“… The second five million years of patching were the worst, also …”
— Marvin, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Champs Online
Got home. Clicked on the FilePlanet link Yay! Unlocked! Downloaded the client/patcher.
Login. Um, what was my password again. (Figures out what it got set to.)
Start the download.
Margie (doing the same on her machine) suggests this will go really fast because she’s already at 18%. I note that in the CoX world, multiple patches may apply (so to speak).
Head out to Back to School Night.
Two hours later …
Both our patchers have hung up with a disconnect error. I click [Patch]. It seems to start things over again. Mine goes a very short way, then stops.
I get an email from Lee:
De said you were downloading the Champs beta. Dunno if you’ve gotten this far yet, but once you’ve got the beta client installed, if you have problems with the patcher, I’ve found that closing the patcher (not cancelling the download, but clicking the red X of the patcher) and then restarting it, makes it chug along. Mine stopped at 9% then 15% then 51%, and each time I close/open it zips through the previously downloaded file and continues on.
I take his advice. My client seems to start over again. Though the numbers look different. There seem to be different numbers for Patched vs. Received.
Margie tries this. She goes 47% to 0.7%. But it’s not the same numbers a I have — “Patched X Mb / Y Mb – Received Z Kb – N %.”
And when it froze again, when I tried the same way, it ended up with a loarger X, a smaller Y, and a much smaller Z, but a larger N.
(“It’s beta, Dave. It’s beta, Dave, It’s beta, Dave …”)
Actually, that’s a fair thought. All those pre-orders trying to patch essentially the entire system at once.
And now stuck at 45%. Or, not, it just paused a bit.
Margie notes: “I expect this. I just don’t expect dead silence on the boards.” That’d be dead silence from the CO folks, not from the many, many people bitching about the download setup.
Someone suggested creating a torrent of it, but in one of the few official responses was asked not to post it — because it would removing the testing of the download process. Um, yeah. It would, but … well, unless they’re running around like crazy behind the scenes, then the testing is pretty clearly not very good for today.
Hey, here’s the official article. Sounds like a number of errors (plus load) causing the problems. Though, guys, if you’re going to say something like, “this should take about six hours to clear up,” you might want to put timestamps as well as datestamps on your posts.
Checking out the forums – lots of very confusing advice, which the above article seems to indicate is now obsolete (as far as moving files around). Waiting for something more officialler that either says, “Stick to it” or “Delete it all and start over again.”
*sigh*
Posting this, and moving the narrative to Comments.
And a news story: Champions Online Open Beta Crippled by Technical Difficulties. Includes a work-around that works?
And Massively’s somewhat earlier take: Champions Online experiences open beta troubles – Massively.
Okay, as I read comment threads, as irked as I am at how this evening is going down, it’s like watching a bunch of really obnoxious and self-entitled kids bitch because the Diet Dr Pepper spigot at the soda fountain is out.
The errors in the patcher *configuration* (not the patcher itself) are understandable, esp. at this stage of the game. Yes, this is a “Preview Beta.” Still.
The lack of comms on this until late is less forgivable, but there’s an opportunity here for the CO support crew to learn. Let’s hope they do. I’m not giving up on the game yet.
And now I can’t get past the Launcher Autoupdate. Yikes.
Going to leave it sitting, and go play some CoH.
Playing CoH was fun.
Watching the client in the background constantly time-out? Not so much.
While on the download screen you can hit “C” to get a DOS console of the status. “X” will give you a different screen showing what’s being downloaded and the IP address of the server. Both are morbidly fascination to watch.
And, btw, guys, it’s a really bad sign when Margie’s posting on the boards to complain about this sort of thing.
In the hope things may have improved over night, and that I may at least get the thing installed and ready to play on Wed, I jumped back on the computer this morning before heading to work (5 mins until I have to run).
The good news: The patch started flying down – I got to 53% in about 5 mins.
The bad news: Then is stopped.
The mixed news: After closing it, and re-starting, the amount left to download was around 1.7GB, which is probably about right as I was half way through a 3.6GB download when I closed. Unfortunately, it’s now downloading really slowly again, so I won’t get to finish before heading to work.
Let’s hope we don’t then have to patch the patch!!
Keep me posted if you guys get on today.
OK past Midnight and I can’t get past 2.6% – I am ready to say this sucks.
They are on version 22_45 now of the launcher. It looks like the biggest new feature of this version is that it won’t boot you when the file transfer drops to zero for minutes on end. We will see if it manages to load overnight.
I’m afraid this is not making very excited about playing.
cottoned Sargent
Well, as of the morning, I’m at 92% and growing. Performance is spiky as all hell, but it does seem to be making progress. Margie left my machine on, not hers, and I’m reluctant to interfere by firing it up …
96.8% …
There is a stand-alone download package here: Standalone Patch for Those with Launcher Issues | Champions Online Official Site.
You know, I’ve always suspected most programs have a CrypticError.exe module …
99.2%
99.9% … just finishing up ShaderCache.hogg …
VICTORY!
Oh my God … it’s offering to let me [PLAY]! Woot!
Okay, now it’s time to (sigh) go to work.
Or, rather, restart the download on Margie’s machine.
So close and yet so far!
Well, Margie’s machine is redownloading the client (slowly), so I’m not going to screw around with it at the moment.
But suffice it to say, it IS possible to get the patching all done.
Well, did you at least get to come out to the Repeat Offenders 4th Anniversary Costume Contests on Justice, Virtue and Freedom?
Heh. No, just ran around with a pair of our old Storm Knights on Champion and had some relaxing fun.
I finally gave up last night and then saw the new standalone file on FP and got it. It let me into the game finally…then crashed. But after that crash, I got to play the tutorial for about 20 minutes before having to go to work this morning. Woo hoo!