Am I the only one who is having endless issues with Live and the Games for Windows Marketplace?

 

I have been very pleasantly surprised with Flight itself. I had intially decided that it didn't look "serious" enough, but the other weekend I downloaded it anyway, just to have a look. And I was sold within minutes - I love the look, the feel, I love the idea that it gently guides you into progressing as a pilot, and, most surprising of all, I found the restricted map liberating - I felt that I could actually explore the whole thing, realistically, rather than being faced with an entire world of limited quality. All good, I thought, I'd like to drop some cash on this. More islands. A Maule. Brilliant.

 

Except that's where it all started to go wrong. At every single step, there've been issues. I had the issue with the registration key when signing into Live. I then had issues with the GFWM Client, which was needed as a workaround to the registration key. I then had issues with my Live acount (it had seemingly decided on its own that I was somewhere I wasn't) so that -eventually, once I had figured this out - I had to start from scratch with a new Live account. But, it's ok, we're up and running now, logged into Live. Add a credit card.... no, can't do that. It just refuses to accept it. Error, temporarily unavailable. Ok, try again later, same thing. Same thing a week later. More trawling the web, more attempts at workarounds. Try a third credit card, for some reason this time the details stick. Woohoo! Try and pay and.... Sorry, we could not validate this card at this time. Gah! Ok, try a paypal account. Added no problem, try and pay and... Sorry. Tearing my hair out by now, I trawl yet more forums and FAQs. No joy. In game or on the markeplace website, it's impossible to pay MS a cent. I try one more time, in game, just because I'm an idiot (repeating the same action again and again expecting a different outcome every time!) and... wouldn't you know it, I just bought 2000 Microsoft points! Astonishing! Quick, use 'em for the Haiwaii Adventure Pack! Yes! It's working, click download, it's working, it's... it's telling me it can't download it right now, Status 80070426. Deep, deep breath. Another hurdle. Ok. More forum searches. Reboot. No joy. Someone clever on Avsim describes a workaround using the GFWM Client .. try that... gadzooks! It's started to download. Slow, but... oh. No. GFWM Client has encountered a problem and needs to be shut. Great. I howl at the moon.

 

Ok, so maybe the servers are slow or something. Let's try a smaller download in the meantime. That Maule. I want to haul cargo and passengers. Oh, not enough microsoft points left - buy some more, yes please. Sorry but your credit card could not be... the words disappear into the red fog that is my impotent rage.

 

Is it just me? I'm almost beginning to feel picked on! All I wanted was to pay a few bucks to MS, and bimble around the Pacific skies... it can't be this hard can it? Can it?

 

Apologies for the lengthy post, I just had to let it all out. And if anyone else has had these constant and seemingly insurmountable issues... let me know how you're getting on! I am not giving up, just yet. Flight is brilliant. Live... not so much.

I promisse to read your post later at home. My main issues had to do wth payments using my internet debit card. I solved it with my bank (I hope)... but they mentioned many problems with MS Portugal and payments too ...

The last update broke my MS Flight, and the Flight team had me uninstall Flight and GFWL, then reinstall GFWL and download Flight from Steam. It worked (thanks guys) and I'm up and running again, but for some reason, loading Flight is now incredibly slow. From the time the 1st splashscreen appears, it take a full 4 minutes before the main menu is available. I assume it's due to having to negotiate with both GFWL and Steam on startup.

I assume it's due to having to negotiate with both GFWL and Steam on startup.

 

I certainly don't know what is going on in these cases, however I cannot believe having to run it through Steam would be a solution - it should work properly running only through GFWL...

Only problem I had, was trying to purchase Hawaii, and it wouldn't take my credit card. ( I used a debit card first). Then I tried an Amex card and Visa and it wouldn't take either one of those. I finally found a Customer Support person om the MS game site, and I bought the necessary points from her. Then it still took an hour for them to show up in my account. When I went back to Marketplace, I then could add my credit card. The system is a bit buggy.

 

Now I see they take Paypal, which I prefer anyway.

I think the whole point system is stoopid. You should just be able to buy what you want as a straight money transaction and not have outstanding points laying around. I tend to avoid it and pay through Steam, now.

I must say I have had no problems at all, every thing has been very smooth from day one. All transactions have gone through first try with my Discover card. I have only delt with the GFWM client, stayed away from Steam entirely. Hope everything worked out in the end, it will be worth it, and welcome to the forum.

Only problem I had, was trying to purchase Hawaii, and it wouldn't take my credit card. ( I used a debit card first). Then I tried an Amex card and Visa and it wouldn't take either one of those. I finally found a Customer Support person om the MS game site, and I bought the necessary points from her. Then it still took an hour for them to show up in my account. When I went back to Marketplace, I then could add my credit card. The system is a bit buggy.

 

This is pretty much what happened to me.... The last purchases went well, and I hope they will with Alaska :-)

I have only delt with the GFWM client, stayed away from Steam entirely.

 

I too have had no problems with GFWL. Tried to buy the HI bundle from Steam, and it was FUBAR. Apparently one has to have obtained Flight from Steam before Steam DLC can be available. Dumped Steam.

Windows Live as common system shared by many games is rubbish in my opinion, so far it has given me nothing good really, in all Windows Live games I find none of its community features user friendly or interesting when compared to ones in Steam for example, Its just another thing to slow down game startups with login stuff. For one game I somehow managed to create two accounts with exactly same name, and now it is hard to remember which one I need to log in.

 

Steam and Origin by EA both are much better systems.

I can imagine the red fog, RobberK... I had one problem with GFWL and that was getting my credit card accepted: it took my quite some time to figure out where I had to enter the necessary data (the link that I got in GFWL didn't work and I had to manually log into some XBox site in my home country... if I remember well). That alone already made me see a little red... Luckily after that I haven't had ANY problems with downloading, buying new credits, buying DLC...

 

I don't want to use Steam because it makes things only more complicated because you STILL have to use GFWL and redeem codes... Apart from that: Steam is always bit late with the updates and DLC and I like to have new stuff NOW. One of those 'clients' is enough for me, thank you.

Steam and Origin by EA both are much better systems.

 

Completely Agree.

 

Although, PlayOnline by Squenix is by far the worst; I get a headache just thinking about it.

I certainly don't know what is going on in these cases, however I cannot believe having to run it through Steam would be a solution - it should work properly running only through GFWL...

 

Agreed -- it should work through GFWL alone. But after uninstalling it all, the GFWL version wouldn't work, but the Steam version did. I get the impression that they know what's caused the problem on some people's machines, but aren't advertizing whatever the problem is. I'm not crazy about having to set up a Steam account, but... *shrug*

I have also had problems with GFWL. I wanted to purchase the Hawaiian pack but when I put my card details in it would not recognize it as a valid number! I tried numerous times without success. Other times I tried buying XP to use and it claimed I was accessing my account from a different computer. I only have the one laptop!

 

In the end I had to uninstall Flight and re-download it through Steam so that I could ask a friend to send me the Steam pack as a gift and I paid him later. I can see I might have to do the same thing to get Alaska.

 

On the loading side of things Flight does take a little longer to reach the splash screen but loading times are pretty much the same.

I don't want to use Steam because it makes things only more complicated because you STILL have to use GFWL and redeem codes... Apart from that: Steam is always bit late with the updates and DLC and I like to have new stuff NOW. One of those 'clients' is enough for me, thank you.

Yeah that is true in case of Flight and other Windows Live games available through Steam... But with games that are actually made to support Steam community features & server browser it is actually very nice to use most of the time.