that's just lazy programming. i know they need launch games, but seriously. if they couldn't meet the deadline, don't even release it. honestly, i'd rather see a delay because day 1 patches just feel gross and this is pretty ridiculous on their part. no one wants to wait to play a game they bought. they want to pop it in and get racing.
Somehow I figured something like this was gonna happen. Microsoft's announcements post-E3 probably caught some launch devs by surprise. Good thing I never did, still don't, and scarcely imagine I will plan to buy an Xbone! :D
But... the Xbox One is required to have one off internet connection anyway, so this being a launch game for a console that requires a one off console patch anyway isn't a big problem if you're buying it at launch. Not to mention, the majority of people who play racing games these days try out the online stuff at least once, so I don't see consumers unable to play this at all, since these consumers will more than likely have the ability to download said patch I can't blame the designers following what MS set off as an 'Always Online' console, and then revoking that later, especially considering the persistent online features in the game. It's like ripping the heart of the game out and telling the designers to patch up the wound with cello tape. I'm not a racing gamer by any means, I find them all fairly boring, but I feel incredibly sorry for the people who worked on this game to be what they envisioned, but that the policies mean they have to patch over a lot of what they wanted to include. For once I completely agree with the 'Always Online' features, because it did create progress for games like this to be persistent and was how the game was built. Now, trying to work it retroactively, is stupid, and like trying to put a PS4 game and retrofit the features onto a PS3.
