BC2 - R11 patch release candiate

[woowoo]

What's this?

DICE has produced a candidate for the next game client update for BFBC2 PC. If this is deemed good enough, it will become the official patch, and will be pushed out to everyone. For now though, the patch is still in Beta.

House rules:
You install and run the patch at your own risk.
The Beta client can only play against a couple of special Beta game servers.
You are expected to report problems and overall impressions in this forum (BC2 PC Patch Feedback - Electronic Arts UK Community (http://forums.electronicarts.co.uk/bc2-pc-patch-feedback/)).


Should I install the Beta Patch?

If you are technically minded and you want to try it out, feel free to do so.
If you just want to play the game, wait until the full release takes place.


How do I install the Beta Patch?

First off, this will only work with the non-Steam version. The updater will refuse to update over the Steam version.


Ensure that you have at least 12GB free disk space.
Download the offline-updater archive here (http://static.cdn.ea.com/dice/u/f/bf...tch_795745.exe (http://static.cdn.ea.com/dice/u/f/bfbc2/tmp/BFBC2Patch_795745.exe)) - total size 2,616,282,167 bytes
Locate the directory where you have installed BFBC2 -- usually it is "C:\Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\Battlefield Bad Company 2".
Make a copy of that directory. Name that copy "BFBC2 - R10". This is your backup, in case you want to play the non-Beta version of BFBC2; if so, launch BFBC2Game.exe inside of that directory.
Lauch the offline-updater. It should decompress some files to a temp directory; locate your BFBC2 installation directory; ask if you want to update to version 795745; then spend ~15 minutes applying the update.



How do I run the Beta Patch?

Launch "BFBC2Game.exe" in your "Battlefield Bad Company 2" directory.

THere are about 10 test servers up - some in Amsterdam, some over on the US East coast.


What are the changes?


Removed some memory leaks
Fixed crashes when the game attempted to render lots of content (high detail, high FOV or multiple-monitor modes)
Chat window no longer causes lag spikes
Chat window reworked opacity & visibility-time is controllable through settings in settings.ini
Clantag is remembered when using auto-login
Banner URLs can be up to 252 characters in length
SecuROM wrapper removed from non-Steam version
Minor performance improvements
Reduced rubberbanding on >24player servers



What should I look out for?

Any problems that you didn't use to have with the old version, but has with the new version.
Especially the process of installing the patch seems to be fragile. Describe your experience.


Ok, then what?

DICE will monitor this forum. Depending on the response we either pulalalala out to everyone or continue working on it.


Some thanks

Thanks to those players who have helped us by running special debug builds on their own machines over the past year. Also cheers to the folks in noobgroup for doing the first round of validation of this latest patch.

source: http://forums.electronicarts.co.uk/bc2-pc-patch-feedback/1419876-client-r11-beta-patch-795745-a.html

[Neil]

A patch? That's surprising. I thought they gave up to be honest. Still haven't fixed VOIP though from the notes I see :(

[Garrett2112]

Played some today - although server only had (only 2 US I see in browser) ~ 20 or so players



FPS is around 10+ more and seems to be pretty steady
Seems to run smoother (but maybe lower players count/placebo thinking on my part)
Rubberbanding seems better (less)
Hit Reg is a lil better or seems to be (but some complaining worse) & once again on lower server counts - so would expect it to be less...


Just moved my BC2 folder and now the game works both ways - DVD/BC2 folder launches patched version & can launch older pre-patched from moved folder BFBC2.exe...

Thx to DICE/Kalms for still supporting the game though.

Anyone else tried it yet?

[zeroy]

Its 2.4 GB and requires a full backup of R10 on client, etc... I'll pass until its officially released i think - i dont play BC2 all that much these days. Also im a bit late i think, this beta only runs for a week i think?

[Garrett2112]

Yeah Kalms said it would run around a week and then most likely would be rolled out officially afterward. I would doubt they would add/tweak anything to the patch (just a guess on my part...) - so I would just go in and delete my backup folder after it's official and completely rolled out to all the servers.

Would also have to *guesstimate* that there's a server upgrade file as well - since we can only access a few servers after we installed the patch?

[Garrett2112]

Like I figured - the beta patch will become the new patch (if it passes Steam QA Testing fine) as per Kalm's post on the EA UK Forums (http://forums.electronicarts.co.uk/bc2-pc-patch-feedback/1421689-client-r11-beta-patch-795745-end-public-beta-summary.html)
Client R11 Beta Patch (795745) - end of public beta, and summary

Thank you for participating!

I have reviewed all feedback in the forum threads another pass.

There are a lot of reports of perceived performance improvements (and the occasional about performance degradations) compared to R10. The performance difference, when played on full servers, will likely be smaller than now - but it will likely be there.

There are reports about hitreg being as-bad-as-usual or a bit worse than usual. I predict that hitreg in general will not be different with R10 vs R11 once everyone runs it.

The bugs reported are not new for R11. Some of them are minor, some of them major - all major already existed with R10.

I have done background checks on the 5 most commonly mentioned bugs here - none of those have obvious solutions. Now, both you and I know that the patch is rather late in the making. BFBC2 is not the prime focus for the company at this time. Getting the people with the right knowledge to efficiently and robustly sort those out would be challenging and simply take quite a bit of calendar time.

The one exception to this is the clan tags saying "[Invalid ]". Given that part of the purpose of Client R11 was to get the clantags to work properly, it actually was a 5 minute fix, and it could be done 100% serverside - the game server which goes out with Client R11 will correct those (they should really be treated as empty).

You have hammered on the patch and validated that no major issues have been introduced either through sloppy coding nor through the $magic in the packaging process.

Given this, I believe that it is better to continue forward with this patch as the official patch, rather than attempting to get further fixes into it.

And now?

It's time for Steam QA. I don't know the timeframe for it; it's been a long time since I spoke to those people.

You'll hear from me again once Steam QA is complete.

What happens then?

If Steam QA gives thumbs up, then those of you which have version 795745 installed on your PCs are already running the official client R11.

If Steam QA uncovers more problems which requires generation of a new client version, then you will be required to install the new version at the time that we roll out the patch to everyone.

I have installed the Beta patch on my machine, how do I clean it up?

Wait until the Steam QA results are available -- I will give instructions on "how to clean up your machine" then.

What about the beta servers?

For the time being, the Beta servers will stay up.

[Garrett2112]

Nevermind - it's back to the same goofy hit regs as before - as Kalms stated he doubted they would change much with the new patch...