version than the scenarios were saved with, most likely.

If AVG (falsely) reports viruses (in fact, it's reporting a "heuristic" scan, which means that it doesn't know what it is... I wish they would finally make this more transparent to users!) then the files in question are not correctly set as exceptions. You could whitelist the entire directory, too.

Thread moved. And no, indexing is disabled for words with less than (IIRC) 4 letters. There are some specific exceptions set by hand, but it's impossible to accommodate all wishes.

Sorry to break the bad news to you, but the expansion only works with the original Battlefront version of Global Conflict. It does not work with any other game version. It says so on the expansion game and purchase pages. If you'd like a return, contact us at www.battlefront.com/helpdesk (click on "Submit Ticket"). I can also offer you the base game at a discount, alternatively.

The demo is v1.10, and the latest game version are 1.10 as well. So yes, the demo includes the latest patch.

This should be our new slogan, really. It is one of the major differences between a simulation like CMBN and table/chart based strategy games. Some people who grew up with the latter and got used to the relative predictability of it seem to have issues from time to time with the oddball outlier you get in CMBN. That's not to say that CMBN gets everything right. There is room for improvement, no doubt. Probably always will be. Which is a good thing. Some day we want to sell a CMx3 Martin