Major Graphics problem

I purchased civ3 online through the yahoo sample game, which was downloaded onto my cpu without any software. I then went out and bought conquests from a local game store. The conquest game starts up and runs fine but the graphics are all messed up and overlapping. Also I can no loger play my origianal civ 3 game because it says I need a disk (cd). Anyone else experience this and if yes how can i fix the problem?

Any info would be great. thanks.

This isn't a bug with the main game, but a problem with the online demo versions that you can purchase.

I just bought Conquests today. I have had no problems with graphics on Civ III nor with PTW, and I cannot play Conquests due to the exact problem described above. I never downloaded a demo version. I am using the game right out of the box. I have the correct version of DirectX and all that. This is incredibly frustrating.

same here.

BTW, my specs include: Athlon XP 1700+; PCChips M841 w/onboard 4x AGP: SiS 740 w/64MB swapped; 328MB SDRAM; 15" ViewSonic 6E monitor; and some other stuff which wouldn't be important to the graphics problem.

Anyone know how to solve this problem, or am I going to have to return the game as DOA? Since I can't get my money back for software, I'll have to choose another game. It won't be one that Atari makes or distributes. At least when Infogrames distributed Civ III and PTW, it didn't have this problem. It seems that Atari created a problem that didn't previously exist when they took over distribution. That's pretty sad.

Note: this is not the same problem which is mentioned here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?threadid=71450

My problem seems to be that the game insists on setting the refresh rate at a setting which does not work for my monitor. I have an old monitor, but it works fine with every game I have. The correct refresh rate for my monitor is 60Hz, and gets messed up if I try to set it higher on any resolution, but works fine at 1024x768 ... that is, except when trying to run C3C. The way the graphics look when I run Conquests is very similar to a bad refresh rate. I wish I could hack the code, but I have no idea where the refresh rate would be set in the game aside from .ini files, and those don't seem to have anything related to graphics. I also cannot show this problem with a screenshot, as the shot is taken from the graphics card and so looks fine when pasted into a graphics program after shutting the game down, but the monitor still has a messed up display when trying to play. Urg!

Try uninstalling everything then reinstalling. That's worked for a lot of people.

Krinklyfig,

try "keepres=1" at your .ini-file. May be, it holds the frequency as well?

ah..... didn't realise it's the same subject at first glance....


thankx

Well, I looked in the conquests.ini file for "keepres," as Commander Bello suggested I add "keepres=1," but there is no such variable, so I'm not sure if the game would recognize it. In any case, it got me to thinking. I checked the ini files for CIV III and PTW, and found that there is a variable which seemed to indicate a refresh rate. It's called, obviously enough, "refresh." On my PTW and CIV III ini files, the line is "refresh=60" - So, if you're having a graphics problem like mine, that is if the monitor appears to be set to the wrong refresh rate when you play the game (the graphics will overlap to the point where you cannot recognize what's going on, sort of like a stereoscopic image without the special lens), then add this line to your conquests.ini file:

refresh=[refresh rate of your monitor at the resolution you play the game]

Make sure to put it on a line by itself - don't add this value to the end of another line. In my file it looks like this:

[Conquests]
Voice Quality=0
refresh=60
Prefs Format=1
.... (more values - do not add dots or periods like that, just here to show there are more below "Prefs Format=1")

... because that's about where it was in the CIV III and PTW ini files. I don't think it matters where you put it, as it usually doesn't matter in ini files, as long as it's on its own line like the others.

So, there ya go! Am going to add this to the bugs list thread, along with the solution. I hope someone at Atari or Firaxis will read this and correct this issue in the next (beta, or first official) patch.

Now to FINALLY play the game!

That didn't work for me unfortunately. i've tried "refresh=75" or lower my screen refresh rate to 60. both didn't work. :\

You'd think they would make the demo bug free (especially with something so obvious like that) so to convince ppl to actually buy the game....

right now i've wasted a good 30 trial minutes on the demo opening and closing the game seeing nothing being fixed... :\

somehow this graphic problem is gone for the Editor though. Before, the resources would show up as striped squares.

These striped squares are also found in the actual conquest game in place of those check boxes .

kvasir: what you're talking about is not the same problem as I had. When I started the game I could not read anything, could not see what was going on at all, couldn't even start the game beyond the first screen or play it, as a bad refresh rate makes it impossible to see anything on the screen except a bunch of squiggly lines. This thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?threadid=71450 probably describes your problem better.

aah... thankx for the pointer. at first glance the problem Duckfan described sounded awfully like mine.

Duckfan's problem is probably like yours. However, mine is not, so the soultion I gave most likely won't work for you. At first I thought Duckfan had the same problem I did, but it seems now that he didn't. Some suggestions for solving this problem are on that thread I mentioned earlier. I think it has something to do with the art files, that the game is picking the wrong ones, and the problem seems specific to the demo and/or downloaded game.

did anyone ever get a patch for this?
it's sooooooooooooooooooooo frustrating