Gears of War 2 information and EPIC quotes!

Big D · 03-24-2009, 12:57 PM

*All quotes from joeGraf are highlighted in Cyan*

*Last edited by Big D; 5/29/09*

*Just a friendly reminder to all*

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Please keep your post's as civil as possible, even if you have nothing nice to say about TU3 you can still be civil about it and get your point across. Please do not flame or insult other posters. If you feel the need to argue, flame or insult please do it elsewhere. I will not hesitate to report a post(er). I made this thread to help alleviate some stress, not create it.

Thank You

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*In regards to Cheating, it's consequences & Detection Code*

Level 100 cheaters, anything being done?

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Originally Posted by ispithotf1r3

Hey, Recently I've Noticed That There Are Alot Of Level 100's Going Around...
I Know How They Glitch It But I Was Wondering If The Gears Team Was Doing Anything About This. Soon Everyone On Gears2 Will Be Level 100 Becouse Of This Glitch..

Are You Guys Doing Anything?

ISpitHotF1R3

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

The rate of new cheaters has dropped dramatically since the gamerscore reset event.

When asked about finishing game with 0 experience

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Originally Posted by KillahDude

When I finished the game I got 0 EXP and have yet to get host since that match.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

That's the standby detection code in action. Thanks for reporting it.

When asked about the new standby detection code

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The current standby code is based off of the original from Gears1 with a number of improvements. I wrote both so I know.

When asked about lag switching

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The punishment does not happen the second that they lag switch. It tracks it and happens later.

When asked if there were any standby/lag switch cheaters yet

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I need to look at the database to see how many people have been caught. I do know that the code detects the various network hiccups, as the MS networking lab tried all kinds of various cheats. The threshold can be updated by our servers, so we can clamp it down tighter if needed.

0 EXP for cheating...or bad lag spike?

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Originally Posted by Blurry Image

I got 0 exp after a game of Guardian on Jecinto.

Any one got any suggestions as for why?

And no I don't lag switch/standby

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Originally Posted by Mintthepepper13

If you were host and your connections at any point of the game lagged a bit you get 0 exp, there is no other way

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Originally Posted by Blurry Image

Aw thats lame. They gonna fix that with the next update?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

No. That's by design.

same thread...

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Originally Posted by Forgewolf

So even the slightest amount of lag? How can someone not lag at all?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

For that code to trigger, you didn't have slight lag. You had extreme lag, to the point that it thought you were standby switching.

Response to Player(s) possibly cheating to level 100

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

We will be reporting those that cheated/hacked their way to the 100 level to the Live team for banning. We can see whether they played their way to 100 or not, so I don't recommend that you use their cheat to get it.

and...

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Wait a few days and see what they think. The satellites are close to lining up for the Hammer to unleash.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Here's what will happen. Pay close attention to the part where they say that you are responsible for what happens on your live account.

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/support/sy...recheating.htm

Part of what happens once Microsoft resets Gamerscore for Cheating

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Once your score is reset, you cannot earn any of those achievements again.

Why doesn't EPIC reset Standbyers too?

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Originally Posted by Public Enemy

Why dont u reset standbyers their ranks, stats etc?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Because you cannot tell the difference between a standby and a network hiccup. This weekend TimeWarner went down for a few minutes and I was host (sad too because I was getting owned). Did I standby? No, but the code can't tell the difference, so I was marked as one and given my penalty. I made up the XP in a few more matches, all of host of course

With people glitching the 100 ...SHOULD THeRE be a NEW 99 rank achievement

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Originally Posted by FloridaGears2

That way there will be an achievement only legit players will get.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

When their gamerscores get reset the level 100 achievement will be only earned by legit players. Stay tuned

When asked "if its possible to have gained lvl 100 yet"

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Originally Posted by GizmoSWE

Im just wondering if its possible to have gained lvl 100 yet, since i have seen alot of lvl 100.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

It's not possible yet. Don't worry. We are having the Live accounts banned for cheating. That means they'll lose their DLC, gamerscore, and have to buy a new Gold account.

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*Connection information*

Party chat lag's

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Originally Posted by B_Mamba17

This is a question based on another thread I read. Does anyone know if it is true that being in the party chat using your bandwith which can lead to increased lag?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

It is true. The game has dynamic bandwidth adjustments built into it. The game does not know about the consumption of party chat so it can't use the dynamic bandwidth adjustment features properly.

When asked about region preference

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Since many people have asked about the region preferences, I'll explain how it works. It sorts matches by country with your country as being the best choice. If there are matches in your country that have space for you, you will join them before a match from a different country. If no matches are available in your country and there are matches available with a ping of less than 200, then you will join that match.

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You don't pick the country. See the official TU3 thread

Regarding Country Preference Filter

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Cant you at least give them the option of waiting for an Australian match ? or is that not possible.

Let them choose if they want local searches only?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

This is a 6 degrees of separation problem. Let's say he selects local only but has a moderate NAT so is guaranteed not to host. Then he finds his next-door neighbor during matchmaking but his neighbor has NOT set that. The neighbor is host and the player that selected the local only option is out of luck. Statistically, that will be the majority case and not the minority, so even though he thinks that feature should work for him, it won't.

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The region preference does not work.

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You are wrong. Australia doesn't have enough players for Australia only matches.

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Sadly I cannot get into a public online match without encountering a horrible amount of lag as 99.9% of the time I am pushed together with an American host.

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Unfortunately for you Australians, there are not enough people playing concurrently in the same playlists for us to restrict you only to your local area.

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4 Day Country Filter test results, Epic please can we have your input on this?

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I've answered the Australian problems numerous times. Do a search.

Region Preference Filter is still there!?

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Basically, Joe said that they turned off the region preference because people outside the US weren't finding matches.

Ummmm.... hello? Isn't Gears of War 2 the FOURTH most played Xbox Live game? Isn't that just below COD4, 5, and Halo 3, all of which have VERY effective region FILTERS?

So is Joe saying that the vast majority of Gears 2 players are American? I can't believe it. I don't think it's the players causing the problem, I think it's the company's lack of ability to create a proper solution. Maybe I'm being too harsh, but c'mon, two-year-old games that are half as popular have a better region filter.

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Closed this because my statements were taken out of context and aren't correct. The region preference is still there (it's only ever been a preference).

When asked if the Ping can be set lower

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Ping of 100 would mean you never play a match. The median ping is ~90, which means there are just as many matches above that than below that.

Regarding Host ping limit

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You could be right. Just last night I got matched with a Japanese host, that's over 600ms.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

The code will not connect to any server with 600ms ping. It has to be < 200.

Ping Limit Reduced & Talks about Playlist change(s)

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I think Joe Graf said something about adding a playlist or something. Don't take my word for it though.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

We were planning to add it today but then the servers went down. We added it once the servers were back up. I also changed the max ping from 200 to 175

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*Quitting Matches & Penalty Information*

Keep quitting and eventually you won't be penalized?

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Originally Posted by attack theoRy

Ya know, if you quit every game you'll never get the penalty.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

That is the only way to avoid it. It just keeps adding them up otherwise. So if you do the 10 or 20 recommended, that will give you a nice -15,000 to -30,000 penalty

Consequences for quitting a Match

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That's exactly how it works. Quit 3 games and then finish 1 and you'll see -4500 waiting for you.

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That sounds about right. The penalty is -1500 per quit.

Increase quitting penalty?

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Originally Posted by blackhawk465

At level 50, half way to being done, you need 625,386 xp. That means if you lost 1,500 experience for quitting you're only losing .24% The penalty should be much higher.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

It's fine. Quitting has dropped dramatically since the XP penalty went in

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Upping the penalty doesn't make sense. Last night I lost power twice. I was just 300 points from my next achievement and lost power twice. I don't see us increasing the penalty

Only the quitter gets penalized for quitting

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yea I mean it just sucks when the host quits and then next game I lose 1500pts. again, its not the points, its the principle. why should i take the exp seriously when epic doesn't take the system seriously?

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You are not penalized when the host quits.

-1500 for not quitting?

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Originally Posted by jamesvbo

Is anybody else experiencing regular -1500 pt penalties WITHOUT QUITTING? It happens very regular to a friend of mine and we cannot explain it. The connections are fine, etc. He gets the notification of penalty as soon as the match ends, but he is still on the list and in my party.
How could this be happening? PLEASE HELP.

TheDarkPlumber speaking for WRM.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

The only way you get the penalty is if you quit before the game travels back to the party lobby. The party lobby is where that data gets saved, so if you quit before that you will get a penalty next time.

and in the same thread...

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Originally Posted by jamesvbo

it happened once while playing multiplayer split screen at my house

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

I've sent QA a request to look at the splitscreen idea, but I remember that as part of their test passes.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

QA says that splitscreen players are not being unfairly marked as quitters. My recommendation is don't quit

more from the same thread...

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Originally Posted by Tom W

Dont you get incomplete match penalties for all the times you have left a game including before TU3?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Nope. (10 silly chars)

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*Quick Experience Explanation*

When asked for a "Quick Experience Explanation?"

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It's based on points and is scaled by the game type. So Annex does not earn 1 XP for 1 point because you get many more points in that game type. They are all scaled so that you get a similar number of XP irrespective of game type.

XP or POINTS

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The EXP we get in a game should be the EXP we get for Rank

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You don't get XP in game you get POINTS. Those POINTS are converted to XP based upon what an average player should get in a match.

Are these ratios right?

Gametype Ratio
Annex 0.26
King of The Hill 0.28
Submission 0.49
Guardian 0.91
Execution 0.98
Warzone 1.00
Wingman 1.09

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Those ratios are right, though we'll adjust them as time goes. We based them off of the millions of matches played and the average amount earned per gametype. Note good players will do better.

Source of Ratio link

Click Me

When asked if you get bonus points (to rank) for winning?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

We do have an option to award a bonus for winning. I'll have to look to see what it is currently set to.

Checking your TrueSkill

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Originally Posted by Erock

hey guys im just wondering if there is a way that you can check your true skill rank now that the new ranking system is in place.

thanks

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

There isn't a way

When asked about Bot's possibly leaving matches

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Bots only keep the teams even. 4 v 3 will get 1 bot, but 3v3 gets none

Sniper Blindfire

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You were never meant to be accurate when blind firing. There was a bug that allowed you to get the aiming bonus and that has been removed.

When asked about blindfire

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i thought they were supposed to fix this? i still cannot blindfire and it still seems most of my headshots dont register

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We absolutely did not change this. That was an exploit and was purposefully removed.

When asked if Gnasher spread had changed

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Nothing has changed. Sorry placebo effect.

When asked about skill matching and if it changed with TU3

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Nothing changed with regards to skill matching. You still are matched by skill, but that skill is no longer shown.

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*Information on Playlists & DLC*

When asked about playlist's

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Something did not get updated on there servers for the playlist changes. We are working on it.

Wingman on new DLC

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Originally Posted by bloodangelz

I know that the last time this happened, it was included in the update. I just want an honest answer. There are tons of us that love wingman and you cannot play wingman on the new maps. How hard would it be to add a DLC playlist for wingman similar to the two way playlists that were recently created?

Thanks in advance.

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Originally Posted by Rod Fergusson

My name is Rod Fergusson and I approve this message.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Additional playlists aren't hard, but each one we add further fragments the matchmaking pool which slows down the process.

same thread...

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Originally Posted by Chewbacca1978

My name is Chewbacca1978 (you'd have though my parents would have given me a normal name like Steve, Frank or David...) but I also approve your message Rod...

Rod - Really, can we not just have tickable box to include DLC when searching for a game...that way we wont' have lots of empty match pools of people searching for games with DLC and games without...one pool per game search choice (ie. if I want to play Annex/KotH i select if as norm, then I select a box to say I want to inc DLC when searching....) would this be something that could be done? Would really appricate your views/comments...

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Originally Posted by Rod Fergusson

It's a little harder than that and UI stuff is much harder for us to change through the TU process. What we're looking at doing now since a lot of people have the DLC is to make sure that on the main playlists that at least one of the two maps offered is from DLC (assuming the players have at least one DLC pack in common).

Thanks,

Rod.

more from same thread...

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Originally Posted by Wired

Rod, any more info on when this will be implemented?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

It's not hard. Reboot and you shall receive

^I would just like to say this was really awesome, Thanks to joeGraf and Rod for listening^

Level 100 takes 125,000,000 million experience points...

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

That number is very, very far off.

also..

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

He's 2 orders of magnitude off on his numbers

When asked about a ERROR message "Too many party members exist for this playlist. Please remove one player or players."

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

Reboot.....

Ranks possibly resetting

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Originally Posted by Nastee In Gears

Just happened to my friend.
Dropped from lvl 28 to 1. I asked him if he cleared or deleted on his Xbox and he said no so I don't know why this stuff is happening.
I have already had my rank reset from 19 back to 1 and now that I am rank 25 if I lose it I'm gonna be pissed.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

I've forwarded this to QA. Did they do something different? For instance, play a lan match without the TU and then go back online? Or something like that?

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*NOTE* The following is not TU3 related but still informative

Is it possible to add more playable characters in MP?

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Originally Posted by S4MUW3LL

Some may have completed the story mode, and found some nice looking locust guards which guard the palace in the end-ish story part. I was a bit disappointing that this skin wasn't playable in multiplayer as it looked very good.

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

We can't add any additional MP characters due to how we coded those. Sorry.

Did bleed-out change from Gears 1 to Gears 2?

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

The bleedout is the same from Gears1 to Gears2.

Can you Resetting stats EPIC?

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I really wish they would reset all the stats for Gears 2 when TU3 is released. All the issues this game was shipped with has really messed up my stats, I would really like to start off with a clean slate.
Anybody else?

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We've said over and over again that we will not do this. Please stop asking

Need active to pop heads with Snipe?

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Originally Posted by pillz

why do i have to have active to get a headshot with the sniper.....please fix

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

That's not how it works.

Microsoft has nothing to do with develop?

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Originally Posted by Dietrevers

Microsoft has nothing to do with develop, they only publish and sell the game, ONLY!

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Originally Posted by joeGraf

That's not correct. They built and run the community web site that tracks stats. We don't even have source code to it.

When asked "Why was shooting after roadie running eliminated"

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Per forum request is why it's gone.

Host wins everytime?

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The host only wins 48% of the time.

*In response to all the threads being deleted*

*Flak has spoken*

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This one is getting closed for being off topic.

And yes, 6 threads on the same topic is too many and they are closed/deleted.

My advice, stop posting unnecessary/duplicating threads, Flak means business.

Special Thanks to

Thanks to joeGraf for given me my first STICKY thread

DARKSIDEMACH2K3

tarheel cb

cogtagnoob

Simburgur

OrtanaIV's

zzzCHERzzz

Gnut

Thanks to ALL who helped get this thread started

Please post any other joeGraf reply's I may have missed in regards to TU3

The little stars at the top are for you zzzCHERzzz

Big D · 03-24-2009, 01:03 PM

Bump to inform!

Big D · 03-24-2009, 01:04 PM

holy cow these forums are moving fast!

Prisoner 849 · 03-24-2009, 01:06 PM

Like.

Should be stickied.

the critic · 03-24-2009, 01:08 PM

has joegraf ever taken the time to explain why the gears series suffers from latency issues far worse than any of their rivals?

has he ever explained whey they talk up so many minor fixes and balancing issues that are easier and cheaper to fix rather than addressing their network problems as a priority issue?

I don't know when you get the opportunity to talk to these guys, but please forward my inquiry.