City Designer 3 is not officially released at GenCon. It will be released very shortly thereafter. I have it with me to demo CD3 though.
Ciao, Ralf
On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 19:10:34 -0400, Robert Graham wrote:
> Simon/Ralph, > > I was just wondering dare we ask about City Designer 3.. GenCon Indy > (seems I could say that you already missed one GenCon this year ;P > (OZ!)) and Avaliblity? >
-- Ralf Schemmann ProFantasy Software ralf@profantasy.com --- ProFantasy Software Ltd is registered in the UK at Spectrum House, Bromell's Road, London, SW4 0BN. No. 2843515
Please check your order confirmation page; those who have "CD3 Box preorder" will receive a copy of City Designer 3. All orders placed during GenCon 2007, Origins 2008, and GenCon 2008 will also receive a copy.
You can receive a copy of all the orders you have placed from the Service/Order Tracking option on ProFantasy's website.
So do we wait for an email or is there a download page we need to go to?
BTW I went to this page
http://www.profantasy.com/service/tracking_pf.asp
put in my email, and after a while got this:
*****
Active Server Pages error 'ASP 0113'
Script timed out
/service/listorders.asp
The maximum amount of time for a script to execute was exceeded. You can change this limit by specifying a new value for the property Server.ScriptTimeout or by changing the value in the IIS administration tools.
I was able to get into my reg page but there are no download links for City Designer 3 that I can see. It just lists me as owning City Designer Pro and gives its registration number.
I ordered a copy of CD-Pro last night, and the page said it included the CD3 Box copy pre-order on the checkout page when I was making the purchase.
However, my order confirmation page says absolutely NOTHING about the CD3 pre-order.
All it shows is: "City Designer Pro Download Only", along with 2 links (one for installing with CC2-Pro, and another for CC3 compatibility).
Moreover, when I put in the provided serial number on my registration page, it shows up as "City Designer 2". There's no mention of CD-Pro, nor of any CD3 preorder... I'm so confused...
Sadly, my biggest concern is the complete lack of mention of the CD3 preorder after purchase (e.g. order confirmation page), despite repeated mention of it prior to purchase (product info page, shopping checkout page).
And now with talk of it already being available today to pre-order cusomters, I'm starting to worry if I made some mistake during my purchase that resulted in purchasing CD-Pro *without* the CD3 pre-order.... =/
@Dally: You don't need to worry regarding your order. As per the ProFantasy upgrade policy, you get the new add-on for free if released within one year of your purchase of the CC2 version. In any case, Simon confirmed earlier that any order placed for CD Pro at this stage is also a CD3 pre-order.
I had originally thought that based on the comments before mine that CD3 had secretly been made available for download to those who had pre-ordered.
It seems however that the original comments were referring to the physical pre-release CDs that were being handed out at GenCon. Those of us not attending will likely have to wait until the official release to get our hands on our pre-ordered copies.
yeah i've got no information on any release so i'm figuring like with DD3 if those of us who did get it 'before' we'll have to wait, problem is no reply from Ralph or Simon yet (figure they are still coming back / recovering).
The other problem is i just realised mine was ordered 2006 back when they originally said it was only going to be a year looks like i really need to double check my orders.. so will there be a discounted upgrade or am I going to have to pay out the FULL price AGAIN for CD3
And looking at the website.. no no no and no *sighs* which is annoying, as elf mentioned earlier for a lot of people who originally brought bundles or groups of the software based on the 'original' upgrade release scheduals.. which where:
CC3 with DD3 coming out a few months later (This actually happened DD3 came out December of 2006) and CD3 being released within the Year (This one obviously did not happen due to technical reasons and it's actually been 2 years since it's release )....
So by the looks of it any one of us who brought it on the original release schedual is gonna have to fork out full price (in my case about 60$ or so) for the software.. again
Posted By: Robyeah i've got no information on any release so i'm figuring like with DD3 if those of us who did get it 'before' we'll have to wait, problem is no reply from Ralph or Simon yet (figure they are still coming back / recovering).
The other problem is i just realized mine was ordered 2006 back when they originally said it was only going to be a year looks like i really need to double check my orders.. so will there be a discounted upgrade or am I going to have to pay out the FULL price AGAIN for CD3
I am finding myself in a similar situation. I ordered back in July 2007, expecting it to be released very soon, and thus get the free upgrade. Now it seems like only orders after August 1st 2007 gets the free upgrade As for your situation, I am fairly certain ProFantasy offers upgrade pricing no matter how old the product is, so I do believe you too qualify for an upgrade price. Reading the CD3 upgrade page, it seems like you have to pay full upgrade price, since you don't get the additional may-july discount, but it should still be lower than the full CD3 price as far as I understand.
I am a bit confused about what they say about that pre-order upgrade price though. I don't have any link at my registration page or anywhere else that lets me order the upgrade now before release (when it is supposed to be cheaper), only the regular non-upgrade version in their online store.
There is still a few items to be worked out on CD3. The CD3s at GenCon were Betas. The release canidate is still a week or two out. Ralf will be getting to it as soon as he gets back. This is only my understanding and not official compnay statement.
Tom
PS. The wait is worth it. The art is amazing. The tools are fantastic. I was at GenCon working the booth with Ralf and Steve. I can attest that the software is everything it promised to be.
Posted By: MonsenI am finding myself in a similar situation. I ordered back in July 2007, expecting it to be released very soon, and thus get the free upgrade. Now it seems like only orders after August 1st 2007 gets the free upgrade As for your situation, I am fairly certain ProFantasy offers upgrade pricing no matter how old the product is, so I do believe you too qualify for an upgrade price. Reading theCD3 upgrade page, it seems like you have to pay full upgrade price, since you don't get the additional may-july discount, but it should still be lower than the full CD3 price as far as I understand.
I am a bit confused about what they say about that pre-order upgrade price though. I don't have any link at my registration page or anywhere else that lets me order the upgrade now before release (when it is supposed to be cheaper), only the regular non-upgrade version in their online store.
This is actually very annoying. I willbe happy if what Tome says is true about it being worth the wait but I got CD in July 07 (like many others) because the expected release date was the fall. If I can't get the CD3 upgrade I will very pissed because I purchased it at the time in good faith based on their release schedule.
I'll be updating the release version of CD3 with the fixes to the bugs we discovered in the beta, build the install and then we'll release the download version. It should take me only a couple of days.
All the best,
Ralf
*is still kinda woozy from the return flight with 4 hours delay*
If it will be free upgrades only for the people who bought after August 2007, I will be seriously disappointed by it, but I heard that won't be the case :)
Why?
First of all: Profantasy is a small bussiness and they need every cent to operate well, etc. The problem is: I can say, Hungary isn't a rich country, and we need to get the maximumum value for our money as well. And even then, we pay extra compared to what the people in USA would pay, since the price is significantly higher for Europe. Good to pay extra after 40 years of communism, when the wages seems to be low. As you see if we try to speak about who is poor, and who needs it, etc. So we can't judge things based on emotions, sympathy.
The question is: When they offered CC3 for first and planned releases with release dates, how many updates was expected to arrive in one year. We checked price to value ratios. And some of us thought about possibilities. Should we avoid the extra high prices and try to order from USA? Or get the whole shebang (even if it would mean we get the products again we already have) and try to save on the upgrade. Though choice, but to order something (do bussiness with someone) you have to trust your partner and what they said, and this went the whole shebang way.
Since that: no good manual yet, but we had to pay for the annual as extra. People who could draw symbols either for annuals or art upgrades, etc. worked on annuals and extra income for them, extra costs for us. With the delays I am not that happy.
DD3 wasn't a big upgrade functionality wise (even if the art is nice and it uses CC3 features), and symbol set upgrades weren't big ones either. But it was said: We will get less upgrades in 1 year time frame, but how big improvement CD3 will be... I can understand: if we would get art upgrades at time (and they wouldn't work on annuals, etc) the art upgrade for the packages would be far less tempting, than CD3, and if the extra functionality would be a separate release after art upgrades we would pay for that, sooner or later. If Profantasy works on CD3 upgrade that is a decent big upgrade, instead of many small upgrades, so a good and fair deal, since what we lose quantity wise with free upgrades we would gain in quality. To me it only makes sense if we get the CD3 upgrade.
But if no CD3 in package? The value seems to be far worse, far lower, and I have every reason to feel cheated.
You have every reason to say: It is a minor issue and we get support often (except we have to pay for some of the help and tutorials, which made others unhappy) and it is good. But the problem is: I have every reason to say, paying extra for being european is a bit discriminative, they broken the trust. And if we see how much an average player or DM can spend on RPGs here it isn't that minor issue either. For one it might costs a bit less extra chips at a gaming table (in USA) for a few weeks, for others it might be: no new books for a few months.
Since most of CC2 and CC3 users are old customers, making sure that Profantasy don't let down the customers who trusted them isn't a big issue for them, since it would involve small minority of customer base, and small minority of income so it is a minor issue for them. It was discussed here before, discussed it with them before, etc.
So far the overall reaction was: In most cases profantasy understands the customer, and tries to help the customers and decide in their favor, and I should count on that. Why? Because they know, if a customer stays a happy customer and recommends them, that is more valuable than trying to get the upgrade price, which one might pay or decide to skip, and avoid profantasy products later (which would be much more lost income, and even a small chance of a such decision is expensive for them).
Hearing this was enough to restore some trust. The first annual I bought when it was finished and ready to be bought at the cheaper price ($) from their partners (web stores that sell profantasy stuff, pdfs, etc), and the 2nd one I have a subscribtion to.
Since I don't like Dungeon based adventures (and hack and slash) at all, city designer is one of the most important addons for me. And it is one of the most important upgrades. At least for fantasy games...
Surprisingly enough on the "most important upgrades" list, I think Character Artist would have a place, since that is where art can make the biggest difference, where the old vector art isn't the best. And I hope it could help to create "skirmish symbols" etc. from characters and monsters. (It would be nice if the character artist would support multiple views, stances, portrait design, etc) And of course I would love to have support for more modern games here... But even if I would love to see it, I know it has to wait, and it should be a major upgrade, which sould be expensive...
Quick heads up: Simon and me are looking at the dates and preparing the release. We'll announce exact dates when we've sorted it all out. Just to let you know I haven't forgotten this thread.
Comments
City Designer 3 is not officially released at GenCon. It will be released very shortly thereafter. I have it with me to demo CD3 though.
Ciao,
Ralf
On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 19:10:34 -0400, Robert Graham wrote:
> Simon/Ralph,
>
> I was just wondering dare we ask about City Designer 3.. GenCon Indy
> (seems I could say that you already missed one GenCon this year ;P
> (OZ!)) and Avaliblity?
>
--
Ralf Schemmann
ProFantasy Software
ralf@profantasy.com
---
ProFantasy Software Ltd is registered in the UK at Spectrum House, Bromell's Road, London, SW4 0BN. No. 2843515
Buddy of mine just returned from GenCon with a coolio gift for me:
CITY DESIGNER 3, EHNANCED EDITION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Time to play!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How's the piece of software? How are the symbols? Come on, tell us ;-)
And, Simon and Ralph, What about those who preordered months ago (i.e. in 2007 / January 2008) and couldn't attend GenCon? .......................
You can receive a copy of all the orders you have placed from the Service/Order Tracking option on ProFantasy's website.
-- Steve
BTW I went to this page
http://www.profantasy.com/service/tracking_pf.asp
put in my email, and after a while got this:
*****
Active Server Pages error 'ASP 0113'
Script timed out
/service/listorders.asp
The maximum amount of time for a script to execute was exceeded. You can change this limit by specifying a new value for the property Server.ScriptTimeout or by changing the value in the IIS administration tools.
*****
The link for CD3 should be on your order confirmation page. And the link to that page should have been send to you after you placed your order.
I ordered a copy of CD-Pro last night, and the page said it included the CD3 Box copy pre-order on the checkout page when I was making the purchase.
However, my order confirmation page says absolutely NOTHING about the CD3 pre-order.
All it shows is: "City Designer Pro Download Only", along with 2 links (one for installing with CC2-Pro, and another for CC3 compatibility).
Moreover, when I put in the provided serial number on my registration page, it shows up as "City Designer 2". There's no mention of CD-Pro, nor of any CD3 preorder... I'm so confused...
Sadly, my biggest concern is the complete lack of mention of the CD3 preorder after purchase (e.g. order confirmation page), despite repeated mention of it prior to purchase (product info page, shopping checkout page).
And now with talk of it already being available today to pre-order cusomters, I'm starting to worry if I made some mistake during my purchase that resulted in purchasing CD-Pro *without* the CD3 pre-order.... =/
But if Steve says it is already available, you maybe just have to resent your order tracking page with the button on PFs homepage.
You don't need to worry regarding your order. As per the ProFantasy upgrade policy, you get the new add-on for free if released within one year of your purchase of the CC2 version. In any case, Simon confirmed earlier that any order placed for CD Pro at this stage is also a CD3 pre-order.
It seems however that the original comments were referring to the physical pre-release CDs that were being handed out at GenCon. Those of us not attending will likely have to wait until the official release to get our hands on our pre-ordered copies.
The other problem is i just realised mine was ordered 2006 back when they originally said it was only going to be a year
CC3 with DD3 coming out a few months later (This actually happened DD3 came out December of 2006) and CD3 being released within the Year (This one obviously did not happen due to technical reasons and it's actually been 2 years since it's release
So by the looks of it any one of us who brought it on the original release schedual is gonna have to fork out full price (in my case about 60$ or so) for the software.. again
As for your situation, I am fairly certain ProFantasy offers upgrade pricing no matter how old the product is, so I do believe you too qualify for an upgrade price. Reading the CD3 upgrade page, it seems like you have to pay full upgrade price, since you don't get the additional may-july discount, but it should still be lower than the full CD3 price as far as I understand.
I am a bit confused about what they say about that pre-order upgrade price though. I don't have any link at my registration page or anywhere else that lets me order the upgrade now before release (when it is supposed to be cheaper), only the regular non-upgrade version in their online store.
Tom
PS. The wait is worth it. The art is amazing. The tools are fantastic. I was at GenCon working the booth with Ralf and Steve. I can attest that the software is everything it promised to be.
Today I will work through the tutorial in the book after I take my son to his doctors appointment (DARN YOU REAL LIFE!!!!!).
I'll post up some pics later today for the clamoring masses
I'll be updating the release version of CD3 with the fixes to the bugs we discovered in the beta, build the install and then we'll release the download version. It should take me only a couple of days.
All the best,
Ralf
*is still kinda woozy from the return flight with 4 hours delay*
If it will be free upgrades only for the people who bought after August 2007, I will be seriously disappointed by it, but I heard that won't be the case :)
Why?
First of all: Profantasy is a small bussiness and they need every cent to operate well, etc. The problem is: I can say, Hungary isn't a rich country, and we need to get the maximumum value for our money as well. And even then, we pay extra compared to what the people in USA would pay, since the price is significantly higher for Europe. Good to pay extra after 40 years of communism, when the wages seems to be low. As you see if we try to speak about who is poor, and who needs it, etc. So we can't judge things based on emotions, sympathy.
The question is: When they offered CC3 for first and planned releases with release dates, how many updates was expected to arrive in one year. We checked price to value ratios. And some of us thought about possibilities. Should we avoid the extra high prices and try to order from USA? Or get the whole shebang (even if it would mean we get the products again we already have) and try to save on the upgrade. Though choice, but to order something (do bussiness with someone) you have to trust your partner and what they said, and this went the whole shebang way.
Since that: no good manual yet, but we had to pay for the annual as extra. People who could draw symbols either for annuals or art upgrades, etc. worked on annuals and extra income for them, extra costs for us. With the delays I am not that happy.
DD3 wasn't a big upgrade functionality wise (even if the art is nice and it uses CC3 features), and symbol set upgrades weren't big ones either. But it was said: We will get less upgrades in 1 year time frame, but how big improvement CD3 will be... I can understand: if we would get art upgrades at time (and they wouldn't work on annuals, etc) the art upgrade for the packages would be far less tempting, than CD3, and if the extra functionality would be a separate release after art upgrades we would pay for that, sooner or later. If Profantasy works on CD3 upgrade that is a decent big upgrade, instead of many small upgrades, so a good and fair deal, since what we lose quantity wise with free upgrades we would gain in quality. To me it only makes sense if we get the CD3 upgrade.
But if no CD3 in package? The value seems to be far worse, far lower, and I have every reason to feel cheated.
You have every reason to say: It is a minor issue and we get support often (except we have to pay for some of the help and tutorials, which made others unhappy) and it is good. But the problem is: I have every reason to say, paying extra for being european is a bit discriminative, they broken the trust. And if we see how much an average player or DM can spend on RPGs here it isn't that minor issue either. For one it might costs a bit less extra chips at a gaming table (in USA) for a few weeks, for others it might be: no new books for a few months.
Since most of CC2 and CC3 users are old customers, making sure that Profantasy don't let down the customers who trusted them isn't a big issue for them, since it would involve small minority of customer base, and small minority of income so it is a minor issue for them. It was discussed here before, discussed it with them before, etc.
So far the overall reaction was: In most cases profantasy understands the customer, and tries to help the customers and decide in their favor, and I should count on that. Why? Because they know, if a customer stays a happy customer and recommends them, that is more valuable than trying to get the upgrade price, which one might pay or decide to skip, and avoid profantasy products later (which would be much more lost income, and even a small chance of a such decision is expensive for them).
Hearing this was enough to restore some trust. The first annual I bought when it was finished and ready to be bought at the cheaper price ($) from their partners (web stores that sell profantasy stuff, pdfs, etc), and the 2nd one I have a subscribtion to.
Since I don't like Dungeon based adventures (and hack and slash) at all, city designer is one of the most important addons for me. And it is one of the most important upgrades. At least for fantasy games...
Surprisingly enough on the "most important upgrades" list, I think Character Artist would have a place, since that is where art can make the biggest difference, where the old vector art isn't the best. And I hope it could help to create "skirmish symbols" etc. from characters and monsters. (It would be nice if the character artist would support multiple views, stances, portrait design, etc) And of course I would love to have support for more modern games here... But even if I would love to see it, I know it has to wait, and it should be a major upgrade, which sould be expensive...