Dear Rockstar Games - Rockstar Vancouver,
A couple months ago I purchased Bully Scholarship Edition for the Xbox 360 and the game itself had been working fine up until recently. The game now occasionally suffers from rhythmic frame rate slowing and just today I was forced to reset my console because the game got stuck in a permanent load ( I waited several minutes to be sure it wasn’t just a long loading screen) while attempting to complete the final mission.
After expressing a bit of frustration I removed the game disc from the tray and examined it to be sure there weren’t any scratches or scuffs that might explain why the game would be skipping or playing abnormally. Not surprisingly, the disc was near perfect, let alone banged up enough to cause errors during gameplay. Also I played a few other games from my collection to be sure it wasn’t the fault of my console, but as I figured, they played fine and without any problems. I’m conscious of the fact that the first batches of discs for Bully Scholarship Edition were reported to suffer from problems similar to the ones I’m currently encountering. I’m also well aware of the fact that there is a patch on Xbox Live that will supposedly resolve these issues, although there is just one problem, I don’t have access to Xbox Live and quite frankly I shouldn’t need to. I payed good money for this product and yet it continues to show glaring flaws and consume extra hours of my life because it can’t run consistently.
Thankfully, I’ve only been deprived of roughly two hours time due to the inconsistencies that were packed with this title. Although there also a multitude of smaller flaws that weren’t addressed in this apparently “updated” and “enhanced” version of the game. I can still identify a score of graphical irregularities as well as occasions where the audio drops abnormally in volume, causing me to lose track of what’s occurring during a mission. I’ve attempted to ignore as many of these flaws as I can, but as the consumer I’m entitled to a working and quality product.
I’m a huge fan of the original Bully as I personally believe it to be one of the finest titles ever to grace Rockstar’s amazing line-up, but all throughout Bully Scholarship Edition for the Xbox 360 there is much evidence that supports the claims that this was a slap-dash remake. I came into this game expecting to get the enhanced experience I was promised, but quite honestly there were times when I considered returning this game and getting it for another, more reliable platform. If I had access to Xbox Live I may have just downloaded a patch and forgotten about this, but I’m almost glad I can’t, there is a big trend in the gaming industry today about developers not completely finishing and testing there products before they put them on the market. Several of them believe that they can release the game, despite gaping problems and just put out a patch and make things all better. Unfortunately, all the gamers without access to online gaming networks will have to suffer because they aren’t capable of downloading these patches. Now I understand that there are times when problems go undiscovered or just cannot be resolved in a certain time frame, but Bully Scholarship Edition has so many flaws that its absolutely inexcusable that I should have to settle for this downgraded experience because you, the developer chose not fix these problems when you should have.
I encourage others to play and purchase Rockstar games because they represent some the best the industry has to offer, but today I feel a bit betrayed by the Vancouver teams efforts to assure 360 users a quality, stable, and enjoyable experience. But anyway, I’d like to thank the readers of this message for taking time out of their busy schedule to address my concern.
- Andre Miller
Subject: Carni''s Complain Letter to Rockstar Games... 
Sun May 17, 2009 4:28 pm