> The game is supposed to work correctly without any bugs.
This is not real-world software engineering :)
Pretty much any software has bugs; maybe surprisingly to non-programmers, games are especially complex (in primis, architecturally).
In real world, one can realistically talk about, let's say, an acceptable threshold of bugs.
> People who paid money for the game deserve continued support
And this is not real-world (game) business. Whether one likes it or not, there is a per-unit profit, and the corresponding value in terms of support is very limited.
An ideal solution to this is open sourcing games after a certain time (Id Software used to do it), but this is not realistic. I wish it, though!
> That ought to motivate companies not to release shoddy work
One can't really force a company not to do shoddy work. The gaming market is a radically free one, unlike other constrained markets, like internet providers. Customers are actually entitled to have the money refunded, at least on Steam. Gaming journalism actually has been including bugginess in games evaluation for a while, so buyers can decide in an informed fashion.
This is not real-world software engineering :)
Pretty much any software has bugs; maybe surprisingly to non-programmers, games are especially complex (in primis, architecturally).
In real world, one can realistically talk about, let's say, an acceptable threshold of bugs.
> People who paid money for the game deserve continued support
And this is not real-world (game) business. Whether one likes it or not, there is a per-unit profit, and the corresponding value in terms of support is very limited.
An ideal solution to this is open sourcing games after a certain time (Id Software used to do it), but this is not realistic. I wish it, though!
> That ought to motivate companies not to release shoddy work
One can't really force a company not to do shoddy work. The gaming market is a radically free one, unlike other constrained markets, like internet providers. Customers are actually entitled to have the money refunded, at least on Steam. Gaming journalism actually has been including bugginess in games evaluation for a while, so buyers can decide in an informed fashion.