HwKeeper
Auto-translated
A couple of days ago, a new Q&A session regarding the released add-on and the problems faced by many players was published on the official website of Heroes 6.
Question: The add-on to Heroes 6 and patch 2.1 were eagerly awaited by fans, but the release of Shades of Darkness and the patch were a disaster. ... Why? Why did all these problems happen – was it Uplay, bad code, servers...?
Answer: First of all, we would like to sincerely apologize for all the confusion you had to go through due to the release of Shades of Darkness. We tried to implement a "new way" of releasing a standalone add-on (at least in Ubisoft) and obviously, we failed. Before looking for the causes of all these problems, we would like to remind you of what we were trying to achieve with Shades of Darkness. Our goal was to allow our players to access their content using only 1 executable file. This means that we had to "merge" the original Heroes 6 and Heroes 6 Shades of Darkness. Moreover, we wanted to make sure that owners of the original Heroes 6 could play with owners of Heroes 6 Shades of Darkness. In principle, we adhered to your interests throughout the process.
In short, we had to apply a server-side solution to separate the original content from the Shades of Darkness content in order to properly unlock the content for all users. Then we launched an update of already created accounts on our servers to make this happen. Unfortunately, something went wrong for people who bought the original Heroes 6 and the Gold Edition, as their keys could no longer unlock the correct content. We worked on finding solutions to these situations and released a script a few days after the release of Shades of Darkness.
Question: I would like to talk about the content of Shades of Darkness (and we will return to this in a minute), but no matter how good the game itself is, it was still overshadowed by the poor state of the release; many fans are wondering if you will continue to release patches to fix the remaining bugs – what are your plans for this? Do you have a timeline in mind, or are you improvising to some extent?
Answer: At the moment, we are carefully reviewing the forums for the main problems preventing you from playing the game. Therefore, we can definitely say that we are improvising and we will try to fix the problems as they appear. Thank you to all the players, we noticed a problem related to the Dynasty Weapon and the mana cost for spells. Our goal is to fix this in patch 2.1.1.
Question: Some fans are complaining about the lack of balance and weak AI in the Shades of Darkness add-on. Is this something you can work on?
Answer: We cannot deny the fact that some fans are complaining, and we are very sorry to hear that. At the same time, we are also reading some user comments who are happy with the add-on, the new campaign, and the new Dungeon faction. During the development of the add-on, we also ensured that the balance was worked on. Even if it is difficult to develop a perfect balance, we do not see significant problems in this area. Undoubtedly, the campaigns present a challenge!
Question: Some question about Shades of Darkness... You chose to develop a "standalone" add-on. Why?
Answer: Releasing a standalone add-on allows new users to buy it without buying the original game. That's why we decided to go the "standalone" add-on route. However, as mentioned above, we undoubtedly tried to make the choice of releasing a standalone add-on as transparent as possible for players who own the original game.
Question: Why Dungeon, and not Academy?
Answer: Okay, but this is not a simple question... It was a difficult time when we decided which faction we should feature in this add-on. We launched a survey after the release of Heroes 6, asking our players which faction was their favorite. However, the results were quite mixed, with Dungeon in the lead. In addition to this survey, we also wanted to link Shades of Darkness to the main storyline of the original Heroes 6, which outlines the Dungeon faction at the very end.
Question: Are you satisfied with the amount of material that is added to the game with the Dungeon, or would you like to add more?
Answer: Basically, after working on a game for a long time, you can only notice its shortcomings.
Therefore, we would definitely like to add more content to the game, more features, more, more, more! But on the other hand, you also have to be realistic and release your game. We had to carefully choose what we wanted to implement, and we must say we are happy with what we have achieved.
Question: Since a "Complete" edition of the game has been released, containing all DLCs, the original game, and Shades of Darkness, will this be the last Heroes 6, or is there another add-on in the works, as many fans are asking?
No joke, we don't know what will happen in the next few months with Heroes 6. Our current task is to fix the mess we created two weeks ago, giving you the opportunity to enjoy the Shades of Darkness content, which we undoubtedly consider amazing and interesting for Heroes players. At this stage, you can't expect any new content.
Answer: First of all, we would like to sincerely apologize for all the confusion you had to go through due to the release of Shades of Darkness. We tried to implement a "new way" of releasing a standalone add-on (at least in Ubisoft) and obviously, we failed. Before looking for the causes of all these problems, we would like to remind you of what we were trying to achieve with Shades of Darkness. Our goal was to allow our players to access their content using only 1 executable file. This means that we had to "merge" the original Heroes 6 and Heroes 6 Shades of Darkness. Moreover, we wanted to make sure that owners of the original Heroes 6 could play with owners of Heroes 6 Shades of Darkness. In principle, we adhered to your interests throughout the process.
In short, we had to apply a server-side solution to separate the original content from the Shades of Darkness content in order to properly unlock the content for all users. Then we launched an update of already created accounts on our servers to make this happen. Unfortunately, something went wrong for people who bought the original Heroes 6 and the Gold Edition, as their keys could no longer unlock the correct content. We worked on finding solutions to these situations and released a script a few days after the release of Shades of Darkness.
Question: I would like to talk about the content of Shades of Darkness (and we will return to this in a minute), but no matter how good the game itself is, it was still overshadowed by the poor state of the release; many fans are wondering if you will continue to release patches to fix the remaining bugs – what are your plans for this? Do you have a timeline in mind, or are you improvising to some extent?
Answer: At the moment, we are carefully reviewing the forums for the main problems preventing you from playing the game. Therefore, we can definitely say that we are improvising and we will try to fix the problems as they appear. Thank you to all the players, we noticed a problem related to the Dynasty Weapon and the mana cost for spells. Our goal is to fix this in patch 2.1.1.
Question: Some fans are complaining about the lack of balance and weak AI in the Shades of Darkness add-on. Is this something you can work on?
Answer: We cannot deny the fact that some fans are complaining, and we are very sorry to hear that. At the same time, we are also reading some user comments who are happy with the add-on, the new campaign, and the new Dungeon faction. During the development of the add-on, we also ensured that the balance was worked on. Even if it is difficult to develop a perfect balance, we do not see significant problems in this area. Undoubtedly, the campaigns present a challenge!
Question: Some question about Shades of Darkness... You chose to develop a "standalone" add-on. Why?
Answer: Releasing a standalone add-on allows new users to buy it without buying the original game. That's why we decided to go the "standalone" add-on route. However, as mentioned above, we undoubtedly tried to make the choice of releasing a standalone add-on as transparent as possible for players who own the original game.
Question: Why Dungeon, and not Academy?
Answer: Okay, but this is not a simple question... It was a difficult time when we decided which faction we should feature in this add-on. We launched a survey after the release of Heroes 6, asking our players which faction was their favorite. However, the results were quite mixed, with Dungeon in the lead. In addition to this survey, we also wanted to link Shades of Darkness to the main storyline of the original Heroes 6, which outlines the Dungeon faction at the very end.
Question: Are you satisfied with the amount of material that is added to the game with the Dungeon, or would you like to add more?
Answer: Basically, after working on a game for a long time, you can only notice its shortcomings.
Therefore, we would definitely like to add more content to the game, more features, more, more, more! But on the other hand, you also have to be realistic and release your game. We had to carefully choose what we wanted to implement, and we must say we are happy with what we have achieved.
Question: Since a "Complete" edition of the game has been released, containing all DLCs, the original game, and Shades of Darkness, will this be the last Heroes 6, or is there another add-on in the works, as many fans are asking?
No joke, we don't know what will happen in the next few months with Heroes 6. Our current task is to fix the mess we created two weeks ago, giving you the opportunity to enjoy the Shades of Darkness content, which we undoubtedly consider amazing and interesting for Heroes players. At this stage, you can't expect any new content.