'Fez' patch out but 'kinda broken'; Polytron warns against installing it (update)

Polytron released a patch for Fez, but quickly advised players against installing it after discovering that it may corrupt save games.

Hold the phone, Gomez: a long-in-the-works patch for Fez came out today, but due to a previously undiscovered issue it creates, developer Polytron is now warning players not to install it at all.

The studio announced the patch this morning, listing dozens of bug fixes and other changes, but updated the post within a few hours to deliver some bad news. Some players who installed the patch found that it appeared to corrupt their save file.

"We're floored that this wasn't found in testing," wrote programmer Renaud Bedard on the Polytron site.

He went on to say that deleting the Xbox 360's system cache "should resolve the issue," but if that doesn't fix it, "there is no known workaround" at the moment. The studio also took to Twitter to advise users against installing the title update unless they're already unable to play the game.

Fez's well-received launch in April was marred by widespread problems such as bugs and crashes, and Polytron had promised that a patch to fix the issues was on the way. Yet the title update had a troubled development history of its own — Bedard explained recently that it had failed Microsoft's certification process in late May due to "two critical issues," one of which he was unable to reproduce or resolve until last week.

Update: According to a second update on the Polytron website, Microsoft has taken down the broken patch until Polytron can find and fix the issues with it. Bedard is hoping for a shorter turnaround this time around — "like, in less than two months," he wrote.