Hi all, especially my fellow South Africans reading this. Ever since Life of a mercenary Was released on Hosted Games last year, i've been having trouble loading or starting the game. A friend of mine also couldn't get it started on her iPad. I've tried different devices, different networks, I've sent emails to their support and even sent them a sysdiagnose. No matter what i do, they keep saying that they are unable to reproduce my problem and therefore can't do anything. Yesterday, another one of their games got released called War for the west and it's giving me the same trouble. Thing is, I know for a fact that I can't possibly be the only South African with this problem As my friend also had this problems with her iPad. Is there anywhere else I can complain? Are there any other South Africans on this site who can confirm or deny the experience that I'm having?
By DMNagel, 15 November, 2019
Forum
iOS and iPadOS Gaming
Comments
You’re not the only one
You’re not the only one experiencing this problem. I also live in South Africa and I Purchased war for the west. Every time I want to load the game, it says in progress And then gives me a network error. Have you tried reinstalling the game?
Yes i did
Please email them at support-ios-omnibus@hostedgames.org. We need to come together if we want them to take this seriously. So far, it sounds like I'm the only one sending emails according to them.
I sent them an email
I have sent them an email explaining the problem. I wonder what could be causing this? The only reason they are not able to reproduce the issue is because it isn’t present in the other versions of the app.
No idea
I have no idea what's causing this as well. All I know is, the more South Africans we can get to email them, the better.
Seriously?
I honestly don’t think they are taking this issue very seriously. I emailed a while ago and I still haven’t received a reply. I know that they are in a completely different time zone to us, but anyway. When ever you access your library page, the app crashes.
So far
They have been pretty responsive, although I'm not sure how responsive they are on weekends. I have also sent them an email with a receipt of the purchase. If you are registered on the main site, you can use the receipt and ask them to add the game for you on there. Unfortunately we won't be playing the game off-line, but at least it will be an alternative.
Yeah, I didn’t think of that.
I kind of forgot that it was the weekend. I also kind of got rid of the invoice as soon as I received it. Oops.
You can try to get it back.
go to settings, then tap on your name and view your Apple ID and tap on view purchase history. Try to find the correct order and double tap on view order. There should be an option to resend the invoice.
Just wondering at The Tetris monster
Were you able to load/start life of a mercenary?
I wasn’t able to start the game, but
I wasn’t able to start the game, but I was able to see the advertisements. Isn’t that hilarious?
Indeed
Those advertisements surely seem untouchable. They always find a way to show themselves. Oh and let's not forget purchase options. They always seem to work just fine. Still waiting for my email regarding the receipt.
You might have to wait
You might have to wait for the email to arrive. If you are using a credit or debit card especially from FNB or standard bank, you may have to wait a couple of days. Let’s hope they respond soon.
Still no answer.
Okay. I’m getting quite frustrated. I know I am being rather impatient, but I feel that they are not taking this issue very seriously. I know not many people have reported the issue, and I know they are unable to reproduce the issue, but can they not post on the forum? We are customers. We are purchasing the products and I believe we have the full right to feel as we do now. I know I can give them my receipt, but I would like to play the product on the platform for which I have purchased it. I haven’t received any response yet.
Sorry about that.
Hey folks, I'm the developer for The War for the West.
I'm sorry you're experiencing that problem. A few users on the Choice of Games forums have mentioned the same thing as well, and I have no idea what is going on. It's probably something only the people from Choice of Games can fix. Given the history I have with them when it comes to bug fixing, I bet they're doing their best to try to solve it.
Of course, it always helps to report stuff, so keep on doing that as well.
I'm particularly bothered by what I've read here because one of the things that make me love interactive fiction so much is the fact that blind people(or people with low-vision) can play it. I remember when I first realized this with my previous game and how happy I was with the mentions it got in similar communities.
So yeah, I guess I'm not helping much here. But hang in there. If there is anything I can do to help you, let me know. Either with that or anything else about the game, really.
You can contact me by my e-mail: lucaszaper@gmail.com
Well
I got my reply yesterday and was playing big time. They were not able to fix whatever is causing this yet, however they were able to add the game to my Choice of Games account. Now I can play online at least, although I'd still like to play normally. This new game is a blast. I'm having so much fun with it. Congrats to lucas_zaper For this masterpiece. Hopefully we can all play off-line soon.
same problem
Hello there, I live in Egypt, and I had the same problem, but I fixed it somehow, all I did is update the hosted games app and press on restart on the game screen. and it worked.
Updating the app?
You said you updated the app. How did you do that? There are no updates available.
re: updating the app
yep, the hosted game app, I haven't updated it in a while, so when I did? it worked just fine. :)
Still nothing.
I'm currently playing those games online but, my hope is to play them offline one day. Let's see how many years this will take.
still not working?
still not working?
No
Still not working.
I’m starting to think they don’t care
I think the colonisation of Mars is more important to them then fixing these problems. I mean, who cares if a few people in South Africa can’t play our games. We’ve got the money, that’s fine. I know this sounds harsh, but that’s how I feel as a loyal customer. Why don’t I play them online? I don’t want to play them online, because I didn’t buy them to play them online. I would like to get exactly what I paid for. No more, and certainly no less. Although that is what I seem to be getting. Sorry guys. Just ignore the rant. It is not the author of War for the West’s Fault. Sorry again guys.
I know how you feel.
It's almost a year now and the problem still persist. I've sent email after email, week after week. Like I said, even though I am able to play them online, I'd still like to play them offline as well. Sometimes we're just not close to Wi-Fi or stuff like that. Man, you'd love war for the west i think. Absolute masterpiece.
Exactly.
I think it is safe to say that I will refrain from purchasing any of their products in the future. I have been a loyal customer for almost 4 years. There games got me through some pretty difficult times. I spent countless amounts Of money on them. Until I see that they are actively trying to fix the problem, not only will I refrain from purchasing any of there products, but I will remove all there games from every single one of my devices. The problem isn’t that they aren’t working as they should. The problem is that they don’t seem to care at all. That’s not good customer service. They have this mentality of okay, If we can’t reproduce the problems, they don’t exist. Who cares if people in South Africa can’t play our games. We have the money. I know this sounds harsh, but I’m getting quite frustrated. Again, the authors who write these games are not to blame, the app developers are. Not for the glitches that are in the games, but for the apparent lack of thought given to fixing them.
Well
Not sure if such a thing can be reported at apple, but i sure as hell feel like trying and see what happens.
I’ve kept my promise.
So, I have uninstalled both choice of games and Hosted Games from my iPhone. I’m downloading iOS 13.3 and I’m hoping that it somehow can fix this problem. Is there any news about the problem being fixed?
Not yet
No news as of yet. Frustrating for sure.
I just sent them a screen recording.
Let's see what happens.
Update on my screen recording
I just got an email from them thanking me for sending the screen recording. They told me that they are still looking into it and that they will keep me updated, although I'm not so sure. One thing I can say is that they remain responsive when it comes to emailing, However the issue itself seem to baffle them as much as the mysteries of the universe baffles scientists. Perhaps one day, when the electric universe is proven to be more accurate you and me will be able to play offline.
How can you be sure?
Thank you for sending them the screen recording. How can you be sure that they are actually going to look into it. Haven’t they been saying that for over a year? I think what needs to be done is they need to post on the forums to find out how many other people are getting this issue. Some South Africans may think that it is an isolated incident.
We can never be sure.
we won't be sure until something actually happens. However, I've been on their forum and I've read that some people are indeed having this problem, Although it seems to happen with one in a bunch. It appears to affect some iOS users.
Just out of curiosity
just out of curiosity, which province are you from? I’m from KwaZulu Natal.
My province
I'm from Vanderbijlpark Gauteng to be exact.
Yay!
Finally! After months of waiting, I am very glad to say that we have made absolutely no progress. I tested it again a few seconds before posting this. Sigh.
Not sure what we can do anymore
Nothing seems to work. They have overpaid, good for nothing technicians.
What is worse in your opinion
What is worse in your opinion? The service delivery of this company or our government? LOL. JK.
You will not believe this!
You will not believe this! The new update was released. I decided to give it a try. When I clicked play, the same thing happened. When I clicked we start, game loaded! It works now!
Let me try
I'll be back in a few with my results.
It works now, although
I had to try a couple of times. First I double tapped on play but it did not work. Next I tried to restart and it didn't work either, So I got back to the title selection screen, reselected the game and restart. That finally did it. Had to do the same with life of a mercenary. Oh by the way, the war for the west have a cheat menu. Just check options on the stats screen. To answer your previous question, I guess we can now place them ahead of our government LOL.