black terrain

[Stoo.W]

having probs with civ4. everything works fine including the leaderheads having now installed the patch. However - i still only get black terrain. whats going on. i think i read somewhere of people who managed to fix this problem. does anyone have any ideas???

 

[AG713]

I have this problem too. I assumed that my video card wasn't good enough. Do you have a good video card?

 

[stannum]

I'm pretty sure it is the video card, this happens to me even after the patch. I don't have a very good video card.

 

[PGM]

Exactly the same problem I have.
I'm a running a P4 2.5, SIS 650 64Mb Video card

 

[sutejo]

This pacth , Doesn't fix the black terrain.
Radeon IGP 320M.
Anyone can help me ???.

 

[dfa1979]

Read this, it has helped some people:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=137475

 

[ticats85]

same thing for me
i got a SiS651 i think

 

[PGM]

Any news on this??

 

[DamRho]

The patch solved this problem for me, and my graphics card is below spec... Maybe try updating your drivers or using the Omega drivers - even though with the latter my game ran waaaay too slow to be playable.

 

[PGM]

The patch solved this problem for me, and my graphics card is below spec... Maybe try updating your drivers or using the Omega drivers - even though with the latter my game ran waaaay too slow to be playable.

I have the latest SIS drivers. My video card is a SIS 650 (good enough for AoE3, etc).
I believe the Omega drivers wouldn't work with it.
I've tried to play with the blackness, but it's totally impossible!

 

[Winged Cat]

I've a SIS M650, and I see:

* Black terrain
* No menus
* Text on the city is blocks instead of letters

...but since it plays at all, this suggests that with the proper T&L, the problem should go away. Perhaps Firaxis could add software T&L to their next patch, for people whose machines meet the required specs except their 64MB video card doesn't support T&L (or supports it but Civ4 has probelsm getting to it)?

 

[stannum]

Yeah, I also have a SiS 661FX card, its gotta be it.

 

[vanguardian1]

Unfortunately, SIS couldn't get enough driver support for their video cards when they tried to release a semi-decent series of video cards, and even though they were okay at the time, game developer support for them is usually iffy at best. They took some of the better parts for their integrated video, but playing newer games on them is completely hit or miss, unfortunately.

Sutejo -
Have you updated your drivers?
https://support.ati.com/ics/support/KBAnswer.asp?questionID=1699

 

[PGM]

Unfortunately, SIS couldn't get enough driver support for their video cards when they tried to release a semi-decent series of video cards, and even though they were okay at the time, game developer support for them is usually iffy at best. They took some of the better parts for their integrated video, but playing newer games on them is completely hit or miss, unfortunately.

But SIS 650 is good enough for many recent games, like AoE3, for instance.
Isn't this strange?

 

[patweb]

I don't think T&L is the panacea. I have a 128MB GeForce 4, and the game looks PERFECT at start up and during the first minutes of play. The graphics displayed start breaking down later in the game, in most cases. Or, in my case, it you scroll out to world view and back in, the land appears stripped of 'greenery'. I have learned to play around the problem.

However, I had cases where all sorts of visual anomolies made the game impossible to play. I monkeyed around with directx, resolution, color depth, video accelleration, etc.

The longer you play the game, the worse it gets until you exit the game and start it up again.

It is poor programming. Programmers can affect the way every object is displayed and refreshed. Also, they can hawk over memory processes and clear them up.

 

[General Mollica]

I have the Black Terrain Problem. I have a Dell Inspiron 1000 w/ a SIS M650 Rev 00 64MB Video Card. I have Downloaded Patch 1.09 and updated drivers but no luck. Has anyone with this PC gotten Civ 4 to work? Or have any ideas?

 

[Zydor]

You mentioned the Black Terrain, any other symptoms? eg slow gameplay - slow time between turns - CTDs - memory related issues.

Your video card is low on RAM, which wont help. Whats the processor and disc size ?

Regards
Zy

 

[General Mollica]

2.2 GHZ Intel Celeron, 512 MB RAM, 37.2 GB Hard Drive 24 GB Free Space. Can't Change Video Card because unit is laptop.

 

[Zydor]

Basic spec seems ok for it, albeit the card RAM is low. Others have reported that rolling back to older drivers (circa 6-12 months old) have produced results - which makes sense as Beta testing will have been frozen on a fixed spec, therefore newer less stable drivers can - at times - cause issues. I dont know the SIS cards or their chipset, so I dont know if its true in your case.

If you are also getting slowplay, CTDs, and other memory related issues, its worth reading the Harkonnen thread to see if it applies to you. I know some people who started off thinking they have a video card problem, find that the memory management improvements in the Patch have helped, if not solved their particular issues. I dont know if it will be so in your case.

Regards
Zy

 

[Neon Deon]

But SIS 650 is good enough for many recent games, like AoE3, for instance.
Isn't this strange?

That is a good IE.

So....

You called tech support and they verified that CIV IV supports SIS 600 series onboard graphics chips?