New Fieldrunners update is AWESOME (Except that it sucks)
This Thursday a new free update to Fieldrunners arrived on my iPad (a paid version for the iPhone subsequently hit today) featuring multi-player and 3 new maps. As anyone who knows me knows, Fieldrunners is perhaps my all-time favorite iOS game, so I viewed this unexpected update as a true Christmas miracle. All three new maps are awesome, the new towers are awesome, the multi-payer is awesome – EVERYTHING about the update is awesome, except for one thing.
It sucks.
As you can see below, all-three new maps will go haywire at some point during gameplay, and begin to send out 1 lone soldier at a time per round, in effect meaning the game will never end. As I test I left my iPad on overnight, and got to something like level 14,670 and had close to 2 million points before quitting.
Another problem is, if the game DOESN’T go wacky, odds are it’s only because it has crashed before it had a chance. Other oddities such as mine carts freezing in place on tracks are also common, and according to the reviews trickling in on iTunes, my experience is not unique. Unfortunately, with this buggy as hell update coming out so close to Christmas, combined with the iTunes App Store’s subsequent “freeze” on new updates later this week, odds are Fieldrunners will continue to suck for at least a couple weeks, thus ruining Christmas and sending me into a depression spiral that is sure to ruin the New Year as well.
Bah, humbug.
Sounds like someone needs a hug.
I was really excited to find this update, had been hoping for one for ages. I had a lot of trouble initially so I powered off the iPad and back on and have had no trouble.
UNTIL NOW! Thanks, I read your little story, go back to my saved game and resume and it plays for like five seconds and craps itself. Tried the reboot again, still the same problem!
Nice layout in the top screen shot too!
Hope you and the family have a wonderful Christmas and New Year Doc.
Actually, Doc, these “bugs” are deliberate things that come together to form what is being called the “Christmas Miracle”. It will simulate breaking until it detects the time 0:00 (or 12:00 A.M.) on Christmas at which point all simulations of nonfunctionality will terminate and the game will resume proper operation.
Or it was just rushed out for Christmas and it’s buggy as hell.
One of the two. We’ll have to wait for Christmas to see for sure.
Doc, you need to get into Angry Birds and Cut the Rope like the rest of us crazy iOS gamers!
Great news! The new update, v1.1.1 for iPad, had gone live yesterday which addresses several of the issues mentioned in this review.