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WB offering full refund on Batman: Arkham Knight on PC till the end of the year

S

Spring-Loaded

Member
Revolutionary said:
The console versions will never look or run like this, so he's entirely correct. It's not a flawless 16.6ms frametime but I'll take that over the console version any day of the week.
Click to expand...
The specs listed in the video description mention 12GB of ram and a (lightly) OC'd 980 Ti. It's silly to mention the small subset of PC users who have this equipment as if it somehow makes up for the terrible quality of the port in any way.

The part of his post about making a profit makes sense though.

Considering a lot of people, even using a 980 Ti, still experience frequent hitching with seconds-long pauses even at 30 fps, I definitely would prefer the console versions over that, which is what most will encounter, unless most people have 980 Ti + 12 GB ram or more. This isn't merely a "doesn't meet PC standards" issue.

EDIT:
Kezen said:
Basically what I said, although I'll concede that I should not be so adamant and not speak for anyone. Those who do not tolerate stutter should not go with the PC version, and should probably quit PC gaming entirely as not a single game in existence does not, at some point, exhibit stutter.
Click to expand...

GAF user SalsaShark's performance, post-rerelease.

"probably quit PC gaming." Please. If you think people who have a problem with the linked performance are being overly nitpicky, you're insane. You really, truly shouldn't speak for anyone though, you're right about that.
 
M

Magnet_Man

Member
firelogic said:
Not sure why people keep bringing up that quote. It doesn't make logical sense. A delayed game is not eventually good. A delayed game has a chance to eventually be good.
Click to expand...

The quote is about the correct mentality a game designer or publisher should have. It's better to hold a game back to fix problems with it than to just release a game that you know has issues so you can get a quick buck at the expense of the consumers' experience and trust. This whole clusterfuck and irresponsibility WB has shown in this game's release is exactly the type of behavior Miyamoto's quote advises against.

Are you going to explain next that despite how easy a task may be, logically it will never physically become a piece of cake?
 
T

thematic

Member
anyone using SSD still experience stuttering ?
I created a stripe disk using 2x 2.5" HDD just for testing, and it seems the stuttering is gone or at least didn't happen 1-2 hours playtime (I'm on the last story mission vs Scarecrow)

of course I'm still using Low texture with GTX 750 Ti 2GB, dunno about 60 fps though
 
K

Kezen

Banned
Spring-Loaded said:
GAF user SalsaShark's performance, post-rerelease.

"probably quit PC gaming." Please. If you think people who have a problem with the linked performance are being overly nitpicky, you're insane. You really, truly shouldn't speak for anyone though, you're right about that.
Click to expand...

That's not what I implied though. :) I clearly stipulated those who can't under any circumstances bear stutter, not those who are not satisfied with the experience they are getting with AK.
30fps seems to eliminate stutter as long as you have healthy amounts of ram and VRAM. But I'm fully aware it's a weak line of defense.

Another run, full Batmobile :
5wBPioZ.png

As is demonstrated here it does stutter on my PC too, because I'm going to cap it at 30fps anyway, I can handle those spikes just fine and speaking for myself I would not even consider any console version considering how the game runs on my specs. :)
 
K

kodecraft

Member
Spring-Loaded said:
Why is there a defense force for this?
Click to expand...

Maybe some can't cope with having a flawed game in their PC library, you know the 'ultimate' version of games which are on PC, this ones flawed and will remain so.

It could never compete with the PS4 version, which in this case...is the ultimate one.

I got this on PC btw.
 
S

Spring-Loaded

Member
Kezen said:
That's not what I implied though. :) I clearly stipulated those who can't under any circumstances bear stutter, not those who are not satisfied with the experience they are getting with AK.
30fps seems to eliminate stutter as long as you have healthy amounts of ram and VRAM. But I'm fully aware it's a weak line of defense.

Another run, full Batmobile :
http://i.imgur.com/5wBPioZ.png[IMG]
As is demonstrated here it does stutter on my PC too, because I'm going to cap it at 30fps anyway, I can handle those spikes just fine and speaking for [I]myself[/I] I would not even consider any console version considering how the game runs on my specs. :)[/QUOTE]

Oh okay. For a moment I thought you were insinuating that it [I]wasn't[/I] dumb to mention "anyone who can't tolerate any stutter should quit PC gaming" as if that had something to do with the discussion at hand.

Because that's really dumb, and smacks of apologist-speak.
Click to expand...
 
K

Kezen

Banned
Spring-Loaded said:
Oh okay. For a moment I thought you were insinuating that it wasn't dumb to mention "anyone who can't tolerate any stutter should quit PC gaming" as if that had something to do with the discussion at hand.

Because that's really dumb, and smacks of apologist-speak.
Click to expand...

That was more of a side remark, which I believe to be true. From my experience frametime spikes cannot be 100.00000% eliminated when aiming for 60fps. At some point even well regarded PC versions can be impacted, Mad Max for instance when a new area is loading (although it's true that it is not as widespread as in AK's case).
30fps obviously leaves a lot of headroom.

Depends on one's sensibility to stutter.
 
S

SapientWolf

Trucker Sexologist
kodecraft said:
Maybe some can't cope with having a flawed game in their PC library, you know the 'ultimate' version of games which are on PC, this ones flawed and will remain so.

It could never compete with the PS4 version, which in this case...is the ultimate one.

I got this on PC btw.
Click to expand...
There's no way in hell a 30fps version is the ultimate anything. Eventually this port will get brute forced into performing acceptably. Sometime in 2025 maybe.
 
W

Weevilone

Member
Green Man Gaming sent a response that they will not be offering refunds, as they consider the game to be in a playable state after the September 3rd patch.

I'd be happy to post the e-mail that I received, but I'm not sure if that's allowed here.
 
Itachi87

Itachi87

Member
thematic said:
anyone using SSD still experience stuttering ?
I created a stripe disk using 2x 2.5" HDD just for testing, and it seems the stuttering is gone or at least didn't happen 1-2 hours playtime (I'm on the last story mission vs Scarecrow)

of course I'm still using Low texture with GTX 750 Ti 2GB, dunno about 60 fps though
Click to expand...

I have it on an SSD and played the batgirl DLC yesterday and experienced very frequent stuttering. I haven't tried the main game yet after the rerelease though it was stuttering before last I played it.
 
K

Kezen

Banned
thematic said:
anyone using SSD still experience stuttering ?
I created a stripe disk using 2x 2.5" HDD just for testing, and it seems the stuttering is gone or at least didn't happen 1-2 hours playtime (I'm on the last story mission vs Scarecrow)

of course I'm still using Low texture with GTX 750 Ti 2GB, dunno about 60 fps though
Click to expand...

SSD does not get rid of stuttering but it most certainly helps with it. Tried with my WD Black 7200RPM and my Samsung 840 Evo, the latter definitely provides a smoother experience but stutter is still there, the engine is the issue methinks.
 
D

Doctor Ironic

Member
Steve Youngblood said:
Right, but even then, why? Keeping in mind that I already admitted to not being the most technical person in the world, why were they able to get these games up to acceptable performance on consoles, but not PC?
Click to expand...

Because Rocksteady made the console versions, and the PC version was outsourced to a different studio (who has proven competent in the past but perhaps didn't have enough time or manpower dedicated to the PC version.)

People are constructing a false narrative of "oh well the console versions are fucked too!" despite the fact that they very rarely dip below 30 fps and Digital Foundry themselves refer to them as "a technical tour de force," and I have the slightest inkling that those guys might know more about graphics and engineering than your average NeoGAF poster.
 
S

Syriel

Member
Steve Youngblood said:
And the conclusion is that some things are unfixable? Wow.
Click to expand...

R_thanatos said:
Same . I don't understand what can't be bug fixed after 4 months and assists from both rocksteady and nvidia.
Click to expand...

Like others have said, it's likely an engine design issue. "Fixing" it would probably mean a ground up redesign. Think of it like trying to use a platformer engine for a shooter. You can, but there will be some limitations and getting around those may not be possible with the code base you have.

Steve Youngblood said:
Right, but even then, why? Keeping in mind that I already admitted to not being the most technical person in the world, why were they able to get these games up to acceptable performance on consoles, but not PC?
Click to expand...

Memory models on consoles and PCs are different. Console users are also fine with 30 fps (sometimes less) and sub 1080p performance. PC users are not.

If you have a high end PC you can run AK at console settings, but anything more stutters.
 
B

BeastlyMandible

Banned
Weevilone said:
Green Man Gaming sent a response that they will not be offering refunds, as they consider the game to be in a playable state after the September 3rd patch.

I'd be happy to post the e-mail that I received, but I'm not sure if that's allowed here.
Click to expand...

That's been the boiler plate response since that September patch. So they probably haven't reviewed the latest statement from WB.
 
P

Pachinko

Member
I know PC owners dislike when games for their platform get delayed for a long time but maybe..... in this case it might have been a preferable option ? They could have simply relied on console sales of Arkham Knight for this year and worked on a proper fully capable PC port which they could then release maybe even next spring as a "game of the year edition". Throw all of the DLC in there and release it at full price , just make sure the bloody thing works properly.

In the future though, I hope PC owners won't bitch when there IS a delay for a hotly anticipated cross platform game. Always remember what happened here , while having this shoddy a port is only 1 possible outcome , it's still preferable to delay instead of risking it.
 
V

Vangmeister

Member
Pachinko said:
I know PC owners dislike when games for their platform get delayed for a long time but maybe..... in this case it might have been a preferable option ? They could have simply relied on console sales of Arkham Knight for this year and worked on a proper fully capable PC port which they could then release maybe even next spring as a "game of the year edition". Throw all of the DLC in there and release it at full price , just make sure the bloody thing works properly.

In the future though, I hope PC owners won't bitch when there IS a delay for a hotly anticipated cross platform game. Always remember what happened here , while having this shoddy a port is only 1 possible outcome , it's still preferable to delay instead of risking it.
Click to expand...

People forget that this game had already been delayed. It was supposed to be released October of LAST YEAR! Rocksteady and WB screwed themselves on this. They had a nine month delay to eventually release a broken game that will remain broken.
 
J

jelly

Member
I'm amazed the possible revenue from PC sales is presumably so low that Warner are saying some things can't be fixed and aren't even close to expected performance. They basically think, screw it, not worth it and the game isn't even a year old. All that investment and they give up, I would be interested to see them explain why the return is not worth it.
 
D

Doctor Ironic

Member
jelly said:
I'm amazed the possible revenue from PC sales is presumably so low that Warner are saying some things can't be fixed and aren't even close to expected performance. They basically think, screw it, not worth it and the game isn't even a year old. All that investment and they give up, I would be interested to see them explain why the return is not worth it.
Click to expand...

Video games sell 90% of the copies they're ever going to sell at release. At this point the amount of people who are still desperately waiting for their chance to pay money for Arkham Knight on PC can't be too large!
 
F

Father_Brain

Banned
Noray said:
They built a frankenengine out of Unreal Engine 3 that's optimized for consoles at 30fps. Their texture streaming tech was not built in any way to scale to various hardware configurations and not it can't handle 60fps unless you have an really good rig with a ton of RAM and VRAM. I'm not a technical person either but at a guess, they'd have to rewrite large parts of the code to change the entire rendering pipeline in order to get it to work properly on PCs without obscene specs. Which means lots of engineering, lots of work, lots of testing. Which they apparently didn't do in the last 4 months although they said they would.
Click to expand...

I think this is the most plausible, succinct explanation I've seen of what went wrong here. Thanks.
 
N

Nzyme32

Member
Pachinko said:
I know PC owners dislike when games for their platform get delayed for a long time but maybe..... in this case it might have been a preferable option ? They could have simply relied on console sales of Arkham Knight for this year and worked on a proper fully capable PC port which they could then release maybe even next spring as a "game of the year edition". Throw all of the DLC in there and release it at full price , just make sure the bloody thing works properly.

In the future though, I hope PC owners won't bitch when there IS a delay for a hotly anticipated cross platform game. Always remember what happened here , while having this shoddy a port is only 1 possible outcome , it's still preferable to delay instead of risking it.
Click to expand...

I think it is beyond obvious that any further delay would not have resulted in the problems being solved in a meaningful way, especially at the point now where 4 months of work (most likely from a skeleton crew of a team) and even more time from now, would still leave some issues unfixable (ie WB do not see a financially justifiable way to do the work, which is already due to their failings during the original development process)

The way this could have been prevented in the first place, would have been if WB had the PC version as a priority in the first place, rather than taking its time to simply pass the work over to Iron Galaxy, with a supposedly shoddy QA testing process throughout, that was considered acceptable

jelly said:
I'm amazed the possible revenue from PC sales is presumably so low that Warner are saying some things can't be fixed and aren't even close to expected performance. They basically think, screw it, not worth it and the game isn't even a year old. All that investment and they give up, I would be interested to see them explain why the return is not worth it.
Click to expand...

I don't think it is surprising at all. The reaction when it launched was so bad that the reviews on Steam tanked ridiculously and pretty much every outlet reported its comical issues. Now they remain in the same situation and risk such ill sentiment toward WB as a whole on PC and may have even seen sales issues with their other games, that offering a full refund through 2015 is the best they can hope for to quell the situation.
 
D

Doctor Ironic

Member
Father_Brain said:
I think this is the most plausible, succinct explanation I've seen of what went wrong here. Thanks.
Click to expand...

It's also completely false.

The more comparable game here is Red Dead Redemption, a game that is also "barely working" on consoles and had difficulties with a (hypothetical) PC version and its results are humans with cougar and bird animations, horses getting stuck in the ground, carriages spontaneously imploding and faces not rendering. If Arkham Knight was as "secretly fucked under the hood!" on consoles as people say, we'd be looking at a similar situation, but the game is almost always at a solid 30fps with barely any bugs whatsoever. Like, here's the facts we know, and aren't just rumors from people claiming "I was a QA tester really guys I swear":

  • AK is completely technically fine on consoles.
  • AK is not fine on PC.
  • PC version was done by a different developer than the usual.
  • The usual developer used to make their own PC ports which were great.
  • AK's publisher is infamously a bag of dicks.

The conclusion here isn't hard to draw - the port got outsourced, and whether they weren't given enough time and resources by WB, or they just screwed up on their own (I suspect the former) - but there seems to be this weird revisionist narrative where "actually it's the CONSOLE versions that are fucked and brave Iron Galaxy tried to fix it but just couldn't!" Like, what?
 
S

SirMossyBloke

Member
Weevilone said:
Green Man Gaming sent a response that they will not be offering refunds, as they consider the game to be in a playable state after the September 3rd patch.

I'd be happy to post the e-mail that I received, but I'm not sure if that's allowed here.
Click to expand...

I already did on the last page.
 
P

Patrick Bateman

Member
Is the difference between the PS4- and PC-version really that extreme?

I finished it on PS4 last weekend and I actually had only one crash during the whole playthrough.
 
D

Dictator93

Member
Patrick Bateman said:
Is the difference between the PS4- and PC-version really that extreme?

I finished it on PS4 last weekend and I actually had only one crash during the whole playthrough.
Click to expand...

You can achieve PS4 performance and even better, with better visuals. The thing is... that is all at 30fps... which is unacceptable.
 
F

Father_Brain

Banned
Doctor Ironic said:
It's also completely false.

The more comparable game here is Red Dead Redemption, a game that is also "barely working" on consoles and had difficulties with a (hypothetical) PC version and its results are humans with cougar and bird animations, horses getting stuck in the ground, carriages spontaneously imploding and faces not rendering. If Arkham Knight was as "secretly fucked under the hood!" on consoles as people say, we'd be looking at a similar situation, but the game is almost always at a solid 30fps with barely any bugs whatsoever. Like, here's the facts we know, and aren't just rumors from people claiming "I was a QA tester really guys I swear":

  • AK is completely technically fine on consoles.
  • AK is not fine on PC.
  • PC version was done by a different developer than the usual.
  • The usual developer used to make their own PC ports which were great.
  • AK's publisher is infamously a bag of dicks.

The conclusion here isn't hard to draw - the port got outsourced, and whether they weren't given enough time and resources by WB, or they just screwed up on their own (I suspect the former) - but there seems to be this weird revisionist narrative where "actually it's the CONSOLE versions that are fucked and brave Iron Galaxy tried to fix it but just couldn't!" Like, what?
Click to expand...

I don't see how the post I quoted is unreasonable, sorry.

It's not a secret that AK pushes UE3 far beyond what it was designed for, that UE3 has always had streaming-related issues on PC, that there are still significant architectural differences between PC and consoles, and that PC wasn't a priority during the game's development.

So yes, I think it's more plausible that the game's current state on PC is due to the drastic, console-focused modifications Rocksteady made to the engine, rather than to any problems introduced by Iron Galaxy during the porting process. If it were possible for WB to fix the game without making drastic changes to the engine, I'm fairly sure they would have done it.
 
K

Kezen

Banned
Patrick Bateman said:
Is the difference between the PS4- and PC-version really that extreme?

I finished it on PS4 last weekend and I actually had only one crash during the whole playthrough.
Click to expand...

There's less rain on PC otherwise the PC version has every tech featured on consoles and more even. But 60fps locked is not possible.

That said, to me, it's still a much, much better version than what I've played on PS4.
I would not go back, never.
 
Q

Q8D3vil

Member
Dictator93 said:
You can achieve PS4 performance and even better, with better visuals. The thing is... that is all at 30fps... which is unacceptable.
Click to expand...

I achieved 60 fps 1400p most of the time and tried to play with nvidia options but the performance ussyes and the crashes every five minutes wasnt worth it (not to mention the random normal crash every two hours).
I like the game and it looked fucking amazing, but man it was a shit port all around.

(i have Titan x and Acer gsync monitor).
 
K

~Kinggi~

Banned
this is amazing. Installed this, launched the benchmark. Am literally stuck at a black screen. Whats going on? I have a pretty vanilla system, 770 4770 and 16 ram on win 7.Is this is a known issue?
 
d00d3n

d00d3n

Member
I just realized that due to the quite sharp fall of the Swedish crown over the last year, I would actually get a 12% profit if I returned the game (which I enjoyed and have finished). I don't know if gog.com accepts refunds at this point though, and the collector in me wants to keep the game ...
 
D

Doctor Ironic

Member
Father_Brain said:
I don't see how the post I quoted is unreasonable, sorry.

It's not a secret that AK pushes UE3 far beyond what it was designed for, that UE3 has always had streaming-related issues on PC, that there are still significant architectural differences between PC and consoles, and that PC wasn't a priority during the game's development.

So yes, I think it's more plausible that the game's current state on PC is due to the drastic, console-focused modifications Rocksteady made to the engine, rather than to any problems introduced by Iron Galaxy during the porting process. If it were possible for WB to fix the game without making drastic changes to the engine, I'm fairly sure they would have done it.
Click to expand...

It's because the history isn't there. Rocksteady has, up until Arkham Knight, had in-house PC versions of their games that range from excellent to good (DX11 is admittedly still fucked in City) and making "console-specific changes" to the engine and the entire "well the game is actually secretly crap on consoles too!" argument hinges on the idea that this company just suddenly decided that 20% of their userbase could go fuck themselves.

Meanwhile we have a publisher who had already outsourced a PC port to someone else and got a bag of shit as a result just three months earlier, and has a history of anti-consumer practices, and people are like "well clearly it's the developer's fault." What?

The accusations of the game not running well before it came out basically amount to "at one point, this game that was in development, was in development!" We just had a thread on how No Man's Sky is (rumored to, but that's all the "AK ran like crap" statements are based off of here too) having a lot of optimization trouble, and the general consensus was "yeah, cause it's not out yet, dummies." But now people here are trying to condemn AK for not running well on PS4 before it even came out?
 
S

Setsuna

Member
d00d3n said:
I just realized that due to the quite sharp fall of the Swedish crown over the last year, I would actually get a 12% profit if I returned the game (which I enjoyed and have finished). I don't know if gog.com accepts refunds at this point though, and the collector in me wants to keep the game ...
Click to expand...

collect when the price drops
 
U

Unknown Soldier

Member
Verendus said:
Very generous of WB really. I have to hand it to them. At least they're looking after their customers.
Click to expand...

They are only offering refunds because Valve probably told them to figure their shit out or they were just going to pull the game from Steam because everyone was getting Steam to refund them.
 
SmokedMeat

SmokedMeat

Gamer™
Contacted Wb about the chance of getting a key to a working WB game in place of Batman, which I received through a Nvidia promo.

Got shot down, and was told to basically ask Nvidia since it was their promo.
 
R

robertlebrone

Member
This is funny. I played through the game at launch and really enjoyed it, performance issues aside. Even still I'd be getting a refund on this if I didn't buy it on CDkeys. I'll definitely be getting all my future PC purchases on Steam regardless of price differential because of this situation.
 
H

hamchan

Member
jelly said:
I'm amazed the possible revenue from PC sales is presumably so low that Warner are saying some things can't be fixed and aren't even close to expected performance. They basically think, screw it, not worth it and the game isn't even a year old. All that investment and they give up, I would be interested to see them explain why the return is not worth it.
Click to expand...

It is a bit nuts since according to Steamspy, Asylum has 2.2 million owners on Steam and City has 2.6 million. Literally millions of sales they're going to miss out on now because of their broken port.
 
O

old manatee

Banned
Pachinko said:
I know PC owners dislike when games for their platform get delayed for a long time but maybe..... in this case it might have been a preferable option ? They could have simply relied on console sales of Arkham Knight for this year and worked on a proper fully capable PC port which they could then release maybe even next spring as a "game of the year edition". Throw all of the DLC in there and release it at full price , just make sure the bloody thing works properly.

In the future though, I hope PC owners won't bitch when there IS a delay for a hotly anticipated cross platform game. Always remember what happened here , while having this shoddy a port is only 1 possible outcome , it's still preferable to delay instead of risking it.
Click to expand...


They released a broken game and didn't fix it and are just throwing in the towel. How does the patience of pc gamers have anything to do with it? They shouldn't have sold it in the first place because they are too incompetent to make it work no matter how long they are given.

P.S. the game is shit on every platform anyway.
 
F

FaintDeftone

Junior Member
ShinUltramanJ said:
Contacted Wb about the chance of getting a key to a working WB game in place of Batman, which I received through a Nvidia promo.

Got shot down, and was told to basically ask Nvidia since it was their promo.
Click to expand...

I was thinking of doing the same thing. I just wanted to ask if they would give me a PS4 code for the digital version. I doubt they would but it would be pretty nice of them to do. I would much rather play this on PS4 at this point. Even though I technically didn't pay for the game, I bought that specific card because of this promotion so I still feel a little jipped.
 
T

texhnolyze

Banned
ShinUltramanJ said:
Contacted Wb about the chance of getting a key to a working WB game in place of Batman, which I received through a Nvidia promo.

Got shot down, and was told to basically ask Nvidia since it was their promo.
Click to expand...

I'm on the same boat as you, but I didn't bother to do that.
Totally expected. :/
 
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