OK, here's my official "I can't f^%#& stand U-Play" thread

[Dweller_Benthos]

OK, so, rant time, settle in boys an girls.....

Right, so I pop in the first disc and start the install. It asks for the second disc, sure, OK no problem. Hmmm..... no choice to put an icon on the desktop, weird.

Once it's finished, I run the two patches I found on the Ubi site, 1.01 and 1.02, both of which are over 250MB, so I grabbed them at w@&k so as not to run up my limited bandwidth at home. Fine, they are both in, we should be good to go.

Fine, how do I run it? Oh, there it is, a shiny new U-Play icon, let's click that and see what happens. I should have guessed, 50MB of updates. Eh, it was time for supper anyway. Half an hour later, it's now running. Still no sign of an FC3 icon or anything.

Oh, there it is, a "My games" link. Weird, it says I have no games, visit the U-Play store. OK, so maybe I have to enter my CD key there and it will unlock. Right, click the link and.....

"Ubi store is unavailable, if you have questions, please visit the support page"

My supper is starting to feel a little unsettled down there.....

Go to the Ubi site, poke around, no, that can't be right? Oh, there's a link to my account, maybe I get it there. Nope. Eh, might as well change my avatar while I'm here. Nope. It just brings me back to the store page. OK, forget that for now. Back to the U-Play interface.

Click my games again, still no joy and it says the store isn't available. Beginning to get a bit frustrated here. Well, a few more rounds of that.... huh, well, let's see if there's something else installed, nope, only thing on the start menu is a Ubisoft group with two links, one to install and one to uninstall (don't tempt me....).

All right, let's poke around the install folder on the hard drive. Right, there it is, the FC3 EXE, let's hit that, and see what happens.

U-Play comes back up, but now at least it's listing FC3 under my games, we're making progress. I enter my CD key and........

It tries to download over 250MB of update 1.03, which I did not see when I looked for updates at w@&k, so it must be fairly new. That much data would take a while on my connection, and eat bandwidth, so it will have to wait, I won't be playing FC3 tonight, back to Minecraft for me.

Maybe sometime this week I'll try again, once the bad feelings this whole debacle has created have faded a bit. If you look for me on U-Play, check my quote, that pretty much sums up my opinion.

Oh, and does anyone put their correct birthday in the stupid popup that keeps asking for your birthday? How stupid is that. I just put in the oldest date they had (is a 112 year old really going to be using this service?).

Oh yeah, U-Play sucks.

[fragger]

That really does suck, D_B :(

I can sympathise. Each of the first two updates took about an hour to come down on my connection. With the actual game install and some other mucking around with my UPlay account, it took nearly three and a half hours for me to get the game installed, patched and running. Now there's another patch? Bloody hell.

Three quarters of a gig's worth of patches for a game that came out a week and a half ago is pretty bad form.

But at least I did get the game happening in the end - I'm really sorry to hear about all the drama you're having. I really hate this online crap with games nowadays.

[Dweller_Benthos]

Well, I grabbed the 1.03 patch today so I'll run that tonight. Maybe.

Thing that toasts my biscuit is that you can't bypass it and play anyway, you HAVE to have it updated, no choice. If you can't update, then, well, too bad, you don't play at all.

[Art Blade]

I loved the "don't tempt me.." bit 

Man, that sucks balls.

I've never liked the online crap as in being forced to go and stay online. Worst of all is GTA IV: you need to go online with steam, Games for Windows Live and Rockstar. Three bloody online "services" at once just to be able to fire up one single game. FC3: go online with steam and U-Play. I can't even do a manual backup of my savegames any more with FC3 since it's apparently 99% stored "in the cloud" and only some pointers worth a few KB (not gigs or megs) are on my HD. I hate having to register with bazillions of "services" and to connect to them and to stay online with them.. welcome to the new era of the data-mining world.

The only few things positive for me are steam giving me English versions of every game I link to them; the always working screenshot function even for games for which nothing else works and last but not least the brilliant voice chat with conference function (multi voice chat).

However.. D_B, matey.. hope to read truckloads of your first FC3 impressions soon  :)

[Jim di Griz]

Damn and I thought the UPlay thing on the PS3 version was irritating enough; appearing every time you load the game up or want to exit - asking you to redeem the code, buy the online passport or cancel - what's freaking wrong with remembering that I have already entered the code and simply saying? 'Oh, we know you, go on through and have fun.'

The multiple online programmes 'needed' nowadays to play a game is one of the major things stopping me going over to PC gaming - thing is we don't need their 'services', they need us.

Sony for all their weird and secretive ways with regard to regional discrepancies and up front communication, still don't require you to be logged in to play a game.

We're getting a Wii U in a few weeks, so that'll be an interesting comparison.

[PZ]

Have any of you tried cancelling out of the update prompt?  Because of the v1.02 problems on the console, I've not done the update.  Each time I start the game up comes a prompt informing me that I must update in order to continue - cancel out of that and I'm quickly on the island.

Probably not that simple on the PC version though.

[Binnatics]

Damn D_B that's pretty damn irritating. I hope you get things running and looking forward to your experiences, but man this is yet another horrible story of people getting f^%#@ by that crappy online 'service'. Indeed they need us and not the other way round.

Probably not that simple on the PC version though.

Don't know PZ, Steam auto-updates anything in my library so I wouldn't even know when the game gets patched again. It even auto-updates my video drivers if it thinks it's needed. I think I will have problems with that anytime in the future, but I'm currently too lazy to change it and too spoiled with a fast machine that doesn't (yet) experience problems with intense software 8-X

[fragger]

I bought my copy in a store, not through Steam, so thank heavens I don't have to deal with them, I only have to concern myself with UPlay. After the installation process, Ubi went and applied the patches before I could even get a chance to start the game so I was never given the choice to opt out of the updates.

Since I don't have to worry about Steam, I can play fully offline. The sequence for firing up the game is: Start the UPlay launcher from desktop; select "Go Offline" when the login window pops up; select Far Cry 3 from the Games window that appears; click on "Play".

Knowing that there's a 1.03 patch I'm reluctant to go online in case it automatically starts downloading and I'll have to wait an hour for it to finish, and possibly screw something up in the game like with the Jackal tapes in FC2.

[Art Blade]

there are too many bugs in the unpatched game already you won't even notice if they add one or two more  :-D

[Binnatics]

heheh :-()

I could as well play off line if I'd wanted. Steam does offer off line gaming once the whole bunch is installed and validated

[Art Blade]

steam message: "look, son, you may play offline once you've installed patch 1.03"

[PZ]

... Steam auto-updates anything in my library so I wouldn't even know when the game gets patched again. It even auto-updates my video drivers if it thinks it's needed. I think I will have problems with that anytime in the future, but I'm currently too lazy to change it and too spoiled with a fast machine that doesn't (yet) experience problems with intense software 8-X

I haven't played through Steam in a while, but isn't there a toggle to prevent auto-updates?  ????

[Art Blade]

they did a couple of updates recently. After one of those, I noticed that games that I had the updates disabled for were all of a sudden shown as updating yet "paused." When I checked the settings, they were still not allowed to update. Now the really strange bit: When I tried, for the sake of it, to actually "un-"pause the update, they were about finished! Somehow they had downloaded a couple hundred MB and now only a few more to claim, "ready to play"  ???

[PZ]

Sounds like Steam to me  :D

[Dweller_Benthos]

Well, I applied the 1.03 patch I downloaded today and fired it up. Worked OK but man are there some annoying things. Can't turn the music down, only on or off, so off it goes. My custom key config seems to confuse it, I remap a lot of stuff, one being the interact key to space bar. Well, at the beginning of the first guard post mission it tells me to hit space to get out of the truck. Well, hitting space did nothing. I had to go back to the control config and reset them to default, go back in game and hit "E" to exit, even though it was still telling me to hit space. Sheesh.

Oh, yeah, and driving controls didn't seem to w@&k either. At the first mission where you gather plants and hides I got into the Datsun or whatever it is and started driving. Well, I couldn't steer right, only left and drove right into a tree (see screenshots thread). Couldn't turn on the radio, couldn't switch seats, could only steer left and accelerate/brake. Fiddled with the control config a bit and got it to steer right, but by this time it was too late, the car was stuck and I had to hoof it.

Supposedly a 1.04 patch will be coming, at least they are going to address the stupid HUD issues. Don't get me started on how much I hate that.

[PZ]

Sounds like a relatively significant list of annoyances, D_B  ???

[fragger]

I had something similar Dweller. LIke you I wanted to remap the interact key to "Space". I then found that I could get into a car using it but couldn't get back out. So I went into Options and put it back to "C", got back into the game and still couldn't get out of the car, using C or Space. "E" finally got me out and I didn't even map that... But now it only recognises C as the interact key with E no longer doing anything ????

I've also noticed that if you remap the vehicle controls, it makes no difference to the hang glider (or wingsuit later in the game). They obstinately remain as W:Dive, S:Climb, A:Bank Left and and D:Bank Right (C to let go and drop). Oddly enough, when using the wingsuit my parachute deploy key is Space (I discovered after numerous high-speed dirtnaps) and there isn't even a remap option for that.

[Dweller_Benthos]

Basically the same problem I had, fragger, even though it was telling me to use space to get out, it wouldn't let me, then when I remapped to E, it still told me to use space, even though E worked. Go figure. I think I may just revert the driving controls to default and live with it. Then there's still the problem of the space being interact, I can't change that, it's been space since the days of Wolfenstein 3D and I ain't changing now.

Oh yeah, U(don't)Play isn't so bad now that it's working, but the install was just horrendous. Pretty much the same as Steam, IMO, at least it doesn't download 3MB of updates (or something) that Steam does each time I launch it. People on high speed probably don't notice it, but for me Steam takes a good 30-45 seconds to load up because it's downloading something every time. When I was on dial up still, it would take up to 5 minutes. I asked Steam support and they couldn't give me an answer as to what it was doing.

[Art Blade]

I had/have the same problem with the remapping. I like F to be the interact key and of course, it stated "hold F to leave the car" -- it was enough to make me vomit on a bread trying to get out of the fecking car. When I finally managed, by accident, hitting three keys at the same time, I thought it was "W" as in forward but now I know it was E thanks to you guys.

Careful when reaching the Southern map, D_B, you will have to use a wingsuit and the prompt will be "use CTRL" while it will be your "change seats" key instead. Safe landing :)

[PZ]

... I asked Steam support and they couldn't give me an answer as to what it was doing.

They're either incompetent or lying.  Likely a bit of both.

[Binnatics]

... Safe landing :)

I agree on the whole change key and incorrect message thingy. It's incompetent. Something else that bothers me even more is the fact that you always have to 'hold' the key to make things happen. Why the f^&%@ did they do that? Are they scared I will take the wrong decision or that I press the wrong button?? Well, thanks for the care but I manage. Meanwhile, they take the whole speed (read; skillfulness) away once you start a) looting b) "interacting" c) changing weapons. Speaking of weapons: Why the HELL did they configure the mouse wheel to be the "change throwables option" instead of the change weapon option? I change weapons more frequently and more in a hurry than I do change from grenades to Molotov. And you can't remap that. That's ridiculous!! 

[Art Blade]

true.. completely incomprehensive.

[Dweller_Benthos]

Ah, so that's why my mouse wheel just keeps changing between grenades. I thought I had changed it, but apparently "next weapon" & "previous weapon" means throwing weapons only. Should have known. So, the only way to change hand held weapons is by the number keys? I really haven't played that much, still only have the 1911 and I dropped that at the guard post raid to pick up an AK.

[Binnatics]

As far as I know the number keys are the only way to change handhelds. Too bad. Would be acceptable if it was a press-'n-go way of changing, but somehow you have to press it firmly in a way, like holding the button for half a second or something. It happened too many times to me already that I want to change from sniper to shotgun because a tiger wants to eat me and I keep hammering that "4" (where I address the shotgun to usually) until sudden death in the tiger's mouth because the damn weapon doesn't change. I have to keep reminding myself "press it firmly" or else it won't w@&k in a panic situation

[PZ]

... I have to keep reminding myself "press it firmly" or else it won't w@&k in a panic situation

This is a complaint I have on the console as well; instead of simply (and quickly pressing a button), in many instances you need to hold the interact button for a while.  For example, getting into vehicles, opening doors, virtually anything you want to interact with.

The "heal" button is also something you need to hold for an extended time, and the problem is that it is slow to respond.  For example on the PS3 the triangle button is used to heal and to put out fires.  Under relatively frequent circumstances when in a hot fight, there seems to be a lag between when the software responds and when the outcome starts.  Here's an example:

I'm shooting at the bad guys (and they are returning fire), and my health diminishes - I hold the triangle button, but something became "stuck" - the heal never takes place.  I need to release the triangle and then hold it again.  What is annoying is that because you have to hold the button in the first place, there are a couple of seconds before you realize that nothing is happening, all the while you are taking more damage.