(possible) CRASH FIX

I was having problems in the current GOTM where the game was crashing. The crash was always near the start of my turn, when the program is cycling through cities, evaluating mood, pollution, production etc.

During experimentation, I was trying things like changing tax rates, rushing improvements etc, and some things worked and prevented a crash, others didn't. I think that the solution that I found may be a work-around for a genuine bug.

I think that the game sometimes crashes under SOME circumstances when trying to evaluate a city that is going into disorder. I found that a revolution, changing luxury rates, setting up a trade agreement or making entertainers seemed to prevent crashes.

If you are experiencing crashes with similar symptoms, this is what I did.

I reloaded at the last auto-save, and played the turn out. Before the "press enter or space bar to continue", I saved the game. I then activated a unit, and did a CTRL-SHIFT-G to bring up the GOTO CITY dialog. I then did a screen capture, and printed this out (...there is a method to this apparent madness).

The order that the cities are listed on this dialog, starting by going down the first column, then the second etc is the order that the game checks the cities at the start of the turn. I continued the game, and watched to see which is the last city to process correctly before the crash. After the crash, I reload, and use my list of cities to check all the cities in order after the last good one, looking for a city that is about to go into disorder. Find that city (or cities), make an entertainer and then continue.

I think that there must be a bug with cities on the cusp of disorder, as things that have a dramatic effect on happiness seem to prevent the crash.

Hope this helps (and hope my analysis is correct!)

Who would have thunk it: Going into disorder crashes your 'puter.

Well since I have over 100+ cities in my GOTM3 it just a pain to keep going into anarchy over and over

anarchy reduces your population (and score) and prob fixes the prob for a while. I think it has to do with the population size/city size. After a period of anarhy everything seems ok. Then After a while crash.

I had to go into anacrhy for 5th time
(I want a cultural victory)

So check your largest cities for problems.
Also I have notice that it crashes in DEMOCRACY. Seemed stable in on Communisom.anyone notice the same thing ??? (sorri but the spellin)

Will post more as i discover more.

Ainwood,

Cities on the cusp of disorder may have something to do with the game's instability under certain circumstances. However, in the last game I played, just to be certain, I cheated using a trainer giving myself over $ 2 million gold and set the luxury level to 80%. There wasn't one unhappy citizen in my entire empire, and yet, I still received the CIVILIZATION3.EXE error.

Other than that, our symtoms are identical. For me, that error message always appears at the begining of my turn at some point during the industrial period.

Since there is a hard cap on the number of cities that can be built (512), I wonder if there is also a hard cap placed on the number of units that can be constructed? There must be some logical explanation why the game is so unstable, and well-nigh unplayable, on huge maps w. 16 civs.

Simple, the game wasn't designed to be played with more than the 8 rival civs. They just added the sixteen because so many people wanted it that way. MY comps over a year old and I never have any trouble playing on with eight civs on a large map but even on a small map with 16 civs there is lag at the start of the game.

My current game is th GOTM

Only one other civ alive. So two civ Chinese + Egyptions
I have not built any addition cities. At one stage there was prob 150+ during this peak the game was very stable. Now with just two civis and 90+ cities it crashes repeatedly

Iam in the final age.

Originally posted by Northstar5757
Simple, the game wasn't designed to be played with more than the 8 rival civs. They just added the sixteen because so many people wanted it that way. MY comps over a year old and I never have any trouble playing on with eight civs on a large map but even on a small map with 16 civs there is lag at the start of the game.

Click to expand...

I understand your point, and that seems to be consistent with Firaxis' official line regarding the problem. However, as I've already stated in another thread, Firaxis hasn't done anyone any favors by including non-working features in their program. If these features do not work, then Firaxis would have better served their customers by not including them at all. Instead, they not only chose to include these features in the game, but actively advertised them as the primary "improvements" over Civ II, especially late in the game's development.

If I purchased a clock radio that featured a non-working radio, I would be equally disappointed. If the company I purchased that clock radio from adopted the same line regarding the non-working feature as Firaxis has with their product, then I would be equally angry. Advertising defective features in what would ordinarily be a great product is not a very intelligent way to satisfy customers, or attract new ones.

But that's just my opinion.

I understand, never bugged me though since I had no idea when I bought the game that I could play with more than 8 civs so I didn;t really mind when i found out it didn't work properly anyways:crazyeyes .

Don't get me wrong I would love to have all sixteen civs on the advisor screen and a shorter wait between turns.

I do find it anoying with 16 civs (even with a full advisor screen) that keeping track of allies trade agreements is still tedious ect and the so called improved diplomacy screens (ya right) become a huge pain in the ass trying to figure out how over 10 civs feel about you or looking for civs to trade tech to.

This worked - yaay!

I had a nice game going - I'm 2 techs ahead and I'm selling old techs to everyone so I can stay at 100% science and they pay me to do it. Sill Greece and Egypt decide to attack, and I start churning out tanks to run overthem. I'm having trouble with war weariness, I look at the clock (it's 1981) and decide I'll spend the next 70 years wiping these 2 pesky civs off my continent, and decide to switch from democracy to communism.

After 2 turns of anarchy, I'm frustrated. The game locks up at the same point each time, after several cities go to civil disorder. I spend 3 hours trying to get past this spot before finally retiring - with a loss, of course, though I'm far ahead of everyone else.

After reading this, I resurrected the game. Set my luxuries to 100%, and decreasing food so there are no unhappy people anywhere. And no lockup! I can continue playing finally, and I can turn my luxuries back to normal.

Worked like a charm, this was exactly the problem I was having and I didn't know it.

Originally posted by ripcord_tx
After reading this, I resurrected the game. Set my luxuries to 100%, and decreasing food so there are no unhappy people anywhere.

Click to expand...

WHAT did you do to decrease food so tere are no unhappty people ? Make specialist in all your cities ??

Thanks, this saved my GOTM game too. I knew the city too and had been messing with everything I could think of.

Originally posted by Minuteman


I understand your point, and that seems to be consistent with Firaxis' official line regarding the problem. However, as I've already stated in another thread, Firaxis hasn't done anyone any favors by including non-working features in their program. If these features do not work, then Firaxis would have better served their customers by not including them at all. Instead, they not only chose to include these features in the game, but actively advertised them as the primary "improvements" over Civ II, especially late in the game's development.

If I purchased a clock radio that featured a non-working radio, I would be equally disappointed. If the company I purchased that clock radio from adopted the same line regarding the non-working feature as Firaxis has with their product, then I would be equally angry. Advertising defective features in what would ordinarily be a great product is not a very intelligent way to satisfy customers, or attract new ones.

But that's just my opinion.

Click to expand...

The game *WORKS* with sixteen civs, and on a high-end PC, it works pretty well. But it doesn't run optimally with sixteen civs, and optimizing it to do so would mean alienating the majority of the customer base who are only equipped to handle 8 civs.

We shipped with the defaults set at reasonable levels, but also provided the means to allow users to wander outside of recommended parameters (i.e., using the editor to play on 256 x 256 maps with 16 civs). This isn't much different from video card manufacturers shipping with presets that you can choose to overclock if you wish (bearing in mind that stability and optimal performance is not guaranteed).

Dan

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS


The game *WORKS* with sixteen civs, and on a high-end PC, it works pretty well. But it doesn't run optimally with sixteen civs, and optimizing it to do so would mean alienating the majority of the customer base who are only equipped to handle 8 civs.

We shipped with the defaults set at reasonable levels, but also provided the means to allow users to wander outside of recommended parameters (i.e., using the editor to play on 256 x 256 maps with 16 civs). This isn't much different from video card manufacturers shipping with presets that you can choose to overclock if you wish (bearing in mind that stability and optimal performance is not guaranteed).

Dan

Click to expand...

Say Dan, just out of curiosity, what do you consider a "high-end" PC? I have an Athlon T-Bird 1.33 Ghz, 256MB PC2100 DDR RAM, 32MB Video card, etc. And yet, I continue to have these difficulties. If these hardware specs are adequate enough to simultaneously run Photoshop 6, Dreamweaver 4, and Flash 5 for hours on end, then why is Civ III so problematic?

I suspect, however, that software/hardware environmental issues aren't what's causing these crashes. Over the years, I've experienced those issues numerous times before relating to other games. So I know what the symtoms are, and they sure aren't consistent with what I'm currently experiencing with Civ III.

Another member has posted their saved game on another thread (Dino...something). He/she appears to be having the same problem with the game that I'm having. If you can find out what's causing their game to inexplicably crash, then you will probably be able to get to the bottom of this problem and confirm that it actually exists.

Good Luck

I myself, have never had CivIII crash, at all, period. I gave your advice to a friend with problems and he is still thanking me. It appears to be useful advice to those with problems. Keep it up!

Well, I dunno about this 16 civ thing, since I have never even once played a game with more than 6 civs. I usually use four rivals. I still get the crash bug, and have noticed similar situations. I have done the smae things and noticed the same things. Its a definate bug in the game but it has absolutly nothing to do with the number of civs.I have had it happen in every gae since I installed the patch. Sooo. There goes that theory.

yep mee 2 gonzo_for_civ

I NEVER had a crash UNTIL I patched it to 1.16F
Thanks Friaxis