I've been a member of Big Fish Games for a few years. I really enjoy it, and have bought quite a few games, but I'm running out of games to buy that don't have some sort of glitch that eventually makes the game unplayable. I prefer casual-style, puzzle-oriented, hidden object scenes, that sort of thing, but it seems lately that every time I see something I want, I go to the forums to check out the technical side, and there's a bunch of locked threads started by people who couldn't finish the game.

Does anyone know of any other game download services that I could try?

Viva Media here or steam.

Most sites either are full of spam or malware that I can't in good conscience recommend them. Just remember, these glitches are in the games by the developers, not BigFish. It will be the same if you purchase from someone else.

You will not find better support than you get from Big Fish.
If a game messes up and they can't help, they will give you a key for another one.
Not every company will do that.

I have to agree Jenny. That is why I hesitate to recommend anyone else.

Thank you, everyone, for your help. I understand that it's the developers that are at fault when a game is unplayable, what I don't understand is why Big Fish continues to have that game for sale when they know that it's unplayable. They should take the game down, fix it, and then put it back up for sale. I haven't had any trouble with Big Fish support, I just wish they'd do things a little differently, and I'm not the only one who feels that way.

Often the game works fine on most computers -- just not all computers.
I wouldn't expect Big Fish to take a game down just because it doesn't function well on a minority of computers. That would deny most players from enjoying it. When you see a lot of complaints about technical problems with a game at Big Fish, keep in mind that thousands of people may be playing the game without issue. It's only the people having technical problems who will post about them. People who aren't having problems have no need to post about them.

It's the nature of PC gaming that not every game is going to work on a particular computer. It's not like console gaming, where all consoles of a certain type have pretty much the same capabilities and it's predictable how a game will behave on them.

But if you are having technical difficulties with a majority of Big Fish games, you probably need to look at your computer and think about why it might be having more problems than average.

In one instance in the last eight years, I experienced a glitch that interfered with my finishing the game, which was later corrected with a patch. This isn't going to be everyone's experience (again, it can depend on your computer), but for me that's a darn good track record.

I agree with what Jenny said. I can remember a game in the past six years that upon initial release apparently didn't work well with the majority of computers, and that game was indeed taken down by Big Fish until the problem was fixed.

Jenny is correct. I can attest to the fact they I've played many of the games before release when I write the guides for them and I will come across none of the glitches reported. I also know that they repair any glitches we do find prior to release and they go through rigorous testing. The last thing the developer and publisher (BigFish) want to do is release a buggy game. They do try and catch what they can before distribution.

I do understand the difference between PCs and consoles, believe me, I've been gaming on multiple platforms since the TI99-4A. (Since the Radio Shack Model III, if you count text adventures.) The real difficulty I have is when I see threads full of people discussing the technical problems with a game, and those threads get locked. It's almost as if they don't want people advertising the fact that there's a common problem with a game in case it scares off potential buyers, and maybe I've been playing all the wrong games, but I've been a Big Fish customer for 7 or 8 years, and I have never seen a patch. Maybe I'm just unlucky.

Anyway, I don't want to start an argument. I will keep trying!

No worries, Skippy. I'm sorry you have had so many problems with the games!

You probably already know this, but a patch for a game on Big Fish is called an update. To get the update, all you have to do is to uninstall and reinstall the game - and it almost never means that you will lose your player profile and have to start over. Updates are announced in the forums. Also, in the Game Manager, if you choose "Options" and then go to "Downloads," you can say you want to be notified of game updates automatically or you can set it to manually, where you check for updates yourself.

Like Marian said -- you'll never see separate patches offered at Big Fish, but that doesn't mean the games don't get patched. They just expect you to download the whole game all over again.

I agree it is non-ideal. They don't give any indication of game version, or dates of patching, so you could download the whole thing all over again and end up with the same version. And downloading can take a LOOOOONG time with their slow website and less than optimal Internet speeds -- especially when some of their games are over a GB.

Skippy, can you provide an example of a technical issue thread that was locked?

Usually there's a topic specifically for technical issues. But a lot of people start their own threads. BFG will lock those threads and move the posts to the technical issues thread.

I'd stick with BFG. You can't beat their customer service when problems arise. If you come across a glitch and don't find help on the game forum, contact Customer Support and be sure to send a Dr. Felix.
I usually don' t check the forum for technical issues unless I run itnto a glitch myself. I then check the technical issues topic on the game forum to see if it's a common complaint. Most often a true glitch in the game is resolved in a few days and it's easy to update without having to start the game over. Notice of an update shows up in your Game Manager and BFG also posts notice of an update in the game's forum. Sometimes an uninstall/reinstall is necessary, but not always. I have a game I bought on another site that has a major glitch that keeps me from completing the game, and I have no way to recoup what I paid.

ETA: I remember when BFG launched a Game Manager upgrade that caused tech issues for a lot of users. Turned out that a big part of the problem was that some users had hundreds of games in their Game Managers. I usually uninstall a game once I've finished it since I rarely replay a game. Can always reinstall from Purchase History. i didn't have any problems with the Game Manager upgrade. Just an example of how tech issues often aren't related to a game itself.

I went looking for some locked threads to use as an example, and I stumbled across something! It seems a few weeks ago, Big Fish added some kind of script to the forums that automatically locks threads that have been inactive for 180 days or longer. There's been a few people asking "Why all the locked threads?" there in the past month, and the auto-locker has been the official response. So, maybe that's one mystery cleared up!

@ Jenny100, thank you so much! That's exactly how I feel too.

@ Marian, I'll have to go have a look at my game history and see about what I can update. I do play through my games two or three times, once I've had a chance to forget the ending, lol!