Terrain is Dark

[rahidz2003]

Yeah, same problem here...ATI Mobility Radeon 7500C.
I've got all the classic symptoms : the leaderhead problem, dark terrain, and a slightly choppy intro movie (the second one).

Sounds like it might be a software problem with the fog of war, so I guess they might patch it, or, some modder could create static leaderheads and maybe a different fog-of war. *hopes*

 

[Kevinicus]

Whenever I zoom out to the entire globe, the cities below turn black. ;/

 

[FranklinNoble]

Whats the reveal map workaround? i have the same problem, chesire cat leaders and pitch black terrain

Start the game. Open the world builder. Reveal all tiles (I don't know the exact menu option... you'll have to browse through the available icons to find it, but it's there).

This reveals the entire map. The game is playable under these circumstances.

It does not fix the leaderhead problem.

It is obviously possible to render the terrain and leaderhed under certain circumstances with these graphic cards. It stands to reason that Firaxis should be able to fix the problem with a patch.

 

[FranklinNoble]

I don't have a space for another graphics card. Do I need a new computer?

Is your current graphics card occupying a PCI or RDP slot? You can always replace it...

If you have on-board graphics, with no available slot, then you have to either lose a component elsewhere, get a new PC, or pray for a patch.

 

[amirsan]

What is firaxis' status on making a patch to fix this problem? Have they responded to anyone's email?

 

[superslug]

Firaxis is feverishly working on a patch.

Whether or not it'll address (much less fix) this problem, I don't know.

 

[allism]

I have not received a reply to my email, but I would be surprised if I heard anything before Monday since I didn't hear anything on Friday.

Just to make sure this passes bug reporting muster, here are the steps to duplicate:

1. Install Civilization IV, run the application.

2. Proceed to the leader selection screen. Notice that all leaders, when selected, have no faces - only floating teeth and eyeballs.

3. Proceed to game. Note that most or all of the terrain displays as black, rather than showing terrain detail such as mountains, grassland, etc.

 

[superslug]

allism, have no worries, this is a bug, and a big one at that. The fact that it's happening on video cards both large and small, TnL and non alike all demonstrates that this is a game bug.

 

[controlledchaos]

Same problem, chipset 828 - it does not support T&L. Enough people are reporting that it's not T&L, though, that I have to question whether that's the sole problem.

It runs fine on my husband's computer, though - and he's fairly certain his does support T&L. He can run out and get a new video card, though - I can't, due to this being a laptop. Using his computer is not an option for me playing because, well, he'll be playing. We bought two copies for a reason .

I thought that my Intergrated Intel Extreme Graphics could handle this game but it didn't. I experienced the black terrain problem and the ghost people (as my son called them). I checked my system out at srtest.com and found out I was dead wrong. While Intel Extreme Graphics does have 3D acceleration it does NOT support T&L.

So, off I went to the store to buy a new graphics card. I chose GeForce FX 5500 128MB card because it was the cheapest ($80) there that I was pretty sure would work. Got it home and my husband installed it for me (Version 6.14.0010.7777 driver). Besides the opening movie choppiness (which I escape through anyway) everything is working fine now. No more black terrain and no more ghost people. The game speed is fine now as I've played for over 4 hours now with no slow downs at all. Maybe this was a T&L problem after all. I have a HP Pavillion Pentium 4 2.53GHz 512MB.

Obviously it seems like upgrading my graphics card has taken care of this problem. This has turned out to be a very expensive game for me now, but both me and my 10 year old son love CIV. My son is thrilled now so I guess that is all that matters. I just wish Sid, 2K Games and Firaxis had remembered the long time fans instead of designing a game that undoubtedly was going to render a lot of video cards out there completely useless.

 

[TastySheriff]

Ive only been through the first 3 pages of this thread, but i havent seen one person with a radeon 8000+, x+, geforce5x, or 6x with the fog problem. There seems to be a blurred line between which cardsd do and do not support T&L, but at any rate it seems clear that this is a problem caused by inferior/integrated graphics. If you can get ur money back, thne it will be just as if your compy didnt meet the reqs.

 

[superslug]

There seems to be a blurred line between which cardsd do and do not support T&L, but at any rate it seems clear that this is a problem caused by inferior/integrated graphics.

It's not so clear if you read the entire thread, as well as the other threads about dark terrain and cheshire heads.

EDIT: Here you go:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=134772

 

[rbis4rbb]

It's not so clear if you read the entire thread, as well as the other threads about dark terrain and cheshire heads.

EDIT: Here you go:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=134772

So do you think the patch will address this problem, especially with the Intel integrated graphics card? I know you said you weren't surte, but maybe you are now

 

[superslug]

I don't know. I mean, I have no inside information or anything like that, so I have no idea what the patch will focus on. It's just that given this problem is affecting above-spec systems, they'll have to address it eventually. Better sooner than later...

 

[amirsan]

Hey, can someone check something for me? Maybe someone who is NOT having this problem?

I wonder, if we players who HAVE the problem are missing some files in our Art directories. For my upcoming mod, I went into the leaderheads xml file and there was a path to the art for each leaderhead inside 'interface/Leaderheads'. I went in my files to find that directory and I can't find it anywhere. I ran a search through the whole Civ4 folder and the only place there is leaderhead graphics/files (besides XML, and one *.fx file for the normal game) is in the american revolution and greek world mod.

So maybe the problem lies in a lack of graphic files? Because for many people, the am. rev, and greek mods work for them fine, however the regular games do not.

Anyways, this is my hypothesis, if someone with a perfectly running came come and prove my thought wrong please do so (or right). I am going to go and run the greek mod and see if I can view leaderheads correctly.

-Amirsan

 

[controlledchaos]

So do you think the patch will address this problem, especially with the Intel integrated graphics card? I know you said you weren't surte, but maybe you are now

I'd be surprised if a patch can fix the fact that Intel integrated graphic "cards" do not support T&L. I upgraded today and I'm so glad that I did. I realize now that my Intel "card" was robbing my system memory this whole time (obviously I'm not a computer whiz).

 

[superslug]

I agree that it's not very likely that a patch will mean Civ4 will run on below spec machines, but on a few it might. I can understand why some posters are waiting for a patch before spending money on a video card.

 

[amirsan]

Err, I just checked and the same problems occur in the Greek mod and American Revolution... so I guess my little idea has no more basis.

I guess I need to wait until I raise another $600 for a new computer. [cry]

 

[amirsan]

Maybe we should all send an email about our greivances to Firaxis on one same day, so they can get a sense of the urgency for this problem, and address it somehow.

 

[mikojava]

Same problem here too guys. Black terrain, yuck, Firaxis please patch this!

 

[joesf35]

What do you mean? So you are saying that you had this same problem we have here and then you did the 'ATI Fix' that Firaxis released and after 30 minutes of playing in the dark it all became fine?

No, after turning AGP off and mipmap to the lowest quality setting, then I played for about 30 minutes and all of a sudden while zooming in and out all of my bleached terrain went away....read above