awful terrible game

[Kamiyama01]

Seriously I want my 10 dollars back.

This game is horrible. At first I thought zombies playing football would be cool but this game does it so terribly I can't even stand to look at it in my library anymore.

First the game needs TWO serial keys. Why? It wouldn't even start up until I went to my library and pulled the CD key out myself. DLC shouldn't even have to put up with this key BS to begin with.

I played halfway through the tutorial and then gave up because I couldn't stand listening to the announcers anymore. Their voices are so ungodly annoying it makes me want to punch babies. They talk way, way too much and contribute next to nothing educational about gameplay that I realized I would learn faster actually playing the game myself.

Second, the loading times are horrendous. I play on a dual-core with 4 gigs of RAM and a SATA hard drive. I shouldn't have to wait 60 seconds to load a map. Also, why is it set to process sound through software by default? Who in this day and age, doesn't have a sound card, even one built into their motherboard? After setting it to run hardware processing for sound, the game didn't lag anymore, but the loading times were still terrible. It would make more sense to just have a option to turn sound on or off. If you don't have a sound card, what are you going to listen to anyway?

Third, the game plays so slow its not even fun to watch. I'm not talking about lag, I'm talking about each character taking a turn to pick up the ball, walk five spaces, run into a guy, attack him, and then watch the next guy take a turn. All the while the stupid announcers never shut up. This has to be the slowest game of football I've ever seen in my life. And I don't understand how you can call it "Blood Bowl" when all the blood you ever see is a little stain on the ground under the guys that fall down.

I played Madden 97 on the SNES and it was more fun to play than this.

I want my ten bucks back. This game is awful. I can't think of another game I've ever played that is anywhere near as bad as this one is. It's THAT bad.

[Delinth]

First the two serial keys. One is for the game itself, the other is for SecuROM. No, it's not system destroying SecuROM, just activation limitations.

Second, if you don't like the announcers, go into options and turn down/off voices. Problem solved.

Third, load times. I do agree that the game has bad load times. However, is one minute really so bad that you have to decry a whole game?

And you last point is something a lot of players do. They purchase the game without doing any research on it and expected Madden with elves. This is not a football game. It's a strategy game. The realtime mode is there but is terribly inadequate. The real meat of the game is in the turnbased mode.

Expect your matches to go anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour, depending on how you set it up.

[VoodooMike]

Because they try to market the game as madden with elves knowing full well that such a game would get them a lot of purchases.

If a product requires research to determine that it is not what you'd expect from the marketing then that simply means the company is deliberately misleading you. While this may be a common business practice among companies that have sub-standard products, it is still plenty reasonable to be angry about it as a customer.

[stinkfinger]

I have never seen any marketing suggesting this game is anything like Madden with elves.

If this were true, I would of avoided the game.

All it takes is a cursory read of the game description on the store page to grasp the style of game.

Yet I can understand Madden fans both assuming and not liking a strategy game that requires any serious thinking... we're talking American football fans now.


The difference between U.S and Europe football fans (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hxo9e5Wr51Q)

[targetbsp]

Madden with Elves?? Considering the game is called Blood Bowl... surely your first assumption would be that it's a computerised version of errm... Blood Bowl? :D

[btmunro]

You sound like a console gamer :( did your 360 red-ring?

It sounds like you haven't given this game a chance. You already compared the game to 97' Madden. You are essentially comparing tic-tac-toe to chess.

This game has a very steep learning curve but there is soooo much content in this game. I agree the tutorial blows but the community has a ton of info and loves to help.

cyanide forums (http://www.cyanide-studio.com/forumBB/viewforum.php?f=11&sid=10c91a7763bddabe7c00c2f1a78b86e7)

The game is slow but it really is a variation of Chess (or Archon if you know that game). I don't think you can really say it is awful until you've played the game for awhile. Judging by your 10$ remark, you couldn't have had the game more than a few days.

[dementedlullaby]

You sound like a console gamer :( did your 360 red-ring?


I have two broken 360s :( crappy ♥♥♥ console. Meanwhile I still have my old NES, PS1, Dreamcast and all my other consoles working just fine.

Sorry for the rant lol.

[Schwinghammer]

Yet I can understand Madden fans both assuming and not liking a strategy game that requires any serious thinking... we're talking American football fans now.

You can take that nonsense elsewhere. I've seen enough epic idiocy from European football hooligans that any stance of silly "superiority" is groundless.

[Kamiyama01]

All it takes is a cursory read of the game description on the store page to grasp the style of game.
[/URL]

Actually, the store page doesn't adequately describe the game at all. It states:

"This is a no holds barred bonecrunching sport! Even if tactics are your favoured route, you can also choose from a large selection of incredible and vicious moves: bribe the ref, devastating spells or illegal weapons…"

It's describing an action game on the store page. No where does it state that it is turn-based.

[Anilusion]

The FIRST sentence in the store description:

"Inspired by the Warhammer Fantasy world, Blood Bowl is an ultra-violent combination of strategy and sports games."

[Kamiyama01]

Sports games are action games. No where on the store page does it say that it is turn-based.

[Kamiyama01]

Madden with Elves?? Considering the game is called Blood Bowl... surely your first assumption would be that it's a computerised version of errm... Blood Bowl? :D

I spent 7 years collecting Magic: The Gathering cards, and accumulated tens of thousands of cards. I spent 10 years playing Dungeons & Dragons, and led a campaign with friends as a DM. I have played Digimon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. I have played Wizards & Warriors, read dozens of Inquest magazines, and have friends that are even more addicted to card games and board games than I am.

... And I have never in my life EVER heard of a Blood Bowl board game. I don't think anyone I know has ever heard of it either. If there is a city or town where knowledge of this game is commonplace, this location only exists in a backwater province of Great Britain in a separate reality that only joins to our own reality when new episodes of The Twilight Zone are aired on Friday the Thirteenth.

[skiddlywibble]

I played halfway through the tutorial and then gave up because I couldn't stand listening to the announcers anymore. Their voices are so ungodly annoying it makes me want to punch babies.

Isn't that basicly the same as every sports comentator, ever?

Third, the game plays so slow its not even fun to watch. I'm not talking about lag, I'm talking about each character taking a turn to pick up the ball ... then watch the next guy take a turn.

That's because it's from a tabletop game. It's strategy, not action.

And I don't understand how you can call it "Blood Bowl" when all the blood you ever see is a little stain on the ground under the guys that fall down.

Blood is generaly more effective when used sparingly. Games which overuse it loose the impact. Case in point? Dead Space. The enemys come apart like wet toilet paper, and have all the impact of said soggy lavatory roll.

[Dr0W]

I spent 7 years collecting Magic: The Gathering cards, and accumulated tens of thousands of cards. I spent 10 years playing Dungeons & Dragons, and led a campaign with friends as a DM. I have played Digimon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. I have played Wizards & Warriors, read dozens of Inquest magazines, and have friends that are even more addicted to card games and board games than I am.

... And I have never in my life EVER heard of a Blood Bowl board game. I don't think anyone I know has ever heard of it either. If there is a city or town where knowledge of this game is commonplace, this location only exists in a backwater province of Great Britain in a separate reality that only joins to our own reality when new episodes of The Twilight Zone are aired on Friday the Thirteenth.

Me neither, I'm from Brazil and people here doesn't even know what's that. But I just typed Blood Bowl on Google I found out about it, took me 2 minutes.

Now all my friends know about it, and I made a Blood Bowl board and I play with them.

[Dr0W]

Sports games are action games. No where on the store page does it say that it is turn-based.

It also says that's and Strategy game. So, you should have known that it's a turn-based strategy game OR a Real Time Strategy game.

And guess what? It's both. Even tough the real time really suck.

[VoodooMike]

By that definition of "Strategy Game" Madden also qualifies, as it is a "real-time strategy game" as well. Every aspect of the steam page for the game emphasizes the idea that the game is an action style sports game.

"This is a no holds barred bonecrunching sport! Even if tactics are your favoured route, you can also choose from a large selection of incredible and vicious moves: bribe the ref, devastating spells or illegal weapons…"

The idea that the game is a slow, tactics game is downplayed when, in reality, that's the entirety of it. There is a realtime mode - one that's so bad and pointless that there are no functional leagues for it and even the loyal playerbase for the game has demanded to know why the company wastes their resources on it. Despite all this, the realtime concept is what is being heavily marketed - why? because they know the customer demographic for computer games like madden are much larger than for computer games like yahtzee, and they're looking for quick sales rather than satisfied sales.

I knew what Blood Bowl was before I bought it, but I certainly don't blame people who buy the game from Steam for feeling like they were duped based on how the game is being marketed to them.

[Dr0W]

No, it doesn't. You don't control the players on Madden just like a RTS. It's just a sports game, if you check the EA Games website it will be listed as Sports, not Sports/Strategy.

[bfx]

So to summarise, you hate a game that you knew nothing about, didn't attempt to find out anything about, don't understand, and can't play? And this is somehow Valve's fault?

[Soulsick82]

You could have viewed a YouTube video of the gameplay before jumping into a game you don't know anything about. Thats a good lesson to learn on steam. Complaining it's turn based really isn't a good argument. All it would take is 5 seconds to find out about the game.

Regarding the game issues, there are quite a few. The interface is horribly clunky and doesn't support steam overlay or alt-tabbing, so you need to write down your keys. Pretty shocking.
The load times are just...... breathtaking.... you think it's fun on your machine? Your's seems pretty fast =P.

BB:L has all the same issues that the original BB had. I'd say that the developers just aren't very good programmers considering they've been developing BB based games since Chaos League (released 2004) and it's still a pain to run. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_League

The DRM is a pretty big issue with me. I own both BB and BB:L and kinda regret it. I gave up on my last OS install and decided to give in and let the DRM infest my computer. I don't know what it installs, I'd say it's at least got drivers considering the de-authentication tool can detect the game is still authorised even if you delete the directory without having to hit the internet to query any servers.
That said, it's a pain in the ♥♥♥ to deal with. I posted about my "fun" with BB's authentication here: http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showpost.php?p=21558765&postcount=33

PS. hardware sound means hardware accelerated sound, most sound cards do not support hardware accelerated (on-board, low-end sound). You may even get a performance penalty for selecting it on these boards. Things like Creative XI of Audigy support H/W, but there's almost no point buying those and creative make ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ products (I loved getting blue screens because of my sound drivers on Win2K!)

[GC13]

Yeah, this is 2011 not 1991; don't rely on the game companies to tell you what the game is like, because none of them are any good at it. I'll bet you still buy official strategy guides for your games too.

[Totalitator]

I spent 7 years collecting Magic: The Gathering cards, and accumulated tens of thousands of cards. I spent 10 years playing Dungeons & Dragons, and led a campaign with friends as a DM. I have played Digimon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. I have played Wizards & Warriors, read dozens of Inquest magazines, and have friends that are even more addicted to card games and board games than I am.

... And I have never in my life EVER heard of a Blood Bowl board game. I don't think anyone I know has ever heard of it either. If there is a city or town where knowledge of this game is commonplace, this location only exists in a backwater province of Great Britain in a separate reality that only joins to our own reality when new episodes of The Twilight Zone are aired on Friday the Thirteenth.

Fifteen years ago I had a friend that was always talking about Warhammer Blood Bowl. He played with a bunch of people every weekend. Book/board/card-based gaming was never an interest of mine
so I never had anything to do with such things but I certainly heard people singing the praises of Blood Bowl. I don't live in the boondocks of Britain.

[Cpt.Calavera]

This is defenitely not a sport game. Its only similarity with football is the ball and helmets. If it was played with a watermelon and players wore pumpkinheads very few people would associate it with football. So if you are looking for Madden with monsters stay away and go play Mutant League Football instead (yeah it's old but still fun).

In the other hand if you like the Heroes of Might and Magic and Disciple series than this game is for you.

[SpectralShade]

I spent 7 years collecting Magic: The Gathering cards, and accumulated tens of thousands of cards. I spent 10 years playing Dungeons & Dragons, and led a campaign with friends as a DM. I have played Digimon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. I have played Wizards & Warriors, read dozens of Inquest magazines, and have friends that are even more addicted to card games and board games than I am.

... And I have never in my life EVER heard of a Blood Bowl board game. I don't think anyone I know has ever heard of it either. If there is a city or town where knowledge of this game is commonplace, this location only exists in a backwater province of Great Britain in a separate reality that only joins to our own reality when new episodes of The Twilight Zone are aired on Friday the Thirteenth.

I find it interesting that you asume the people that HAVEN'T heard of said game are the ones NOT living in the 'backwater province' you claim. Especially since the game is known and have been marketed in multiple nations.

Somehow I get the feeling you're just miffed the world doesn't revolve around your epicenter with your comment.

[Kissaholic]

You guys do know that blood bowl is a board game... which are turn based.. You should of known what you were getting yourself into.

[dugman1]

I spent 7 years collecting Magic: The Gathering cards, and accumulated tens of thousands of cards. I spent 10 years playing Dungeons & Dragons, and led a campaign with friends as a DM. I have played Digimon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. I have played Wizards & Warriors, read dozens of Inquest magazines, and have friends that are even more addicted to card games and board games than I am.

... And I have never in my life EVER heard of a Blood Bowl board game. I don't think anyone I know has ever heard of it either. If there is a city or town where knowledge of this game is commonplace, this location only exists in a backwater province of Great Britain in a separate reality that only joins to our own reality when new episodes of The Twilight Zone are aired on Friday the Thirteenth.

You must not have hung around the same crowd I did in college. Back then in the minatures front the three big games from Games Workshop were Warhammer, Warhammer 40k and Blood Bowl. Obviously the other two are much more popular, but even so Blood Bowl had a pretty big cult following, especially in Europe. Also this isn't the first computer version of Blood Bowl, there was another version back in 1995.

[One_Eye]

Sigh... seriously this game takes many hours just to understand the basics, years to become truly good at and impossible to ever master. If your to stupid, ignorant, impatient or just lacking general motor skills to play the game effectively, the Bloodbowl community will bid you farewell and please ask you don't allow the door to hit your dumb-♥♥♥ on the way out.

All your complaints are either (a) easily solved for anyone with an IQ above 14 or (b) easily solved had you bothered to type the words BloodBowl into any one of the many search engines located on the new-fangled device, the internet.

Bloodbowl has a massive core following across the world. You and your obviously massive base of friends have never heard of this game huh? Well thats a ringing endorsement that the game is no good isn't it... or perhaps by reading through the list of games you play it says that you play the mainstream games that are thrust in front of your face, rather than actually delving into the gaming communities and finding out the thousands of other games out there.

Bloodbowl has world cups, it has many thousands of leagues across the world, before Cyanide it has a fully functioning fan-based website called FUMBBL that allowed online games and Bloodbowl has been growing stronger and stronger despite its founding company Games Workshop no longer supporting the board game due to its lack of profitability.

LEARN about the game your bagging rather than prove to everyone your ignorance and general lack of ability. But then again i hope you don't learn, delete the game from Steam and we happily move on from this waste of a post.

[Lifeshield]

Sigh... seriously this game takes many hours just to understand the basics, years to become truly good at and impossible to ever master. If your to stupid, ignorant, impatient or just lacking general motor skills to play the game effectively, the Bloodbowl community will bid you farewell and please ask you don't allow the door to hit your dumb-♥♥♥ on the way out.

All your complaints are either (a) easily solved for anyone with an IQ above 14 or (b) easily solved had you bothered to type the words BloodBowl into any one of the many search engines located on the new-fangled device, the internet.

Bloodbowl has a massive core following across the world. You and your obviously massive base of friends have never heard of this game huh? Well thats a ringing endorsement that the game is no good isn't it... or perhaps by reading through the list of games you play it says that you play the mainstream games that are thrust in front of your face, rather than actually delving into the gaming communities and finding out the thousands of other games out there.

Bloodbowl has world cups, it has many thousands of leagues across the world, before Cyanide it has a fully functioning fan-based website called FUMBBL that allowed online games and Bloodbowl has been growing stronger and stronger despite its founding company Games Workshop no longer supporting the board game due to its lack of profitability.

LEARN about the game your bagging rather than prove to everyone your ignorance and general lack of ability. But then again i hope you don't learn, delete the game from Steam and we happily move on from this waste of a post.

This. :)

[ire_wolf]

Your arguement states this is a bad game. People argue with you because this isn't exactly true.

What has happened is that YOU don't like the game. So in YOUR opinion that makes it a bad game.

Lets look at why you don't like it. After reading many of your posts I think it's fair to say that 1/ It's not what you expected 2/ You don't like this type of game.

This doesn't make it a bad game. Perhaps, the description isn't all that clear on what type of game it is, but, so what? Go complain to them that they mis sold you the game. If you can justify/prove this then legally you can get your money back.

This won't happen however, because while they may have been slightly vague in the discription, you could have always just clicked on the meta critic rating at the side and read any number of reviews.

You didn't look into what you were buying and now your pissed off. This doesn't make it a bad game. Lesson for you is to research games before you buy them. Therefore, side step the voiding of your bowels and looking like an idiot on the steam forums even if that would put you in similar company.

[Conchobair0]

dumb thread from a dumb person

[centisteed]

The game isn't that slow. I've got an I5 quadcore
with 8G RAM & it starts right up. I'm playing
classic turn-based. The real-time isn't real
Blood Bowl & should be ignored.

My biggest gripe is with the computer player.
Even on easy it's too difficult. It takes all
the risks & succeeds whereas my risks cause an
immediate failure 80% of the time. When the AI
blocks my players, the players fall down. When
I block AI players, they're merely pushed to
another square. Boggles the mind.

Probably League Play against other players is
what I want.

[Dr0W]

The game isn't that slow. I've got an I5 quadcore
with 8G RAM & it starts right up. I'm playing
classic turn-based. The real-time isn't real
Blood Bowl & should be ignored.

My biggest gripe is with the computer player.
Even on easy it's too difficult. It takes all
the risks & succeeds whereas my risks cause an
immediate failure 80% of the time. When the AI
blocks my players, the players fall down. When
I block AI players, they're merely pushed to
another square. Boggles the mind.

Probably League Play against other players is
what I want.

Actually... The AI even on difficult is damn easy. What you really need is to "learn the game". It took me like 10 games to win my first one. You need to really learn all the rules in the game, read the game manual or learn from another player.

Trust me, this game's AI is ♥♥♥♥ and playing other players will probably be much harder. But if you got a nice partner, they will tell you what you are doing wrong and then you will learn to play pretty quickly.

After you learn the game, you will see what I'm talking about. Good Luck!

[airblad3]

I have never seen any marketing suggesting this game is anything like Madden with elves.

If this were true, I would of avoided the game.

All it takes is a cursory read of the game description on the store page to grasp the style of game.

Yet I can understand Madden fans both assuming and not liking a strategy game that requires any serious thinking... we're talking American football fans now.


The difference between U.S and Europe football fans (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hxo9e5Wr51Q)

Taken from the comments:

You take Michigan Stadium, a college football stadium that is not known for being the loudest in the nation or anywhere close and compare it to Beşiktaş fans said to be the loudest fans on Earth. Plus this team is from Istanbul which is borderline Middle-Eastern rather than European. Hardly Fair!.

Silly Americans and their American Rugby.