Insane Civ IV System Requirements announced [Archive]

JoAT

May 30, 2006, 11:52 AM

The more I look at the numbers, as well as past comments by Brad on the web, the more this makes sense to me.

I've seen lot's of game developers in the past talk about there sometimes being no substitute for raw MHz when porting PC games to the Mac. (This conversation was a little more relavent/important when Macs were languishing with 500MHz G4s while the rest of the industry was smoking along with 1GHz+ PIIIs and such, but still holds true today.) Sometimes system requirements can come down during the porting process, sometimes they can't. So let's start from there.

Now, look at all the reports that have peppered the web since Boot Camp was released that show framerate disparrities between the Mac and PC versions or games. (PC versions under XP are getting substantially better performance than the same game under OS X on the same machine.) Hypothesis there is that OS X is "vastly unoptimized"/"incomplete"/"broken" for games. OS X's sluggish game performance could be causing the bump UP in system requirements.

or

Brad has talked a little about all of the different libraries he has had to work on to create Mac versions where none existed. Some of these libraries may be very mature on or optimized for Windows. Who knows what kind of performance hit the game might be taking from use of these ported libraries, or from the sound switch to OpenAL. There could be a bump UP in requirements from that.

and

Add to the fact that Glenda has stated on several occasions (regarding several games) that Aspyr likes to post system requirments that are more conservative/realistic...

And here we sit.

awb

May 30, 2006, 11:54 AM

I like Aspyr too. But these system requirements are absurd. And no one has come here to answer questions about them.

AlanH

May 30, 2006, 12:01 PM

Additional note: where is the forum for Civ 4 Mac??

I'm tired of putting posts for Civ 4 mac in the Civ3 section...come on moderators, you've known this version was coming since November 2005 and no bloody forum!!!!
The fact is that the volume of activity has not justified a separate forum to date, not surprisingly, since there is no product to talk about yet. Generic Civ4 discussions are already catered for in the main Civ4 forums. Other than system requirements, there is no other Mac-specific discussion to be had yet. This thread is the first one to generate any significant post volumes ... mostly by people saying they won't be able to run it.

Beamup

May 30, 2006, 12:40 PM

That's my point...it doesn't make financial sense to release a game for a very small market...and the number of people with Macs that meet the minimum is too small to surely break even. I'm not an economist so I'm guessing, but have been with macs and the mac market for nearly 20 years.
You're assuming Aspyr must be omniscent and able to predict ahead of time what the sysreqs will be. This is not at all true.

Again, what I think may have happened is that they took on the project thinking that the sysreqs would end up being lower. Then it ended up not being possible to get them as low as they'd thought. But since optimization and tweaking are typically the very last things to happen, the great majority of the cost of the port had already been spent. And so it made sense to go ahead and finish up anyway.

Also remember that it's perfectly possible to make a good profit off of a game with those sysreqs - CoD2 is certainly expected to do well, for example, last I heard. TBS is less popular than FPS, true, but it's not like there are so few Macs out there that meet the specs that a profit is impossible.

So those are the two bottom lines. First, nobody could have known for sure how the sysreqs were going to end up until very late in the development process. Second, the sysreqs are not that atypical of many games these days - serious TBS gamers can simply no longer get away with using MUCH older systems than all the other serious gamers around, it appears.

bio_hazard

May 30, 2006, 12:54 PM

Hellfire

May 30, 2006, 07:20 PM

I hope some brave souls with G4's will give this game a try (and post their experiences here!). My impression from the PC version was that it was a) the video card, and b) amount of RAM that determined how well the game functioned. Are the g4 and g5 chips really so different that we'd expect the game not to run at all on a g4?

If anyone tests, try turning off any fluffy, blinky things and sound. Turn off as much of the glitz as possible. Perhaps it runs fine without any extras. Plus some of us may just want to try it for the new government and strategy elements.

And someone has to try it with a dual G4 card with a nice high MHz rating.

All suggestions for anyone who wants to give it a shot. I'm not spending $50 now if I can buy it for $20 later after I get a bigger computer.

Gatekeeper

May 31, 2006, 12:17 AM

*shrug* Well, FWIW, I still plan on buying Civ IV. My current iMac is circa 1999, 333mhz, OS 8.6. I *really* need a new computer.

Gatekeeper

Dalmuti

May 31, 2006, 05:14 PM

I have a friend whos a programer over a Alias (now Autodesk), the company that makes Maya. He's been there for 5 or 6 years now and when he picked up CivIV for his PC his first comments were that the game seemed to have some serious flaws when it came to the core programming.

He tempered his comment with the fact he had not seen the code but that from his experience with building a very complex, very high end graphics programs (Maya, Sketchbook, and AliasStudio) it looked like whomever was in charge of this part of the game made some serious mistakes. His guess was that the core graphics engine was built without a good plan to interface with the game engine, and was also rushed more than is normal. The result was when they started to hook things up, rather than the game handling the graphics and other information smoothly, its going through a very convoluted process with the graphics constantly trying to catch up. He believes that the graphics themselves are not the major issue but how the core game engine passes the information on to the graphics engine. He cited how in the first rev. it took forever to lay the grid down on the map and even longer to count things like relative military strength, both of which should be fairly easy operations. The game should not have to work as hard as it does to do what it does.
All in all he believes that along with generally poor technical direction, the process was probably plagued by unusually large number of changes and revisions that just didn't allow for the programming team to build a good product. Basically no one on the programming side pushed back hard enough (Is Sid going Lucas on us?)

Anyway there isn't much we can do about it, but this is likely to be the real problem behind the high minimum specs.

D

ejday

May 31, 2006, 05:28 PM

Hmm...

No Brad comment yet.

I get the vibe that he's well-cloaked, looking to see how many complaints/flames/defending heroes will chime in on the subject. I'm also guessing that this flaming buzz is finding its way back to Glenda in some filtered way or another (all while Brad shakes his head at this latest sign that the "Mac gaming apocalypse" is upon us).

Brad?

imadork

May 31, 2006, 06:22 PM

Or maybe he's just insanely busy....

Gatekeeper

Jun 01, 2006, 12:36 AM

Perhaps. But something like this would definitely have Aspyr folks perusing major forums, et al., in an effort to gauge reaction from potential buyers.

Gatekeeper

AlanH

Jun 01, 2006, 03:59 AM

It looks as if Apple have my new Mac planned for August :D

http://www.thinksecret.com/news/0605intelxserves.html

Apple's Power Mac systems, meanwhile, are expected to make the transition to Intel processors with the Core 2 Duo, code-named Conroe, for which Intel is targeting a July release. It has been widely speculated that new pro systems will debut around Apple's Worldwide Developer's Conference, which takes place in early August.

Faijer

Jun 01, 2006, 07:51 AM

I should be getting a 20" iMac once I head off to university around October, so I'll just get it then :D

w00t for student discounts at the Apple Store!

EDIT: Just ran a search on "Core 2 Duo" and found something else: Core 2 Extreme - http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=2170

Earthling7

Jun 01, 2006, 12:08 PM

Guess I'm out of luck on Civ for the first time since 1991. I have bought all versions up to now, but CivIV will be the first one I skip. I bought a PowerBook 15 months ago and judging from it's otherwise fine performance, it will serve me well into the latter half of the decade. It seems to meet all CivIV requirements except the CPU, so if the sysreqs will lower or people report a decent G4 performance, I might change my mind. On thing I will not be doing is buying a new computer for this, or any other, game until I feel the general performance of my system is starting to lag.

People have been comparing CivIV with first person shooters, but I don't buy that. It is a strategy game and the people playing it are interested in strategy first. Eye-candy is fine to sweeten the experience, but it should absolutely not be the main goal of the game. Sid going Lucas on us? Quite possibly. Civ3 was a drama, it was unfinished when it came out and failed to challenge Civ2 after two expansions. There was a reason for that, with Brian Reynolds leaving Firaxis half way through, but that just makes it that much more important to get it right with CivIV.

I wouldn't be suprised it the coding theory above is correct. My PowerBook plays SimCity4, it races ahead with C&C Generals. True, both games are a couple of years old, but they still look gorgeous. Fancy graphics or not, it seems that Firaxis (as I'm not blaming Aspyr) has lost the plot on Civilization. Shame that ActiVision and others are out of the game.

So, one final question. Is there another game for the unlucky 90% of the Mac community?

AlanH

Jun 01, 2006, 03:33 PM

So, one final question. Is there another game for the unlucky 90% of the Mac community?

You might want to try the Europa Universalis/Hearts Of Iron/Victoria series if you haven't already. They are complex strategy games, with more realistic system reqs. I don't have time to explore them myself, but I believe they are highly thought of.

MAS

Jun 02, 2006, 06:11 AM

People have been comparing CivIV with first person shooters, but I don't buy that. It is a strategy game and the people playing it are interested in strategy first. Eye-candy is fine to sweeten the experience, but it should absolutely not be the main goal of the game. Sid going Lucas on us? Quite possibly.

So, one final question. Is there another game for the unlucky 90% of the Mac community?

I think It is not just the eye-candy, 3D engiens also have other advantages. As far as eye-candy is concerned, 2D often still looks better, but the other advantages may tip the balance.

AlanH

Jun 02, 2006, 06:32 AM

I think It is not just the eye-candy, 3D engiens also have other advantages.
A 3D engine provides perspective, animated 3D sprites, and the ability to view the scene from different directions and distances. The animation usually includes physical world simulation to represent ballistics, friction, collisions etc.

Those features are clearly important in a real time shooter, but as far as I am concerned they are simply superfluous eye candy in a turn-based strategy game. No doubt they sell the game to those who spend their lives running around simulated real time worlds, but most of them run PCs, not Macs.

What real advantages does a 3D engine offer in a TBS game that can outweigh the impact of a massive reduction in available market?

Padma

Jun 02, 2006, 08:47 AM

The only value-added I can see is the time-savings the artists get. Consider that Civ3 art was done with 3D tools, then meticulously converted to 2D for the actual game. By using a 3D engine, they can skip the conversion step. (The problem is, you can't get good 2D modelling tools - everybody jumped on the 3D bandwagon, so it is actually faster and easier to do it in 3D, and then convert!)

For actual gameplay, all that pretty 3D stuff is superfluous.

lateralis

Jun 02, 2006, 09:23 AM

I'll chime in to say that I'm happy my dual 2.5 G5 with GeForce 6800 ultra is safely within the requirements. ;) (if only I could stretch the game to use both of my 23" monitors...)

However, my "portable to replace the ibook G4 which will be passed down to my wife" may not be the black macbook I was hoping it would be :(

on the "why 3d?" discussion, having an actual globe on which to play is the biggest value added proposition as far as I'm concerned. I never much liked how there were an equal number of arctic tiles as there were equator tiles.

ejday

Jun 02, 2006, 12:08 PM

...on the "why 3d?" discussion, having an actual globe on which to play is the biggest value added proposition as far as I'm concerned. I never much liked how there were an equal number of arctic tiles as there were equator tiles.
I could be wrong but I was under the impression that maps are essentially the same as Civ3, with similar ratios and layout –*and the globe view was simply a graphical shoehorn of a flat map rather than any new spherical algorithm.

Don't get me wrong, I'd still like to see a map as a globe –*but I don't think it affects gameplay.

Can anybody whose actually played CIV chime in on this?

AlanH

Jun 02, 2006, 02:04 PM

Even if it's real, I'm not sure that a spherical game space quite cuts it as a response to "What killer benefits does 3D engine bring to offset an 80% reduction in market capacity?".

ChiefSparkY

Jun 02, 2006, 05:39 PM

At a slight tangent to the current discussion but it occurred to me earlier today that while there were some people on this forum questionning Aspyr for doing C3C (instead of putting all resources into Civ 4), maybe Aspyr knew the sys requirements were going to be insane and that Mac people would still want their Civ fix...

ejday

Jun 02, 2006, 06:17 PM

...maybe Aspyr knew the sys requirements were going to be insane and that Mac people would still want their Civ fix...
Hmm... Normally, I would agree with this but then it would be painfully ironic that C3C doesn't have an editor.

Two swings, two misses.

Gatekeeper

Jun 02, 2006, 07:51 PM

Thank God there will be an editor for Civ IV ... it's built into the game, so they can't leave that out (again!).

Gatekeeper

ejday

Jun 03, 2006, 12:02 AM

Thank God there will be an editor for Civ IV ... it's built into the game, so they can't leave that out (again!).

Gatekeeper
Yes, and both Mac users will be able to use it.

azzaman333

Jun 03, 2006, 01:08 AM

Earthling7

Jun 03, 2006, 01:34 AM

on the "why 3d?" discussion, having an actual globe on which to play is the biggest value added proposition as far as I'm concerned. I never much liked how there were an equal number of arctic tiles as there were equator tiles.

I remember playing a game in 1995 which used a globe for strategy and then small maps for tactical play. It was called X-Com. When developing a game, you balance the features you want with the hardware in use. I still believe that Firaxis blew this one. Sid has always said that he likes his games to be playable on a wide range of computers. He has either changed his mind or lost the grip of things.

MAS

Jun 03, 2006, 05:45 AM

What real advantages does a 3D engine offer in a TBS game that can outweigh the impact of a massive reduction in available market?

I wasn't thinking about gameplay advantages, but that it might be easier to work with a 3D engine than with a 2d one.

wallyskier

Jun 03, 2006, 07:05 AM

Well, to say that this is disappointing is an understatement.
There is NO way I can justify buying a computer that is essentially 3x faster than the one I have just to play a game. I don't know if the company monitors this website, but if they do, I hope they see that many people won't be able to play their new game for some time.

C3C will keep me busy for now. Thanks for all your efforts in that, Brad. I'm regularly getting my fanny whacked, and I love the challenge of the new variations.

azzaman333

Jun 03, 2006, 07:11 AM

Blame Civ 4. The problem isnt with the transfer to Macs, but the original game.

AlanH

Jun 03, 2006, 07:43 AM

Blame Civ 4. The problem isnt with the transfer to Macs, but the original game.
That's true, but I think the problem is significantly exaggerated when it translates to the Mac platform because there are more Mac systems that are not easily or cheaply upgraded - iMacs, laptops, minis. And Mac owners don't expect or need to upgrade their systems as frequently, so there is more "old" hardwre out there. Upgrading the video card or CPU in a PC tower is not a big deal. Upgrading the video or CPU in most Macs is expensive or impossible. Plus you don't really want to spend money on upgrading a two or three or four year old Mac that's based on an obsolete PowerPC architecture.

ejday

Jun 03, 2006, 09:30 AM

...Sid has always said that he likes his games to be playable on a wide range of computers. He has either changed his mind or lost the grip of things.
It seems, with CIV, that the eye-candy came first (to satisfy the trendy, spendy cross-over RTS crowd) and they figured out how to justify it with a few UI advantages for the old school strategy crowd.

With that in mind, it would seem that Sid has a firm grip on making a half-respectable game that'll sell very respectably to the PC masses, make him a bundle of money and allow him to establish his own civ on an island whose major export is Mai Tais. I'm guessing he's thinking retirement.

ejday

Jun 03, 2006, 01:28 PM

Okay, as of a few days ago, when they announced the sys req's (and got this underwhelming response), they have yet to update the Aspyr Game Agent with the CIV comparison.

Hm.

Maybe, and this is a long shot, but just maybe they floated the sys req's to see how high they could push the minimum and are still judging whether they can/should make compromise tweaks to make it slow but playable on near-miss systems.

I know if it'll at least run on my PB, I'll buy it (and likely be very happy until I get MBP and be even happier).

AlanH

Jun 03, 2006, 01:39 PM

Maybe, and this is a long shot, but just maybe they floated the sys req's to see how high they could push the minimum and are still judging whether they can/should make compromise tweaks to make it slow but playable on near-miss systems.

Nice idea, but wishful thinking, I feel. It seems a pretty dire marketing strategy to get everyone upset and send them off to buy the PC version to run under Boot Camp, only to say in a few weeks time, "Sorry, we didn't mean it. Pleeeese come back and buy it now we've reduced the specs. It'll run, really quite well ... honest!".

ejday

Jun 03, 2006, 03:28 PM

You're right, of course, but...
...now we've reduced the specs. It'll run, really quite well ... honest!".
...at this point, I don't care if it runs well, just as long as it runs.

promethean_beta

Jun 03, 2006, 03:34 PM

buy the PC version to run under Boot Camp
Excepting of course that Boot Camp will only run on the most recent macs...

AlanH

Jun 03, 2006, 03:40 PM

Anything much less, other than a quad G5, won't run Civ4 AT ALL!!!

Beamup

Jun 03, 2006, 05:28 PM

Yeah, the only case where Boot Camp might be of relevance are the new Minis and MacBooks. The great majority of systems that can run Boot Camp will do just fine running CIV native.

awb

Jun 03, 2006, 08:48 PM

Brad... where are you? I feel like people at Aspyr HAVE to be lurking on these forums.

Here are my feelings: Civ 4 should run on Macintoshes made in the past 2 years, not just on computers made in the past 12 months. I think most people would not expect Civ 4 to run on Mac Mini's, or G4 iBooks. But for Civ 4 not to work on newly released Mac Books is pitiful.

ejday

Jun 03, 2006, 08:58 PM

Brad... where are you? I feel like people at Aspyr HAVE to be lurking on these forums.
Well... as somebody pointed out, he could be busy working.

But... Since he's drifted in and out of here before, it's very likely he's seen this thread and just assumes he doesn't have enough asbestos to protect himself should he delurk. He would be asked all kinds of uncomfortable questions, he would say that his hands were mostly tied, he might be brimming with all kinds of interesting tidbits on the politics and procedures of Aspyr and everybody else... that he wouldn't be able to mention since he's not independently wealthy and otherwise ready to retire from the business.

Unless Good Brad has one stout too many, it's unlikely he'll chime in on this one for some time (right about the point most of are able to run the damned thing).

MAS

Jun 04, 2006, 03:20 AM

Anything much less, other than a quad G5, won't run Civ4 AT ALL!!!

whow, not to fast, My dual 1.8 meets the requirements. (barely)

AlanH

Jun 04, 2006, 04:04 AM

Sorry, yeah, a slight exaggeration for effect!

A bit like...
Yeah, the only case where Boot Camp might be of relevance are the new Minis and MacBooks. The great majority of systems that can run Boot Camp will do just fine running CIV native.
Where are the stats that say the great majority of Intel-based systems will NOT be Minis and MacBooks by the time MacCiv4 ships?

Beamup

Jun 04, 2006, 05:56 AM

Where are the stats that say the great majority of Intel-based systems will NOT be Minis and MacBooks by the time MacCiv4 ships?
Anecdotally, the iMacs and MBPs are much more popular. There'll likely be a good chunk of MacBooks, but from what I hear, the Minis especially don't sell that fast.

That is anecdotal, though.

md2112

Jun 04, 2006, 11:04 AM

Hello, long time lurker here .....

I too am disappointed by the spec's as I have a Powerbook G4, 1.67 gig - so I'm in the 'will it run at all on G4's' camp. While it is probably too late for redesigns to tweak the minimum specifications, Aspyr can do one thing for the community. Post a demo version (plays 20 turns) so that we can all at least try it out on our systems. Maybe Civfanatics could pitch in a few game saves. Say from different world sizes and different time frames so we could experiment - I would hate to see it work well at 4000bc but be unusable in the later stages of the game (I tend to get to nuclear age). I would think there are plenty from GOTM by now. For PR sake, they should post the alpha as soon as possible to cut down the negative chatter (and/or false hopes).

ejday

Jun 04, 2006, 11:30 AM

Hello, long time lurker here .....
Hello md2112! :wavey: Welcome to CFC!
I too am disappointed by the spec's as I have a Powerbook G4, 1.67 gig - so I'm in the 'will it run at all on G4's' camp. While it is probably too late for redesigns to tweak the minimum specifications, Aspyr can do one thing for the community. Post a demo version (plays 20 turns) so that we can all at least try it out on our systems. Maybe Civfanatics could pitch in a few game saves. Say from different world sizes and different time frames so we could experiment - I would hate to see it work well at 4000bc but be unusable in the later stages of the game (I tend to get to nuclear age). I would think there are plenty from GOTM by now. For PR sake, they should post the alpha as soon as possible to cut down the negative chatter (and/or false hopes).
A demo would be good...

Or at least some word on just how "minimum" the minimum specs are. Some developers (I have heard) will have a minimum level based on what they want the user experience to be when playing the game. While a game could technically run (or walk, I suppose) at a slower pace, the game pings the system and if it doesn't meet the desired specs, automatically disables itself to prevent a user from eventually moaning "Aw, man, So-n-so has produced a real dog here..."

So, yes, not auto-disabling and a demo would both be good, just so us near-miss systems could get an idea if we stagger through a game.
...Cuz, with a world builder...? Heck, if I can stagger through it, I'll pony up and be a happy camper.

AlanH

Jun 04, 2006, 11:33 AM

Maybe Civfanatics could pitch in a few game saves. Say from different world sizes and different time frames so we could experiment - I would hate to see it work well at 4000bc but be unusable in the later stages of the game (I tend to get to nuclear age). I would think there are plenty from GOTM by now.
You can already find plenty of saves in the SG forums. The new C-IV SGOTM 01 is also accumulating saves at a rate of knots - go to the C-IV SGOTM Progress page ( http://gotm.civfanatics.net/submit/civ4sgotm_submission_list.php?game=50001&displayteams=displayteams&format=sgotm_saves_list.php#format), in "List of Saves" format to find links to over 300 saves submitted by the 19 teams playing that game. Also, by the time anyone has access to a demo or the real game the results for GOTM 6 should be out. There are typically 300 entries for each GOTM, and the final saves for all those players will be available to download and test. There are already plenty of saves for previous games, which were played in earlier patches of the Civ4 software.

Akhhorus

Jun 04, 2006, 11:56 AM

You can put me in the camp that doesn't believe that these will be the final requirements. There is no way Aspyr or any game publisher can put out a game that is an engine to drive sales for more games with such restrictive requirements(unless they don't want anyone to buy it). They're basically cutting out half the market. I think that the speed and memory requirements are going to drop.

Dalmuti

Jun 04, 2006, 03:45 PM

I'm going to agree that Aspyr will do whatever they can to broaden the market, it's a business after all. But As I said a few posts back I think that Fraxis dropped the ball on this one by designing a poor product. Not poor in the sense that the game is bad, just not well programed. The PC version also has performance issues, (I've been playing on and off on my friends PC and it's a 2.5ghz with an 256mg ATI graphics card and still has less then optimal performance), so it's unlikely that anyone at Aspyr can do a whole lot.

I vote the Technical Director and the Project Manager(s) off this island.

D

Beamup

Jun 05, 2006, 10:09 AM

Akhhorus

Jun 05, 2006, 03:38 PM

If you believe that the requirements are going to go down, you're deluding yourself. There is absolutely no credible possibility that will happen. Sysreqs are set very carefully, based on real-life testing, after extensive optimization. The fact that Aspyr has stated requirements at all, given what they are, demonstrates pretty much conclusively that everything they could do to reduce them has already been done.

It's not a case of "Aspyr will do whatever they can to broaden the market," it's a case of "Aspyr has already done whatever they can to broaden the market."

Maybe it will be possible to get it to work on systems below the requirements. Maybe it won't. But realistically, you've got a better chance of taking out 50 Modern Armors with a single Spearman than the sysreqs coming down, IMO.

Then Aspyr is a corporation of fools. They aren't in the business to put out a great game, they are in the business to make money. They won't make money with CivIV for mac with the requirements the way they have it now. They exclude far too many potential buyers. I bought my iBook 6 weeks ago and its a new model, and it can't handle the requirements(it will struggle to work on the new MacBooks). If they are going to keep the requirements the way they are, they should pull CivIV for mac for a year for any reason and wait for the prospective mac buyers(or a big enough percentage of them) to have powerful enough computers. Now, they might put out CivIV for mac as is, but if sales drag(which they will), expect some sort of patch or new version to bring those requirements down. There is no way they just put it out with the requirements they have unless they are trying to kill mac interest in Apsyr games(and the Civ Franchise in specific). Which is a possibility.

Beamup

Jun 05, 2006, 04:25 PM

Akhhorus

Jun 05, 2006, 05:42 PM

Oh, so you're saying that it's a BETTER idea to pull a brand-new highly anticipated game that doesn't even have terribly high requirements overall? That would be possibly the single stupidest and most destructive thing they could possibly do. It would completely and utterly destroy their reputation. Releasing a game with high sysreqs for its genre (but not overall) will not.

Its too late to pull it(which I never said they should do-they should delay it and it looks like they are), but as soon as they saw the minimum requirements, they should have held off on releasing it and stopped all promotion of it until they figured out a solution.

They did their best to bring requirements down.

Unless you work there and were involved in the project, you can't know that.

They could only get it down to a fairly typical level for a big new game, rather than a typical level for a big new TBS. Some sales are greatly superior to no sales, so they sell it.

Then you have no clue how to run a business. Some sales aren't better than no sales, since a bad sales run can hurt your brand name and the franchises you run. Which will hurt all yours sales from then on. If they waited on releasing CivIV until a majority of the mac gaming community could run it, then the delay wouldn't be remembered. Now, CivIV looks like it will be a total bust for Mac and will hurt the image of Aspyr and the Civ franchise. Which is the last thing that Aspyr and Firaxis want.

You are, like so many others, falling into the two great fallacies that afflict so many about this topic. You simultaneously attribute omniscience, precognition, and stupidity to Aspyr.

I don't think it was any of those things and only the third one is remotely relevant. They knew how much hard/soft ware it took to run it on the Windows version(and have similar examples of what similar games took to run on Mac) and they can easily find out-through market research-what their target demographic runs in terms of hard and software on their Macs(for example, what mac users who bought C3C have on their computers) and could have easily made the decision to try to make the requirements more inclusive or held the game for a predetermined time period until a big enough percentage of their target demographic ran powerful enough computers. Now, that sounds complicated, but businesses do that thousands of times every day. Its called good business. Aspyr is failing to accomplish this with the mac version of CivIV. They're asking for major sales problems with this version. And what's funny about this whole conversation is that Aspyr looks cautious with the release of this game. They still haven't announced a release date, although its supposed to ship this month. They announced the release date for Mac C3C a couple months ahead of time(then delayed it a couple weeks).

When all the evidence indicates they thought they could get the requirements down.

Oh really? Like what? And don't try to wave some press release as evidence of that(in fact, if they issued a release about that it means they realized how much of a CF this is going to be).

And you persist in comparing the requirements only to other TBSes, instead of to such other new games as CoD2.

I haven't compared the requirements to any other games. Don't put words in my mouth. My view is on strictly business lines. Aspyr is asking for major headaches from the mac community in a business sense.

Beamup

Jun 05, 2006, 05:55 PM

Its too late to pull it(which I never said they should do-they should delay it and it looks like they are), but as soon as they saw the minimum requirements, they should have held off on releasing it and stopped all promotion of it until they figured out a solution.
Oh really? What part of

they should pull CivIV for mac for a year for any reason
is NOT saying they should pull it? Additionally, you're assuming there is a "solution." The odds are overwhelming that there isn't, since they most certainly would have done everything possible already.

Unless you work there and were involved in the project, you can't know that.
Unless one attributes far more idiocy and stupidity to Aspyr than is even marginally credible, there is no possible way it could be otherwise.

Then you have no clue how to run a business. Some sales aren't better than no sales, since a bad sales run can hurt your brand name and the franchises you run. Which will hurt all yours sales from then on. If they waited on releasing CivIV until a majority of the mac gaming community could run it, then the delay wouldn't be remembered. Now, CivIV looks like it will be a total bust for Mac and will hurt the image of Aspyr and the Civ franchise. Which is the last thing that Aspyr and Firaxis want.
Which might be a fair point, if not for the fact that any other option would do far worse to their reputation.

I don't think it was any of those things and only the third one is remotely relevant.
In order for your accusations to be even marginally credible, yes, all of those things are necessary.

They knew how much hard/soft ware it took to run it on the Windows version(and have similar examples of what similar games took to run on Mac)
You assume FAR too much. It's nowhere near that simple. Nobody can know what the requirements will end up being until very late in development - this is a simple fact that's universal throughout the industry.

and they can easily find out-through market research-what their target demographic runs in terms of hard and software on their Macs(for example, what mac users who bought C3C have on their computers) and could have easily made the decision to try to make the requirements more inclusive or held the game for a predetermined time period until a big enough percentage of their target demographic ran powerful enough computers.
The fallacy here is that nobody knew for sure. Again, you're requiring them to be omniscent and be certain what the sysreqs would have been before they even started development - which is ludicrous.

Now, that sounds complicated, but businesses do that thousands of times every day. Its called good business. Aspyr is failing to accomplish this with the mac version of CivIV. They're asking for major sales problems with this version. And what's funny about this whole conversation is that Aspyr looks cautious with the release of this game. They still haven't announced a release date, although its supposed to ship this month. They announced the release date for Mac C3C a couple months ahead of time(then delayed it a couple weeks).
No business in history ever has, or ever will, know ahead of time what the sysreqs on a port will be. There are simply far too many factors involved.

Oh really? Like what? And don't try to wave some press release as evidence of that(in fact, if they issued a release about that it means they realized how much of a CF this is going to be).
Brad's various comments over the development cycle, most prominently.

I haven't compared the requirements to any other games. Don't put words in my mouth. My view is on strictly business lines. Aspyr is asking for major headaches from the mac community in a business sense.
Not explicitly, but implicitly, you most certainly are, insofar as the only basis on which the requirements could be described as "high" is relative to other TBSes. Games with similar requirements, relative to the systems available at the time, are released quite frequently, and do quite well. They're just FPS instead of TBS.

I might also inquire what, exactly, you think gives you the authority to claim that you know so much more about the Mac game porting business than people who do it full-time, very successfully, and have been doing so for many, many years? Because that's what you're doing, when it comes right down to it - insisting that YOU obviously know hugely more about it than everyone at Aspyr put together.

azzaman333

Jun 05, 2006, 06:39 PM

I've had the PC version of Civ 4 since release in Australia, and it has been plagued with frequent crashes, extremely poor performance, cant even play wonder movies without crashing, running out out memory, an meny more problems with the original product. If you saw the Civ 4 Tech Support Forum in the first 3-4 months after release, there were so many people with the recommended specs who couldnt play the game for one reason or another. In the end, this would give a lot more BAD publicity than setting the specs higher and having fewer people able to play the game, losing some sales for a while.

Akhhorus

Jun 05, 2006, 07:47 PM

Oh really? What part of

is NOT saying they should pull it? Additionally, you're assuming there is a "solution." The odds are overwhelming that there isn't, since they most certainly would have done everything possible already.

They're a difference between delaying and pulling off the shelves. I was advocating delaying it now since its too late to pull it. Badly worded, I grant you. Pulling something means that it would be gone forever, pulling it for a year-which I said-means a delay(which ironically, they're doing for CivIV). And if I'm assuming, then you're right next to me in the assumption junction.

Unless one attributes far more idiocy and stupidity to Aspyr than is even marginally credible, there is no possible way it could be otherwise.

You assume a lot. And you're going on pure supposition, not fact. We don't know if they could make it more compatable or not. You assume they couldn't. I don't believe that a corporation in the business of making money would limit their abilities to make money knowingly unless they are a poorly run company.

Which might be a fair point, if not for the fact that any other option would do far worse to their reputation.

If they delayed it, even for a year: and it worked for 80% of their target demos, no one would complain about the delay. Keep in mind that Mac Users are used to delay and long delays between a PC version and a Mac Version.

In order for your accusations to be even marginally credible, yes, all of those things are necessary.

Not at all.
omniscience: The capicity to know everything. They don't need to know everything, just to know their audience and target demographics, which would be easily acquired with one phone call to a market research firm. If they don't do market research(which I highly doubt), then they deserve the bad sales they get. I run a company with 10 employees, and I do market research even for the smallest things.

precognition: Knowledge of the future. This is completely irrelevant to this discussion. Whether they would know what the future held, in this case, I assume you mean the requirements for the Mac CivIV(which I take issue with). There's no way they didn't have a good idea what would be required for this program.

stupidity: They don't need to be stupid to make this big an error. They can be lazy, greedy or pernicious towards mac gaming.

You assume FAR too much. It's nowhere near that simple. Nobody can know what the requirements will end up being until very late in development - this is a simple fact that's universal throughout the industry.

BS. They have a good idea what the requirements will be. Again, you speak as if you were involved in the devlopment or are a game programmer.

The fallacy here is that nobody knew for sure. Again, you're requiring them to be omniscent and be certain what the sysreqs would have been before they even started development - which is ludicrous. No business in history ever has, or ever will, know ahead of time what the sysreqs on a port will be. There are simply far too many factors involved.

Again: you're full of it here. Any programmer who didn't know the general requirements of porting a program isn't a good programmer. I recall that when they announced C3C was to be released, they had a general list of requirements posted long before it was ever shipped or even went to Beta.

Brad's various comments over the development cycle, most prominently.

Feel free to post someone them. I remember AlanH talking about how the requirements might be high, but nothing like what was released. Brad is a nice and helpful guy around here, but he's been wrong before(still waiting on that patch, going on 4 months....).

Not explicitly, but implicitly, you most certainly are, insofar as the only basis on which the requirements could be described as "high" is relative to other TBSes.

No, I did not. I mentioned that they were high period and would be restrictive against sales. Not in relation to other games. I never mentioned other games' requirements as a comparison. Others have in this thread. Get your facts straight and don't put words in my mouth.

Games with similar requirements, relative to the systems available at the time, are released quite frequently, and do quite well. They're just FPS instead of TBS.

Feel free to stop speaking in generalities and offer some examples. I remember that Republic: The Revolution was released with draconian requirements for the time and sales were extremely poor. The Championship Manager series of games all suffered from the same problems(and the Football Manager games have had poor sales since their requirements have always been high for when they're released).

I might also inquire what, exactly, you think gives you the authority to claim that you know so much more about the Mac game porting business than people who do it full-time, very successfully, and have been doing so for many, many years?

I'm speaking in general business terms. Something I know a lot about. Whether you're selling mac games, cars, toothbrushes, anything; the same principles apply. You can't expect to succeed if you make your product hard to use. If you make a toothbrush 5 feet long, you won't sell many. This is an extreme example, but it is exactly what Aspyr is doing with CivIV. This tact from you is hilarious if this is all you have left.

Because that's what you're doing, when it comes right down to it - insisting that YOU obviously know hugely more about it than everyone at Aspyr put together.

They're programmers, not businessmen(apparently). This(and similar phenomenon) has been the death of hundreds of computer and internet companies since the tech bubble burst. The proof will be in the pudding. If CivIV is released with these minimum requirements, we'll see what the sales are. If they are high, I'll gladly say I was wrong. If they aren't, I hope that you will be as honest also.

Akhhorus

Jun 05, 2006, 07:50 PM

azzaman333

Jun 05, 2006, 07:54 PM

Sounds like a problem with a poor product and not something where they set the bar too low with the system requirements. CivIV came out pretty quick(relevatively speaking) in relation to the final PC version of C3C. Maybe they rushed the whole program?

It has been believed for quite a while that it was rushed. This is because Take Two's other big game for the year, GTA: San Andreas had to be pulled off the shelves because of the Hot Coffee Mod. So people have been thinking Civ 4 was rushed so Take Two could make enough profit to make themselves look better. Something like that at least, ive never been good at finding or remembering details.

Akhhorus

Jun 05, 2006, 08:02 PM

It has been believed for quite a while that it was rushed. This is because Take Two's other big game for the year, GTA: San Andreas had to be pulled off the shelves because of the Hot Coffee Mod. So people have been thinking Civ 4 was rushed so Take Two could make enough profit to make themselves look better. Something like that at least, ive never been good at finding or remembering details.

That explains a lot about the draconian requirements for CivIV. And it also means that even if you bought a new Mac to use this(which appear to be the only macs you could run this on), it wouldn't be that great a game. It was years between the versions of CivIII and C3C to come out for Mac, and CivIV is coming out for mac 6 month(ish) after C3C was released. I still find it interesting that CivIV is still in Alpha production and they will not give a vague release date for it. Its supposed to ship this month.

yellow_roast

Jun 05, 2006, 10:58 PM

I am also quite disappointed about the high level sys requirements, as i have a dual 1.25ghz G4 Powermac with 23" Cinema display which I am sure to be happy with for my uses another 4-5 years. It has a radeon 9000 so even my video card doesnt meet the requirements.

Regardless, i just want to comment on the people that claim to have better knowledge about the mac software business than the company that is releasing the game.

Just maybe, they are looking long term, and that is a major factor on feeling confident when making the specs so stringent, cutting out possibly 80% of the current mac user market (figure just a guess off the top of my head). I have only just stopped playing Civ3 in the last few months, so i do not doubt that Civ4 will remain available for some years as it would seem pretty obvious Civ5 will not be coming out hot on its heels.

What would be most helpful however, is a statement saying if us G4 (and Radeon 9000) users are locked out altogether, or if the specs are only a suggestion only. I say that as i usually only play on small or normal sized worlds anyway, so it isnt important to me if my computer can run a large or huge world effectively or not. I would considering getting a graphics card upgrade to play Civ4, but im certainly not going to buy a new computer just for this purpose, when for the most part, a dual 1.25 is still a rather decent machine for any other application.

Peace.

Beamup

Jun 06, 2006, 05:09 AM

They're a difference between delaying and pulling off the shelves. I was advocating delaying it now since its too late to pull it. Badly worded, I grant you. Pulling something means that it would be gone forever, pulling it for a year-which I said-means a delay(which ironically, they're doing for CivIV). And if I'm assuming, then you're right next to me in the assumption junction.
Good grief. I can't believe you are now arguing "when I said they should pull the game, I didn't mean they should pull the game." For the record, we were using the same definition of "pull," BTW, i.e. temporarily.

You assume a lot. And you're going on pure supposition, not fact. We don't know if they could make it more compatable or not. You assume they couldn't. I don't believe that a corporation in the business of making money would limit their abilities to make money knowingly unless they are a poorly run company.
EXACTLY!!! The folks at Aspyr are quite competent programmers and businesspeople. They have demonstrated this time and time again. Hence, one must inevitably start from the assumption that they aren't idiots.

If they delayed it, even for a year: and it worked for 80% of their target demos, no one would complain about the delay. Keep in mind that Mac Users are used to delay and long delays between a PC version and a Mac Version.
You are flat out, 100%, as wrong as it's possible to be here. There's a HUGE difference between not porting a game for a while and pulling it temporarily. The latter will do HUGE damage to your rep.

Not at all.
omniscience: The capicity to know everything. They don't need to know everything, just to know their audience and target demographics, which would be easily acquired with one phone call to a market research firm. If they don't do market research(which I highly doubt), then they deserve the bad sales they get. I run a company with 10 employees, and I do market research even for the smallest things.
They certainly know this, nobody denies that. I was referring to...

precognition: Knowledge of the future. This is completely irrelevant to this discussion. Whether they would know what the future held, in this case, I assume you mean the requirements for the Mac CivIV(which I take issue with). There's no way they didn't have a good idea what would be required for this program.
There is no way they DID have a clear idea. I mean, sure, they could be certain that it wouldn't work on a G4/450. But there is no credible way they could know it wouldn't be fine on a G4/1.4, for example. The uncertainties are just too great. This is a simple fact of porting that has been stated by, that I can recall, Glenda Adams, Brad Oliver, Chris Jacobson, and others.

stupidity: They don't need to be stupid to make this big an error. They can be lazy, greedy or pernicious towards mac gaming.
Or have no better option available.

BS. They have a good idea what the requirements will be. Again, you speak as if you were involved in the devlopment or are a game programmer.
I speak as if I've read many statements on the subject from people involved in such porting projects. Which I have.

Again: you're full of it here. Any programmer who didn't know the general requirements of porting a program isn't a good programmer. I recall that when they announced C3C was to be released, they had a general list of requirements posted long before it was ever shipped or even went to Beta.
There's a huge difference between having a general idea and being able to predict whether it'll need a G4/1.4 or a G5/1.8. You're demanding a precision that, quite frankly, is entirely impossible.

Feel free to post someone them. I remember AlanH talking about how the requirements might be high, but nothing like what was released. Brad is a nice and helpful guy around here, but he's been wrong before(still waiting on that patch, going on 4 months....).
Sure. That belief was clearly incorrect. That doesn't make anyone an idiot or malicious, just mistaken.

No, I did not. I mentioned that they were high period and would be restrictive against sales. Not in relation to other games. I never mentioned other games' requirements as a comparison. Others have in this thread. Get your facts straight and don't put words in my mouth.
If you claim that they are objectively high, to the extent that a game will not be successful, you are wrong. I will, again, point out that they are near-identical to CoD2, which is, as I hear it, expected to do VERY well. The only basis on which such claims as you make can be justified in the least is by comparison to other TBS titles. Hence, since I choose to assume you're arguing from the marginally credible angle when it's unclear, I assume that's the angle you're taking. If you're instead choosing to claim CoD2 will be a complete failure, or that Deus Ex (which had perhaps even higher requirements relative to its time) was a failure, then I was apparently mistaken and you are taking the completely invalid tack to it.

Feel free to stop speaking in generalities and offer some examples. I remember that Republic: The Revolution was released with draconian requirements for the time and sales were extremely poor. The Championship Manager series of games all suffered from the same problems(and the Football Manager games have had poor sales since their requirements have always been high for when they're released).
Done. Repeatedly.

I'm speaking in general business terms. Something I know a lot about. Whether you're selling mac games, cars, toothbrushes, anything; the same principles apply. You can't expect to succeed if you make your product hard to use. If you make a toothbrush 5 feet long, you won't sell many. This is an extreme example, but it is exactly what Aspyr is doing with CivIV. This tact from you is hilarious if this is all you have left.
No, you are in fact claiming to know far more about mac game porting. Specifically how precisely it's possible to know sysreqs before you even start a project.

They're programmers, not businessmen(apparently). This(and similar phenomenon) has been the death of hundreds of computer and internet companies since the tech bubble burst. The proof will be in the pudding. If CivIV is released with these minimum requirements, we'll see what the sales are. If they are high, I'll gladly say I was wrong. If they aren't, I hope that you will be as honest also.
Let's be clear here. Our point of difference is not in whether CIV will sell well, or as well as it would otherwise. I am claiming that it's possible it will sell reasonably well, though not so well as otherwise, and that Aspyr isn't staffed by a bunch of idiots, but rather by people who are making the best they can out of a situation nobody is happy with.

dojoboy

Jun 06, 2006, 06:49 AM

Wow, I've been missing out on this debate in real time. Quite a bit of catching up to do. But hey, I'm on summer vacation. Exams graded, averages totaled, and sun shining! :D Needless to say, I've got time.

Let's be clear here. Our point of difference is not in whether CIV will sell well, or as well as it would otherwise. I am claiming that it's possible it will sell reasonably well, though not so well as otherwise, and that Aspyr isn't staffed by a bunch of idiots, but rather by people who are making the best they can out of a situation nobody is happy with.

I agree that Civ4 will sell reasonably well upon release. Of course, "reasonably" takes in the higher system specifications.

This game is not geared toward the "get rich quick" model. Long term sales will be its strength, as more and more people purchase new machines (for whatever reasons). Aspyr will make a respectable sum and users will be happy.

Unhappy users will be those who rush out and purchase it in spite of the released system specifcations, then wail in agony as the app runs like a dog on their under-powered machines.

AlanH

Jun 06, 2006, 08:12 AM

Please can we call a truce in a debate that is clearly not going to change minds? If you guys want to continue then I suggest you do so via PM, as this discussion is not generating any new information as far as I can tell.

Akhhorus

Jun 06, 2006, 09:08 AM

Good grief. I can't believe you are now arguing "when I said they should pull the game, I didn't mean they should pull the game." For the record, we were using the same definition of "pull," BTW, i.e. temporarily.

Weak. I qualified by use of the word pull with a time period. There's a difference between pulling the game totally and delaying it.

EXACTLY!!! The folks at Aspyr are quite competent programmers and businesspeople. They have demonstrated this time and time again. Hence, one must inevitably start from the assumption that they aren't idiots.

They have? LOL. They've done a terrible job with CivIV for both platforms and CivIII for Mac.

You are flat out, 100%, as wrong as it's possible to be here. There's a HUGE difference between not porting a game for a while and pulling it temporarily. The latter will do HUGE damage to your rep.

Not if you don't publicize that the game is coming out. If Aspyr had waited to mouth off about the game coming out until they saw what the vague requirements would be, then they wouldn't be in the fix they are in.

They certainly know this, nobody denies that. I was referring to...

There is no way they DID have a clear idea. I mean, sure, they could be certain that it wouldn't work on a G4/450. But there is no credible way they could know it wouldn't be fine on a G4/1.4, for example. The uncertainties are just too great. This is a simple fact of porting that has been stated by, that I can recall, Glenda Adams, Brad Oliver, Chris Jacobson, and others.

I don't buy that with confederate money. If they didn't have a vague idea of what the requirements would be, then they aren't involved with the porting or aren't telling us the full truth.

Or have no better option available.

No, they have a better option. Sit on the game until the sales of macs that can handle the game are high enough. Right now, the only macs that can operate this game are the next generation of macs that were just released.

I speak as if I've read many statements on the subject from people involved in such porting projects. Which I have.

You'll believe anything you're told then.

There's a huge difference between having a general idea and being able to predict whether it'll need a G4/1.4 or a G5/1.8. You're demanding a precision that, quite frankly, is entirely impossible.

Thats not that big a difference. They knew the graphic card requirements long ago and the vram requirements. Processor speed is something that wouldn't be known until the final productions, but the graphic card and vram requirements had to be well known and what is equally as well know is that it would have been difficult for the vast majority of mac to operate the software just on those requirements.

Sure. That belief was clearly incorrect. That doesn't make anyone an idiot or malicious, just mistaken.

I didn't say that he an idiot or malicious. I think he was mistaken. Which means that you can't take what the Aspyr people say as the Gospel truth.

If you claim that they are objectively high, to the extent that a game will not be successful, you are wrong.

They are high in comparison to hardware that a majority of their target demo runs.

I will, again, point out that they are near-identical to CoD2, which is, as I hear it, expected to do VERY well. The only basis on which such claims as you make can be justified in the least is by comparison to other TBS titles. Hence, since I choose to assume you're arguing from the marginally credible angle when it's unclear, I assume that's the angle you're taking. If you're instead choosing to claim CoD2 will be a complete failure, or that Deus Ex (which had perhaps even higher requirements relative to its time) was a failure, then I was apparently mistaken and you are taking the completely invalid tack to it.

So, you admit that I didn't say what you said I said; but thats what you assume I meant? Did you suffer head injury sometime last night?

As for Call of Duty 2: its sales have been poor. Amazon has it(the mac version) as the #58 best Computer game in sales. Its sold extremely well on XBox and PC, but Mac sales seem low.

Done. Repeatedly.

Thanks for avoiding to offer any real examples of your blather.

No, you are in fact claiming to know far more about mac game porting. Specifically how precisely it's possible to know sysreqs before you even start a project.

No, I'm claiming to know more about business. Thats the basis of my whole complaints. Mac game porting is part of it, I don't buy that Aspyr had no clue what the requirements would be. Since they knew what Windows required for it to run in terms of Vram and video card. So, what your saying is that Aspyr is full of total incompetants who can't be bothered to check out the windows version before they port it? LMAO, that contradicts most of your entire argument on this point.

Let's be clear here. Our point of difference is not in whether CIV will sell well, or as well as it would otherwise. I am claiming that it's possible it will sell reasonably well, though not so well as otherwise, and that Aspyr isn't staffed by a bunch of idiots, but rather by people who are making the best they can out of a situation nobody is happy with.

Wow, are you chickening out now. Aspyr has great programmers and designers, but as businessmen? I don't see their competance. Especially if they insist on releasing CivIV with these requirements in the next few weeks. Unless they plan on offering discounts on upgrades for people to run it.

AlanH

Jun 06, 2006, 09:20 AM

I tried to be polite, but I repeat:

Please can we call a truce in a debate that is clearly not going to change minds? If you guys want to continue then I suggest you do so via PM, as this discussion is not generating any new information as far as I can tell.

Akhhorus

Jun 06, 2006, 09:31 AM

I tried to be polite, but I repeat:

Sorry, I didn't see that until after I posted. I apologize.

bio_hazard

Jun 06, 2006, 01:43 PM

This may have been mentioned already, but just wondering why anyone will ever make/port a mac game ever again (because of BootCamp)? If people are willing to upgrade RAM or a graphics card for a few hundred dollars, they will probably be willing to shell out for Windows, as distasteful as that sounds.

In terms of playability below minimum requirements, I finally decided (after trying out official and unofficial fixes) that Civ4 for PC was not playable on my not-too-old mid-level laptop, although I could sometimes play for a couple of hours in a row without a crash. Of course, it was brutally slow and I couldn't see any terrain graphics!

Most of the early PC problems seemed to have to do with accomodating a bazillion different kinds of graphics processors and drivers, which shouldn't be as much a problem for macs. I'm not computer-savvy enough to know whether different CPU's (g4vsg5) are different enough to cause qualitative performace problems (won't run) vs qualitative problems (speed and bells&whistles). Also, here's hoping that either a patch will come out that will make it backwards compatible with G4 processors, or that some brainiac here can program something like that to be posted as a mod, once we know where the incompatibilities lie.

AlanH

Jun 06, 2006, 01:49 PM

Even if I were prepared to shell out to W Gates for his so-called OS, I'm not willing to reboot my Mac just to play a game - or to do anything else. I multi-task my activities way too much for that, probably demonstrating that I am not a serious gamer. However, I'm sure there are lots of people willing and able to manage their time better than me, and to dedicate long perods to a game.

Don't hold your breath for a third party piece of magic to make C-IV run on a G4 if it doesn't do so out of the box. If Brad doesn't do it inside the code I'll be willing to bet it's not feasible from outside.

Beamup

Jun 06, 2006, 02:00 PM

NoMan

Jun 06, 2006, 02:14 PM

For anyone but a serious gamer, Boot Camp is far too much trouble for gaming. OTOH, any serious gamer who's still on a Mac at all is typically there because they're seriously attached to the OS.

So, for the people who might consider doing it, generally they really prefer to use the Mac OS, so Boot Camp isn't terribly attractive. I mean, let's face it. Most people for whom Boot Camp would be a really good option simply aren't using Macs any more.

I agree. I bought an MBP 2 weeks ago and loaded Boot Camp and C-IV. I turned off my old PC (which has integrated graphics but still ran C-IV with somewhat lower graphics). I am now rebooting every night to play. I will most definitely be buying the Mac version when it comes out.

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 12:59 AM

Certainly disappointing as Brad Oliver early on suggested you could probably run it just barely on a Mac mini PPC.

You can run Civ4 on a PPC Mac Mini. It'll get pokey during the end-game for sure, but it certainly runs. There is some graphical corruption on the zoomed-out globe view due to the low amount of VRAM on these Macs, and there may be some other graphical quirks as well. The video card was low-end enough to make the game mostly work, but not enough for it to be something we'd want to support.

Those integrated Intel graphics chips in the Intel Mac Mini and the MacBook, however, are not up to the task and it's not worth trying on those Macs.

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:01 AM

I also note that the Mac Civ4 description doesn't include an SDK. Are Mac users going to be second class customization citizens again?

We haven't had time to roll in the SDK, but the goal is to support it. It's only code. :)

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:07 AM

Or maybe he's just insanely busy....

Bingo. It's been the longest 6 weeks of my life trying to wrap this thing up.

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:12 AM

Here are my feelings: Civ 4 should run on Macintoshes made in the past 2 years, not just on computers made in the past 12 months.

For Civ4 to work well, you need two things: a fast CPU and a non-sucky video card. You can of course have a fast G4 and a high-end Radeon and probably have a nice Civ4 experience if you tone down some of the eye candy.

But for Civ 4 not to work on newly released Mac Books is pitiful.

The video chip in the new MacBook is pitiful, so there you have it. Run it at your own peril.

AlanH

Jun 07, 2006, 01:14 AM

Thanks for taking time out to come here and respond, Brad. It' much appreciated. :thumbsup:

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:14 AM

Post a demo version (plays 20 turns) so that we can all at least try it out on our systems.

The problem is that there is no PC demo (that I've seen - I've been in a bunker the past few weeks), and producing a Mac-specific demo is problematic for many reasons.

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:20 AM

What would be most helpful however, is a statement saying if us G4 (and Radeon 9000) users are locked out altogether, or if the specs are only a suggestion only.

The game won't forbid you from trying to run it, but you will be warned. And you should expect that it'll run poorly. Your CPU is pretty pokey and worse yet, the Radeon 9000 is not up to running modern 3D games well. It also likely doesn't have 64 MB of VRAM, which is really the minimum that Civ4 needs to avoid corrupted/missing textures.

AlanH

Jun 07, 2006, 01:28 AM

The problem is that there is no PC demo (that I've seen - I've been in a bunker the past few weeks), and producing a Mac-specific demo is problematic for many reasons.

A local announcement from November last year:

http://www.civfanatics.com/news2/comments.php?id=589

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:43 AM

OK, lots of talk about the requirements here, so it's time to try to answer some questions. :)

Yeah, they're high alright, probably a bit higher than necessary. We had to nail down the requirements a while back for the boxes and other legal junk, so we went with what felt right based on the current Civ4 builds we had at the time. As it turns out, we were able to squeeze a bit more out of the Mac port since then, and I'd say we're in the ballpark of PC performance on similar hardware, but low-end Macs and crappy video cards really should not try Civ4.

32 MB video cards (the Radeon 8500/9000/9200 class, also the card in the PPC Mac Mini) do not have enough VRAM to run Civ4 without graphical corruption. Worse, driver bugs on those cards as well as a few others caused us to raise the bar a little higher than we would have liked. That said, it's playable on my PPC Mac Mini in the early going (with some oddball textures here and there) but it bogs down quite a bit at the end. When it became apparent that the graphical corruption on these cards was a deal-breaker, we opted not to support these Macs and cut our QA time on these Macs accordingly.

As Beamup said, the specs for Civ4 aren't really out of line for modern games. The shocker is the gulf in specs between Civ4 and Civ3. Civ3 is really a Luddite in this regard - it was all 2D, and was a 256-color game at its heart.

As Glenda said somewhere else, we opted to go conservative with the Mac specs. The PC specs are generally regarded as a bit low, and given the high performance of Civ4 and our deadlines, we felt it was better for our customers to aim high on the specs rather than try to sell something that would probably be a disappointment on less-powerful Macs. I'm pleased that we've been able to wring out some more performance since then, but I would still think long and hard about buying Mac Civ4 if you do not meet our posted minimum specs.

The Mac version is current with the PC 1.61 patch. I haven't even looked at the SDK code yet, but certainly that will be on my TODO list once this thing ships. Although confusing, keep in mind that our "alpha" milestone is what everyone else in the entire world calls "beta". I know there was a reason why we decided to rename all our milestones, but I couldn't tell you what that reason is. So with that said, Civ4 is currently very deep into what you guys would call beta. I suspect we'll be putting out a press release soon to update this.

As for the Civ3 patch, I believe it was decided to wait until Civ4 ships so I can return to it and finish it so we only have to do one patch ever for Civ3. I have not touched Civ3 in a few months now because of Civ4's death march of a schedule. Of course now that I've said that, watch us release a patch next week and prove me wrong. ;)

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 01:45 AM

A local announcement from November last year:

http://www.civfanatics.com/news2/comments.php?id=589

Wow, I totally missed that! I'll get in contact with Firaxis and see what we can do. Obviously if we do a demo, it will post-date the Civ4 Mac release at this point. ;)

Gatekeeper

Jun 07, 2006, 03:10 AM

Keep up the good work, Brad, and make sure to get a good night's sleep every night. Don't want you getting into an accident or something because you're sleep-deprived. ;)

Oh, and to reiterate: Am I ever glad I waited to buy a new iMac. That Intel iMac with 2GHz processor, 2G RAM, 256MB VRAM is going to run Civ IV splendidly (crosses fingers)!

Gatekeeper

Beamup

Jun 07, 2006, 05:05 AM

JoAT

Jun 07, 2006, 06:49 AM

32 MB video cards (the Radeon 8500/9000/9200 class, also the card in the PPC Mac Mini) do not have enough VRAM to run Civ4 without graphical corruption. Worse, driver bugs on those cards as well as a few others caused us to raise the bar a little higher than we would have liked.

While some versions of the the Radeon 8500/9000/9200 class are 32mb cards, the retail ATI release of the Mac 8500 and 9000 cards come with 64-128mb of VRAM. (Not to mention all of the flashed PC variants with plenty of VRAM people have running in their Macs. But that's a different story.) Are the driver bugs still going to cause graphical corruption issues on these cards with enough VRAM? Are the bugs in Apples video drivers, ATI's retail drivers, or both?

JoAT

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 09:57 AM

Are the driver bugs still going to cause graphical corruption issues on these cards with enough VRAM? Are the bugs in Apples video drivers, ATI's retail drivers, or both?

I don't believe we tested Civ4 on a config with a 64M retail Radeon of that class, so I don't know.

I also don't know that we ever got a definitive word on if it's an Apple bug or an ATI bug. I could see making a case for either: GL doesn't report failure on any card when you create a pbuffer that is too big for VRAM, but the other cards do seem to cope more gracefully with the situation.

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 10:02 AM

Great to hear from you, Brad. It's always very much appreciated. Hopefully you can get back to a more reasonable schedule in the near future! Maybe even a vacation - sounds like you really deserve one at this point.

I probably will be taking a break from Civ4 once it ships. That means that yes - you won't hear from me on this forum (or any other!) for a while once again. Burnout is always a problem after a project ends, and I'm anxious to work on anything but Civ4 for a while. :)

Cougarcat

Jun 07, 2006, 10:18 AM

For Civ4 to work well, you need two things: a fast CPU and a non-sucky video card. You can of course have a fast G4 and a high-end Radeon and probably have a nice Civ4 experience if you tone down some of the eye candy.

Wow, thanks for all the posts, Brad. So do you think a 1.67 Powerbook w/ 128 MB Radeon 9700 and 1.5 GB of RAM should run it OK? Or is it going to bog down in the end, due to the slow CPU? I really do not care about having all the settings on low; it's a turn-based game after all.

dojoboy

Jun 07, 2006, 12:46 PM

...., and I'm anxious to work on anything but Civ4 for a while. :)

SMAC/x! :D

Woo-hoo! ;)

Brad Oliver

Jun 07, 2006, 03:09 PM

Wow, thanks for all the posts, Brad. So do you think a 1.67 Powerbook w/ 128 MB Radeon 9700 and 1.5 GB of RAM should run it OK? Or is it going to bog down in the end, due to the slow CPU? I really do not care about having all the settings on low; it's a turn-based game after all.

I think you'll be mostly OK but yeah, the endgame will be a little pokey.

yellow_roast

Jun 08, 2006, 05:00 AM

Thanks for your reply Brad.

As someone who played Civ3 extensively before knowing about the patch that was available, ive lived with pokey end games before... ;)

Cougarcat

Jun 08, 2006, 11:21 AM

I can live with a little pokiness, too. After all, I played Deus Ex on a 350 mhz iMac. :)

By the way, Civ IV has officially reached beta. (http://www.macworld.com/news/2006/06/08/civ4beta/index.php)

scottellsworth

Jun 08, 2006, 02:34 PM

Burnout is always a problem after a project ends, and I'm anxious to work on anything but Civ4 for a while. :)

I do hope that you get a few cycles for the Civ3E patch after you return. Civ 4 looks like fun, and I am definitely going to buy it, but as you said above, Civ 3 is far more parsimonious about system resources. I can run it in a window on my MBP, and still do other things.

Appreciate the hard work - it is not easy getting through that last month or two before shipment. Do take a good rest after - burnout really sucks.

(On a slightly related topic, I own Parallels Workstation, and could install Boot Camp, but I am unlikely to. I multitask too much to reboot for a game. For that matter, only a few games on the PC side have made me even consider installing a windows version. Thus, at least from the perspective of this gamer, I will still be buying any turn based strategy game, and virtually any sim/economic 4x game that comes out for the Mac.)

Scott

Brad Oliver

Jun 08, 2006, 02:35 PM

By the way, Civ IV has officially reached beta. (http://www.macworld.com/news/2006/06/08/civ4beta/index.php)

And as a way of further muddying the waters with our (Aspyr's) terminology, when we say it hits "beta", it is what most people would call "final candidate."

It's more analogous to something like an "internal final candidate", where we do one last QA pass here at Aspyr. When we send it to Take2/Firaxis, we call it "final candidate" for real. From a pragmatic standpoint, it's equivalent to an "external final candidate" since it's mostly out of our hands at that point.

Hope you are all confused now. :)

Earthling7

Jun 08, 2006, 02:47 PM

Thanks Brad. Woud have been confused, but am not. What really strikes me is that one person does the porting. It must be a monumental task.

It is a shame that the game is such a resource hog, but that is out of your hands. As I said earlier, I think Sid lost the plot on this one. The graphics better be worth it, gameplay wise. Now it's just a matter of waiting to see what others with measly, little 12" Powerbooks (Feb. 2005 rev.) have to say about the performance before I fork out for the game. If it's a dog on the PB, then I second the poster above that suggested porting SMAC/X!

Brad Oliver

Jun 09, 2006, 01:33 AM

Thanks Brad. Woud have been confused, but am not. What really strikes me is that one person does the porting. It must be a monumental task.

Civ3 Complete was a one-man job. Civ4 had three of us on it. It was still a beast. :-)

Earthling7

Jun 09, 2006, 09:49 AM

Still impressive! Not wanting to bore you with drivel, but I'm curious. Were you able (or allowed even) to use the existing Civ3 Vanilla to speed up the Civ3 Complete port?

Brad Oliver

Jun 09, 2006, 11:33 AM

Still impressive! Not wanting to bore you with drivel, but I'm curious. Were you able (or allowed even) to use the existing Civ3 Vanilla to speed up the Civ3 Complete port?

Yes and no. Some of the fixes we originally did for Civ3 vanilla were sent back to Firaxis when I was still at Westlake, and so they appeared like magic when we got the C3C code. That was surreal. But beyond that, it was basically a re-port from scratch.

waltham845

Jun 10, 2006, 10:45 AM

I don't know if your reading, but thanks for Civ4 Brad :)
I am still playing the old Civ3 vanilla, plus two other games of C3C and was wondering since you whipped up C3C so fast, if you didn't get the old vanilla code to help out.
When I get Civ4 I might try out the blue marble mod, my hands are just itching to play it. Thanks Alan for being patient with me as well. Civ on..

ejday

Jun 10, 2006, 01:15 PM

Wow, thanks for all the posts, Brad. So do you think a 1.67 Powerbook w/ 128 MB Radeon 9700 and 1.5 GB of RAM should run it OK? Or is it going to bog down in the end, due to the slow CPU? I really do not care about having all the settings on low; it's a turn-based game after all.I think you'll be mostly OK but yeah, the endgame will be a little pokey.
This is the best news I've heard all day. I don't mind "pokey" – just as long as it runs! :goodjob:

Cougarcat

Jun 10, 2006, 04:37 PM

This is the best news I've heard all day. I don't mind "pokey" – just as long as it runs! :goodjob:

Indeed. The second-best news I've heard is the existance of the blue marble mod (http://www.civfanatics.net/~bluemarble/content/index.php).(Thanks, waltham845!) After looking at those screens I can't understand why Firaxis went for a more cartoonish look.

ejday

Jun 10, 2006, 07:51 PM

Indeed. The second-best news I've heard is the existance of the blue marble mod (http://www.civfanatics.net/~bluemarble/content/index.php).(Thanks, waltham845!) After looking at those screens I can't understand why Firaxis went for a more cartoonish look.
Just looked. That is pretty cool. But it says "program" (and I assume it's written in Perl)... will it be loadable on Macs? I have no idea how the textures work for CIV, it doesn't seem as simple as replacing a little artwork.

AlanH

Jun 11, 2006, 04:53 AM

I don't think there's any perl in Civ4, code is all C++, Python and XML as far as I know. Textures are stored in .dds files, short for DirectDrawSurface, a DirectX format, and there's an .XML file called CIV4TerrainInfos.xml that tells the game how to use them.

CivBlueMarble.zip expands to a Windows installer .exe. Stuffit doesn't open it - in fact on my system it crashes when it tries. I've tried running the installer in my old PC, but it wants a valid copy of Civ4 to install into. I don't have one, and that seems to be a fatal error in the installer, so I can't see what it contains. However, I would guess it's just .dds and .xml files like the other other terrain mods that are available in the Civ4 C&C forum.

ejday

Jun 11, 2006, 11:40 AM

I don't think there's any perl in Civ4, code is all C++, Python and XML as far as I know. Textures are stored in .dds files, short for DirectDrawSurface, a DirectX format, and there's an .XML file called CIV4TerrainInfos.xml that tells the game how to use them.
The only thing that made me wonder was the Blue Marble mod page that Cougarcat pointed out (scroll down – they mention it). Though that might just be the "graphics scaling tool" they talk about.
CivBlueMarble.zip expands to a Windows installer .exe. Stuffit doesn't open it - in fact on my system it crashes when it tries. I've tried running the installer in my old PC, but it wants a valid copy of Civ4 to install into. I don't have one, and that seems to be a fatal error in the installer, so I can't see what it contains. However, I would guess it's just .dds and .xml files like the other other terrain mods that are available in the Civ4 C&C forum.
One might assume (...) that if it's just .dds files that we should be able to throw it in a folder somewhere and it'll work (though, obviously, not be scalable with the little custom program). Have to pick at that, see if we can figure it out once CIV is in our Macs.

Just to test it, I downloaded it to see if I'd get similar results. Unfortunately, I got the "does not appear to compressed or encoded..." error message.

Just for giggles, I sent an email to Kai, the genius behind this mod:
Hello Kai.

A number of us over at CivFanatics saw your Blue Marble mod and were wowed. Problem is... We're in the "Mac" section of CivFanatics, still rubbing our hands together and waiting for C-IV to be released for our platform (we hear it's coming out in late June).

Is there any chance that we Mac Folk might get a version? I can say with some confidence that we'd love to use the scaling tool, but if nothing else, getting the textures in files that we could manually install would be very welcome.

Thank you... From the whole Mac Community.

Erik Day
If I get any response, I'll share it here.