CIV 1 and the save process

[bigbernie]

Good morning everybody
First, excuse my poor Englich.
I'am deeply found of Civ 1
More than 1500 sets in 20 years. On Amiga 1200. I bought a new one 2 years ago from India.

But there is a very big problem about CIv 1 saves. Because that fuc....saves process. Very difficult playing using converting tools like WHDload, or PC DOS or WINUAE.
For savings you do that inside the game. You click Save
But for loading saves games you MUST quit completely and restart.
A lot of CIV 1 updating have be made, some of them fort PC but the process of savings has never been rebuilt.
What it is catastrophic ? Simple
On Amiga install 4 floppies you restart the game in few seconds.
But using a converting tool you can't do that. Before restarting the game you must restart the tool before. It takes about 15/20 seconds.
Playing the game in the mode "you never loose" = 150 to 200 saves and loads in a single play. Every action loosed, yout try again till you winn. You need a lot of saves.

200 loads by 15 seconds each and you see it's not easy playable.
Without Amiga this game can't be played . I have an Amiga but later ?

I do not think this game has been reeencoded in order to include saves without ending the game..

??????

Thanks a lot.

 

[Posidonius]

I do not think this game has been reeencoded in order to include saves without ending the game..

Hello BB, you are correct. The program was never coded to remain running after the current game is closed. So you must restart the program always, to load a savegame. This year i performed many test games with 300+ save-close-reload cycles. This type of game takes over 3 hours, even though i got the cycles down to 10 seconds with practice and with keyboard shortcuts. Everything is faster when you don't have to reach over to the mouse. It could be 8 seconds, but i always wait a sec after closing to make sure Civ1's RAM cache is flushed, and i let the intro music play for a second before launching the reload. I probably don't have to do those things, but i do, because of civperstition.

15-20 seconds each cycle is not bad, do not be ashamed. When you get up to 10 units in play, the time you spend within the turn dwarfs your cycle time. If you are focused and thinking a couple turns ahead, use the 20 seconds to review and plan your next moves, so when the game restarts you only need ten seconds to play the units and save the game.

If you can do 2 turns per minute, that's 120 turns in an hour, and that's not bad, not bad at all. Just use the cycle time to visualize, in your mind, what you want to do when the game restarts, then you will save more time in-game and offset the time you lose in a long restart cycle.

 

[bigbernie]

Good morning and thanks a lot
It's only the difference of time beetween 20 years ago and now. On my Amiga I200 I use floppies with install set up included and quit and restart takes only 3/4 seconds.
But with PC and DOSBOX or WHDLoad it takes 15 seconds. Civ 1 Saves is not made for converters.
A CIV 1 rebuilt for Windows does not exist. I'm playing a lot of old games using DOS or WHDLoad without problems like that.

Bye and thanks again.

 

[Mallagan]

Hi bigbernie.

There is actually a Civ 1 version for Windows, and now DOS. it's simply called "Civilization for windows". I have it myself, but can't manage to get it to work on Windows 7...

Also, I'd recommend doing a normal HD install of Civ on the Amiga, instead of using WHDLoad. It's really easy.

1. Make a directory for the game, like DH0:Games/Civilization (for example)
2. copy all content from the flopies to said game folder
3. create a start script for Civ, with the following lines

Assign Civ1: DH0:Games/Civilization
Assign Civ2: DH0:Games/Civilization
Assign Civ3: DH0:Games/Civilization
Assign Civ4: DH0:Games/Civilization
Civilization (or CivilizationAGA if you run the AGA version)

4.make an icon for your script, set IconX to be the program/command used to run it
5. double click your script file that you made
6. play

I wish I could help you more about the problem you seem to have with save files, but at least when you run Civ the way I described, you'll be able to save your game files to any drive your Amiga can see and write to, in game

 

[bigbernie]

Thanks
I'll try this way of doing.
On Amiga I can use my 4 floppies game stocked on a CD since more than 20 years. 4 dms files.

Whdload is easier to get, install and use. I do not remember an old game made like that about way of saving.
And not reencoded for PC. Civ1 was a top game, like Dungeon Master on Atari etc etc etc.
Civ 1 DOS same problem. DosBox quit and start all game long.

Thanks a lot.