Civ on a P166?

Spadge

Chieftain
Joined
Feb 2, 2002
Messages
14
Location
Melbourne, Australia
Hi there,
I recently bought a copy of Civ3 in anticipation of me getting a new computer. While I am waiting I thought I'd try putting it on my girlfriend's ancient machine. A p166 (no MMX) with 4MB video amd 64MB ram. I just wanted to see if I could get ANY glimpse of the game. To my surprise it actually worked (sure some of the in game animation is a little choppy...but hey). I've never played a game past about 900AD (I'm REALLY not good at this game yet!!).
My question is...Will the game slow down as time goes by? And if so by how much? I'm guessing a lot? At least I'm gonna be pretty good at the early game when I get my new 'puta :crazyeyes

Spadge
 
Basic rule of thumb, the bigger the map and the more units that are present (which always is more on a bigger map anyway) the slower it is going to get.

I'd stay away from huge maps on a P166 - otherwise it may start feeling like a PBM :)
 
I stay away from Huge maps on my P3/800 256MB with a nice 64MB ATI card. I've also seen it run like crap with huge maps on a new P4 1.7 system.
 
VERY cooool .... actually it is weird that it isnt on the min specs! .. i wonder how many people are out there that are waiting for an upgrade to get the game? or mebey u are just real lucky and it doesnt work on many of the dinosaurs .... but it is very interesting to note

as to the slow down thing .... some people with superdeathninja computers are getting upto minutes wait on large maps

btw ... how long does a turn take for u? and on what size map? number of civs and all that
 
I'm getting my ""old"" computer back next week. It's not really old but to me it is. Its a P4 1.8 Ghz. with 512 MB RAM and and pretty much everything has been upgraded. I have downloaded games with everyone complaining about how long it takes and after turning off unit animations I have been playing modern turns with 16 civs on a huge map with only about 45 seconds wait. :eek: Oh yeah, that's after overclocking the processor to 2.6 Ghz. I can still run it for a few hours at a time even after the overclocking.

Unfortunately, that computer fried about 1 1/2 mos. ago and I will be barely getting it back. :mad: :D

As to your question: DO NOT ATTEMPT A HUGE MAP WITH A P166. NOT A GOOD IDEA. If you stick with small or tiny on pangea with early conquest as your goal and unit animations off, you may actually be able to win an entire game. I would put enemy on chieftain or warlord because they build tons of units on higher levels.
 
I've played on huge maps with the max number of civs (all animations on) at monarchy level until about 950 AD with no problems at all. Turns take up to about 5 mins, maybe a little longer. Personally I'm finding it hard to believe that it's working at all. I'm sure not complaining though!!
 
cool stuff spadge!! guess it would be a bit much asking u to persevere to make it into the modern age? ... hehe .... cant say i would do it ;)

and gonzo_for_civ .... it takes me about the same time also on my crustry p3 500 .... so im thinking that all that extra prossesing power u got is being wasted a tad .... still ... it would be nice to be instantanious

btw ..... while we are talking about extraudenary stuff (huh?? who?) .... any of u aussis (or south africans) see lee's batting efforts? .... WOW
 
Actually, it WOULD be too much to ask me to get to the modern age. I get my arse kicked long before then!! Probably something to do with me attacking everything in sight. :rolleyes:
 
I usually attack everything in sight :D, but do it smartly. Concentrate on 1 civ at a time. Eliminate it, then switch to next.

Devide and Conquer :D
 
Originally posted by Selous

btw ..... while we are talking about extraudenary stuff (huh?? who?) .... any of u aussis (or south africans) see lee's batting efforts? .... WOW

Hell yeah! :D Pity it was for nothing though... :(

Back to the original topic - is there any other way to further turn animations off other than the preferences? It still takes ages for the computer moving units through my territory... (I'd tell thim to **** off, but then they'd beat the crap out of me, but that's another story... )
 
I have no problems running civ3 on a PII-266MHz computer with a generic 4MB video card. I don't play anything bigger than a normal size map and turn off all the animations and it works great. I don't think you'll have any problems running it on a slower machine if you turn off the animations (and run the patch).
 
Chewie, you can also turn off "Show enemy moves", which will speed things up a bit. I don't do that though, because then it's harder to see if the AI is moving through your territory or massing troops on the border. I prefer to watch them when they're moving near me. Even on my poor little Celeron, that's quicker than scanning my borders every turn.
And, yes, Spadge, that's patch 11.6f, only one out so far.
 
Yeah, the game got significantly faster after the 1.16f patch. I think a part of the patch was letting you turn off some animations that you didn't have the option to turn off before. I think I left the show enemy moves on but turned off the show friend's moves and most of the animations.
 
hey, Karlsen,

I bet most of the readers here don't know what you meant by PBM. Those were the good old days. I used to run a game company called Flying Dutchman Games, running a game called Quest of the Great Jewels. Nice to see another relative old timer around.

Rich
 
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