I vote for waiting, sure 1.1 would be an amazing Xmas present, I guess we will just have to see how it goes between now and then.

Good point, as an Xmas release , 1.1 would be a much better option over 1.08, but we would still need the polish in the game text, descriptions, and encyclopaedic . 

If you have any reservations, how about a v1.091 Stable release?  It's just numeration, but with the initial rocky release,  the .1 series may be of increased significance to some.  It signifies that the 1.0 series is "fixed".  Perhaps release what you've got as v1.091 and publisize this as the last step, in a series of steps, before v1.1.  Ask the people for their feedback.  Once again put it out there that this OUR game and that Stardock seeks player feedback in order to finalize v1.1 to then begin working towards v1.2.   Speak of significant stability improvements and added game depth.  If something should go amiss with this builds launch, perhaps calling it v1.091 instead of v1.1 will garner a tad more acceptance and patience?  v1.091 still showcases the great work done thus far and it still gets the word out in time for the holidays.

Good idea, WhiteElk!   You make some excellent and thoughtful points.  Stardock, what do you think?

Best regards,
Steven.

Great discussion with a lot of important stuff, but it doesn't change the fact that this is in lockdown. It seems crash bugs are the bugs of concern at this point. Since this is the case, release 1.1! There is no comparison to 1.09. None whatsoever. Onwards to 1.2 and polish!

Hi - I haven't looked through all 5 pages so this was probably mentioned, but I've had some crashes with patch t, usually if I load a saved game from within my existing game.   Some out of memory does occur late game, but that's not frequant, so you can go to 1.1 with that... 

Overall the game is much more stable, but the "load from within a game" crashes are the bigger concern.  I'm going to try it with the latest patch (patch u I think) and see what happens.

p.s. I don't think should rush into getting 1.1 out.  Just getting the engine as stable as it can be this side of 2010 would be a job well done.  Then build on a reasonably stable platform in Q1 2011.

But if Stardock already made the decision to release 1.1 in December there would be no point in asking the community for advice, except of justifying the release and that would be the same mistake as in the beta.

I think WhiteElk's idea is a very good one.

Best regards,
Steven.

Ok - tried out patch u, and pretty good stability.  Didn't run into any "load from within game" crashes during almost 2 hours of play - that is excellent.

Just one "out of memory" error.  I'll send in the debug if I can remember how to do that...

I think you're putting yourself in a hard situation, Frogboy. You can't add to the AI in 1.1, and yet improvements to the AI is what is most needed to make 1.1 a fun gaming experience.

If you can't update the AI until 1.1 is done, then by all means, release the patch and work on the AI as soon as possible!

Stability has been much better, gameplay is pretty good, but it's still far far to easy to simply walk all over the AI. A recent update, either T or U managed to break the map editor's load map function for me which is a huge bummer, I've spent about 15 hours on a map, and now I can't load it in to finish it up.

It's time to put this out there. Some of us haven't been part of the beta and have been patiently waiting for over 2 months for an update. Hearing people say it should be delayed because text changes should be made makes my blood boil.

The only question you people should be asking yourselves is this: Is it better than what's out there for us now. If the answer is yes then it would be inexcusable to make your fans, like me, wait through Christmas. 

My Christmas break is when I play games. Civ V is a disaster. There are no other decent new TBS games on the horizon. Elemental is my only option but the current version is just too raw. Give us 1.1 now please.

It's already 'out there' in the form of the gradualy improving betas.  If your reasoning is merely to have something better than the previous release version, then use the beta - there is no advantage to 'being patient' and not playing the beta..

If you find the current beta version too raw, then guess what your 1.1 is going to be no matter what it's called?  Changing the name of .9x 'beta' to 1.1 'released' is not going to miraculously change anything.  And releasing an unstable unready 1.1 would simply be repeating the same mistakes as at launch. 

I don't play betas. I've been waiting for 1.1. So the version I have is the one from BEFORE Halloween like 99% of everyone else. Don't make the mistake of thinking that active forum participants are representative of the larger player base. 

FB listed what 1.1 was going to have back in October. From what I've read it has that and then some. Some of you guys are demanding a never ending increase in requirements before release. That's nuts. If it's stable give it to us. 

Give us the 1.1 that was promised. Quit adding more hoops to jump through before it's "good enough".

Does it have global mana? does combat now have a to hit roll? Are people now a resource? Is the inteface better? If yes then if it is stable give it up and go to the next update. 

A lot of people start going on Christmas break in the next week or two. So having it come out 3 days before Christmas is not acceptable. It should have been out before Thanksgiving. 

If it's a crash fest then by all means don't release it. But if the reason not to put it out there is because of community demand feature creep then that's no excuse to make us wait any longer.

I'm with TheJaker, most people here just don't get it. They keep demanding more of their personal pet peeves. Stability and bugs are the issue and it's good enough. They can hotfix it after if people have problems with it, which I doubt they will.

I don't think you get it.  Think you're being naive to the extreme you think the reason for not releasing it is merely some 'personal peeve'

The damn thing needs to be stable before the major 1.1 release.  Stardock has built up some goodwill after the disaster that was the release, and if they release a similarly buggy version, they may just lose it.  Only with the very latest patch (released today) does it seem more stable on my system, and even then I've had 2 crashes.  If the only thing was some silly "personal peeve" then yeah of course release 1.1 would have been out before. 

The other thing you don't seem to get is that most people, including me, would prefer to play a non-beta version (doh!).  Just some people are less patient than others, hence the beta + ongoing hotfixes.  So if you 'refuse' to play because you are 'extremely patient' to the point of silliness (such as refusal to even try the game) or you just hate the term 'beta' or hate sending in debug files, too bad.

You're not finding the latest builds stable, esc? Then you better get reporting because it's solid as a rock here. If you want to see unstable, go back and play the officially available version.

Most people who don't hang out on these forums don't know there's a beta. It's not the default setting in Impulse. Someone who buys it from the store or even from stardock is gonna be playing the version from last Fall. Not a good thing.

It's ready to go now. It was ready to go last week. Stardock is over compensating for the bad release. 

I'll say this so my opinion is as clear as i can make it .....

If it is Locked Down Release 1.1

But and thia a big BUT.... give us a proper Manual to help us Over the Rough spots .....

Will this Help with AI and polish issues???

No but it will give us and the newcomers some idea what is intended going Forward.....

Is not the intent to get people to look at 1.1 as a bridge between where we started 1.0-1.09e and where we want to end up (1.2 - Expansions)?

The stabilty fixes and Proper Documentation will do that.... I Think the Manual whould also ease the learning curve of anybody that does recieve this for Xmas....

Edit .. I also think other people have a point last official Patch was what... October? If one bought the game on release day and don't know about the beta's. It may be starting to look like that whole wait until 1.1 speech was just so much marketing speak....

I can see what both sides are saying here.  

What most people on these forums don't realize is that of the active people who play the game, over 97% of users who play Elemental (and are connected to the Internet) are running the last released version because they don't know there is a beta. Only people who have changed the Impulse mode to show betas will know there is a beta.

The purpose of this post (as the title implies) is to see how people are feeling about stability. We are not looking for feedback on whether individuals think the feature set or scope of v1.1 is sufficient. We are only looking to see if we have passed the stability threshold with them.

With today's build I do believe we have met that criteria. We'll see what others say. So then it's a matter of further refinement and polish as marketing decides the best date to release v1.1.

Thanks Frogboy....

I hope you consider a Manual release with 1.1... would make me for one happier about the release ...

As long as further refinement and polish is an important priority up to release of 1.1, I am in full agreement with your assessment, Frogboy.

Ok I see - 97% of people don't click on the "see pre-release" option.  (Although if they're on this forum, well they have little excuse to not click on it IMHO...)

Regardless, as early as 2 days ago, I'd have said going to 1.1 would be a bad move.  Even yesterday, I thought build t wasn't especially stable and the crash types were rather annoying.

Today's build; build "u" is the very first version I would subjectively call "reasonably stable" (on my system); even the two crashes are relatively minor (and yes I sent in the debug). So yeah, if 97% of people still using that old version, definately upgrade them.  That is really cutting it close though....

I would agree but the problem is that even now the game may change a lot in the next few patches, and that's alot of work to put out something that may be outdated soon.

We'll see how V looks.. i posted a few dumps from crashes in u today. I was on the go live with it boat til i actually started testing myself

Yep. Working on it.