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rowe33
09-18-2002, 10:24 AM
Hey all, I bought NHL Hitz 20-03 yesterday as soon as it came since the original was one of my Xbox favorites. Overall it looks amazing and is a definite improvement. The franchise mode seems like it'll really cool and I love that they added stats this season. The mini games are a nice little touch but nothing spectacular.

Problems -> my game has locked up about 5-6 times already in the 2 hours I was able to play last night. Not a good thing. I'm going to take it back and try a different dvd just in case it's the disc. I had to create a franchise three times in a row because it locked up at the end of franchise creation twice. Which leads me to problem #2: my stats are screwed up. This really bothers me since I'm a stat fanatic. Very annoying. I've played three franchise games so far yet my main center is listed with 11 games played, two other players are listed with 3 or 4 games a piece and the other members of my team have ZERO games played. I've been rotating among the 6 position players I have between periods so everyone has played. The goalie stats are perfect though. Also, the goal and assist totals are off (not that there are many to keep track of so far). I've gone 1-2 so far, scoring exactly one goal. EAch game has been a 1-0 game. The goalies are very tough at the default AI settings compared to last season (All Star mode). However my main center is listed as having scored the goal AND assisted on it somehow. He has two points while the rest of my team has zero. Very annoying. I hope it's some sort of glitch because my franchise had to be created three separate times. I hope the stat tracking system isn't inherently buggy.

I also noticed a bug in the mini games section. A couple times, I was Team #2 and won the event but the announcer would say 'Team 1' won. Not earth shattering but it'd be nice to see these things fixed *before* release.

maximan00
09-18-2002, 11:12 AM
ouch...i was just on my way out to buy Hitz until I read your post. If you get it replaced, please post the results of a different disc. I dont want to get stuck with a bad game. Hopefully it was just a bad batch.

kevgt2000
09-18-2002, 10:18 PM
its fun! also i havent had any problem with it.

Craig35_007
09-18-2002, 10:34 PM
no problems here either

I like the new one

Halo Evolved
09-19-2002, 03:26 PM
Same here, I got Hitz yesterday and have been playing it for awhile and have yet to see any problems with the game.

I guess it might have something to do with faulty batches and such seeing as I usually hear about probs with games whereas my copy works fine as day.

CrazyCougar
09-20-2002, 09:51 AM
Its a manufacturing problem. CD's are run through a moulding machine in batches of upwards of 10-20,000 at a time. Usually the first ones run through aren't the most reliable and the last few of the batch arent either. Once the machine is up and running a while and gets "warmed up" 95 % of the batch goes well. But the inspectors, looking for lacquer, print smudges, scratches and extra before the product is packaged are supposed to catch the errors. But they are human and will miss a few. If yer having problems with a disk take it back. Its not a programming issue but a manufacturing issue.

rowe33
09-20-2002, 12:58 PM
OK, to update my original post:

I took it back to EB and exchanged it for a new copy. Brought it home, loaded it up and BOOM, same exact problem. The thing is, this lockup is happening at the exact same spot. And I'm not getting problems with my other games. The intro movie plays perfectly, then I eventually get to the main menu. I've noticed that it takes a while for the icons to the left to show up (the Stanley Cup, the World, etc). After testing a few times, I've noticed that sometimes they show up very quickly (in which case my game runs well and has no problems) and sometimes they take forever to load (if they load at all). In that case, if I click on Options from the main menu, my game immediately locks up and has to be restarted. I'm going to try a DVD cleaner and see if that helps with my drive but I would think I'd be getting similar problems in other games if this were the case. Could it just be a whole group of faulty DVDs? Or just a problem with my Xbox in this case?

Thanks for any tips / advice!

kevgt2000
09-20-2002, 10:20 PM
bring it back and let eb load it up see if it happens there. if it does get a refund and buy a copy somewhere else


goodluck with it :)

Halo Evolved
09-21-2002, 03:20 PM
Well, as stated above a few posts there are faulty batches and as someone said it usually occurs with the first run and last run batches in the production "day". So taking your copy back to the exact EB you received it from probably won't cure the problem since the copies they have would be alocated from the same batch so to say.

CrazyCougar
09-21-2002, 04:10 PM
That is not totally true. Beginning fo batches and ends of batches get mixed into the whole batch during packaging. They usually have about 3 machines putting the disks into jewel cases and then they run down a shrink wrap machine to packagers grabbing handfuls of ten and putting them into shipping boxes. So some of the beginning runas well as the end of the run is here and there through out the final product. Simply saying the disks do not get packaged in the same order they were molded.

Stores can have disks from 2 different maunfacturing facilities at one time also. All depends on how large of an order the game was for , etc... So I suggest taking it back and trying to exchange it. Chances are you will get a good copy.

Halo Evolved
09-21-2002, 04:21 PM
Well, certain stores do not get huge quantities of games like this....so it can be a safe assurance that the shipment that that EB got if not all of it is faulty because of the order they package the shipments. Huge titles like GTA3 on PS2 had batches mixed since so many stores were full of pre-orders so the stores received huge shipments of that particular game. Now back to Hitz 2003...this title was not a huge game and so therefor the shipments were small and this raises the risk of a store getting an entire shipment of faulty software.

Shipment can range from 1-10 copies of this game unless a certain store had adequate pre-orders.

CrazyCougar
09-21-2002, 09:38 PM
Most faulty disks do not even make it to packaging as tey are hand inspected by people. Every disk. But yes a few do slip through when ya got a lazy inspector or just a tired one for that matter. The finished product(inspected cd's, packaged in jewel cases, shrinkwrapped and then boxed) at the maufacturering facility does not all go to the same DC. The product usually gets shipped to a few DC's across North America and Canada. Then from the DC, they dropship to a store or to another customer DC. EB does there own dropshipping so the main DC ships to EB's smaller DC. SO the likelihood of 1 EB store getting 10 cdroms that were manufactured at the same time from the same run is very very very slim. Its difficult to explain unless you have worked in the manufacturing and distribution of CD's. Trust me, take the game back and try a new one. Chances are 99 % you'll get a bug free game the second time around. (and the game may not even be the prob like you said, it could be the xbox)

CrazyCougar
09-21-2002, 09:43 PM
Hey Halo just so ya dont think I am trying to contradict ya man. I've worked in the manufacturing and shipping of software for 10 years, so I'm not trying to bust yer chops. I just think he has a good chance of returning the product and getting a perfectly good copy in return. Hope I didnt **** ya off or anything posting to your posts. If I did sorry.