Amazon R324 Early Build Release (Updated 05/14)

2

Comments

  • WhiteBomber
    WhiteBomber Posts: 659 Critical Contributor

    Mobile media is the worst. Having to keep up with all of these mediums is a huge pain. I can't imagine they see too much profit from Kindle either. That being said, this is a sizable failure, that absolutely should not have happened.

  • toecutter3095
    toecutter3095 Posts: 77 Match Maker

    So..., how about that update for the current debacle? Have you considered rolling forward with the beta for Kindle and hooking them up to live servers? Not ideal perhaps, but if you can't rollback the version it might be the most expeditious solution.

  • derrickn
    derrickn Posts: 53 Match Maker

    It HAS been a week+ for kindle players now. Missed the end of the season. My SO and I have been playing 10+ years and she's likely going to quit over this. So I can finally quit! So. Not all bad.

  • NMANOZ1
    NMANOZ1 Posts: 150 Tile Toppler

    See you back soon. ;)

  • GJB1138
    GJB1138 Posts: 11 Just Dropped In

    Some clarification? Android is on r323 so is there going to be a r324 update for all other platforms and then a further r325 for everyone? If so is it a couple of weeks for players that only use Amazon?

  • Chrynos1989
    Chrynos1989 Posts: 417 Mover and Shaker

    Just to stay updated, has this been solved or are folks still waiting?

  • GJB1138
    GJB1138 Posts: 11 Just Dropped In

    @Chrynos1989 said:
    Just to stay updated, has this been solved or are folks still waiting?

    Still waiting.....

  • Chrynos1989
    Chrynos1989 Posts: 417 Mover and Shaker
    edited 13 May 2025, 07:57

    D> @GJB1138 said:

    @Chrynos1989 said:
    Just to stay updated, has this been solved or are folks still waiting?

    Still waiting.....

    Okay, that’s bulls***! They should just reverse it to the version before that faulty one if the fix with the new engine will take that much longer, I might not be into coding but you can‘t tell me going back one update is impossible…

  • Gymp28
    Gymp28 Posts: 142 Tile Toppler

    Maybe they saved over it? 🤦‍♂️

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,922 Chairperson of the Boards

    I hate to say it but I just have this bad feeling they have sacrificed fixing this in place of beta testing the new engine. They have given a largely unsatifactory "work around" being play on a different device which CS will help you with.

    This is openly neglectful of one part of your customer base. It doesn't exactly inspire confidence for any other rollouts either.

  • Scofie
    Scofie GLOBAL_MODERATORS Posts: 1,553 Chairperson of the Boards

    @DAZ0273 said:
    I hate to say it but I just have this bad feeling they have sacrificed fixing this in place of beta testing the new engine. They have given a largely unsatifactory "work around" being play on a different device which CS will help you with.

    This is openly neglectful of one part of your customer base. It doesn't exactly inspire confidence for any other rollouts either.

    I have some experience of software releases, though not in a commercial environment. Every release had rollback provision in it. Maybe there's a significant cost to it? Or maybe it was accidentally released before that was possible?

    As to prioritising testing the beta or fixing this, I don't know what work is going on behind the scenes, but, my opinion is that it would depend on timescales for both options; i.e. if the fix takes 2 weeks but new engine is 3 weeks away, it might make sense to not delay everything by 2 weeks for everyone for the sake of 1 week for part of the player base. I'm not saying that's how it is, but it is how is think about the choices. Of course, problems arise when plan A gets delayed and all of a sudden the choice looks wrong, but hindsight is a wonderful thing, and nothing to differ plan B wouldn't get delayed either.

    Regardless, I think an update would be helpful.

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,922 Chairperson of the Boards

    @Scofie said:

    @DAZ0273 said:
    I hate to say it but I just have this bad feeling they have sacrificed fixing this in place of beta testing the new engine. They have given a largely unsatifactory "work around" being play on a different device which CS will help you with.

    This is openly neglectful of one part of your customer base. It doesn't exactly inspire confidence for any other rollouts either.

    I have some experience of software releases, though not in a commercial environment. Every release had rollback provision in it. Maybe there's a significant cost to it? Or maybe it was accidentally released before that was possible?

    As to prioritising testing the beta or fixing this, I don't know what work is going on behind the scenes, but, my opinion is that it would depend on timescales for both options; i.e. if the fix takes 2 weeks but new engine is 3 weeks away, it might make sense to not delay everything by 2 weeks for everyone for the sake of 1 week for part of the player base. I'm not saying that's how it is, but it is how is think about the choices. Of course, problems arise when plan A gets delayed and all of a sudden the choice looks wrong, but hindsight is a wonderful thing, and nothing to differ plan B wouldn't get delayed either.

    Regardless, I think an update would be helpful.

    An update would be helpful!

    These things are complex and everybody understands that, it's a massive thing with fine margins but they are in danger of looking like a two tier customer base exists, I just can't imagine if this had affected iOS users for this length of time that something wouldn't have been sorted out or more frequent feedback given.

  • dianetics
    dianetics Posts: 1,768 Chairperson of the Boards

    How do you rollback from an entirely new engine?
    It likely replaced all data on their devices.
    New engine, file structure, save structure, asset libraries, etc.

    Their old data probably got nuked but they don't want to say it publicly.

    They still have access to the data server side so they can do the workaround, but I doubt it would be so simple as just a rollback.

  • Scofie
    Scofie GLOBAL_MODERATORS Posts: 1,553 Chairperson of the Boards

    @dianetics said:
    How do you rollback from an entirely new engine?
    It likely replaced all data on their devices.
    New engine, file structure, save structure, asset libraries, etc.

    Their old data probably got nuked but they don't want to say it publicly.

    They still have access to the data server side so they can do the workaround, but I doubt it would be so simple as just a rollback.

    Good point - this isn't a standard software release. Here's hoping for a quick resolution.

  • DeNappa
    DeNappa Posts: 1,414 Chairperson of the Boards

    Two of my alliance members were hit by this and they bought new devices so they could continue playing :# . Rip kindle i guess

  • KGB
    KGB Posts: 3,538 Chairperson of the Boards

    @Scofie said:

    @dianetics said:
    How do you rollback from an entirely new engine?
    It likely replaced all data on their devices.
    New engine, file structure, save structure, asset libraries, etc.

    Their old data probably got nuked but they don't want to say it publicly.

    They still have access to the data server side so they can do the workaround, but I doubt it would be so simple as just a rollback.

    Good point - this isn't a standard software release. Here's hoping for a quick resolution.

    I'm also in the S/W business.

    They should be able to just delete the game on their device and re-install. Assuming of course that they made the previous version available in the store (that's likely the issue because what I recall is it takes a while to get versions approved for the store). The real data that matters (your account) is on the servers or backed up in Facebook/Google.

    KGB

  • dianetics
    dianetics Posts: 1,768 Chairperson of the Boards

    Doing a commit like this via the kindle store probably has a lot more involved with it since it is replacing the release build.

    Amazons store is notoriously ****. I don’t know how much it has changed but another live service game I played a long time ago constantly had issues with the kindle store.

    I’m sure if it was just as easy as reposting the old build they would have done it.

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,922 Chairperson of the Boards

    It seems the data is all there (it would have to be in order to transfer to another device), the build is just not pointing at it. This is why I think they haven't bothered with a workaround because the end goal is use the new engine and time available is best spent testing that ready to roll out. I can't think of any other reason they would let this rumble on if a fix was actually in the works. The fix will presumably be the release of the new engine pointing at the live data and that is all dependent on finishing testing for Amazon store approval I guess.

  • bluewolf
    bluewolf Posts: 6,085 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited 13 May 2025, 13:35

    Sideloading the google play store on a Kindle is ridiculously easy. One could simply do that and load in the Android version of the game and use the Kindle to keep playing.

    Now…wanting a new device and using this snafu as an excuse is totally fine and hey, we all do things like that sometimes.

    But no one who really wants to play and has a kindle is forced to buy a new tablet.

    Although I haven’t used my kindle in a long time so maybe the Android version needs higher specs than the Kindle has? Although I assume it’s basically the same spec requirements since Kindle is just using a custom Android platform.

    All that said this whole thing is not a good look.

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,922 Chairperson of the Boards

    I fully intended to try out the new engine on my sons old Kindle account but they obviously got wind of my plan!

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