Firaxis a little slow?

[kiteless]

The day I bought my copy I installed it and haven't had a problem since. We have three computers here on the network all vastly different -

P3 450, 256M Ram, 20G HD, On-board video
P3 400, 256M Ram, 10G HD, some crappy old matrox card
P3 1G, 128M Ram, 40G HD, a cheapy ge-force card

As you can see we're not remotely cutting edge here. I haven't had problems with this game on any of the three, except on the P3 400 because of the refresh rate, and that is fixed in the patch. Now, granted my fiance and I are both in tech support, myself specifically software support, but it shouldn't make a difference. All software has bugs, look at Windows ME, or any other windows version. It's ****e, and we know it. Now Civ III on the other hand doesn't have any catastrophic bugs, we should be pretty thankful. I don't think most people realise what goes into coding and QA'ing and fixing software. It is a huge task and Firaxis isn't a giant company. We're lucky Dan even reads the forums here, most companies could care less. If you were more constructive when you explain your bugs rather than being all snotty about it, maybe they'd pay more attention.

Thank Firiaxis for making the game, I'm addicted, and waiting for the MP. :crazyeyes

 

[Ripley]

To whstaff:

Making statements like "The software engineering in this game can only be described as amateurish." is always going to elicit a response from people like me.

There's no angel in my pc. Nor is it optimized for Civ3, not that I suggested as such. Hell, it's not even cutting edge any more (in fact I don't think it ever was).

Your computer apparently produces corrupt save games, amongst other things. I have downloaded a number of such corrupt save games from various people on the technical support board. They crash on my pc as well. But mine does not produce them. Ever.

So if your computer produces corrupt save games, whilst many other peoples do not, that suggests that there is something with your configuration that is a big part of the problem. Does it not?

It would appear to me that the people on these boards who get the most helpful responses are the ones who post as much pertinent information as possible and don't make such sweeping statements as preceded this message.

Your only post in the technical support forum is along these lines.

"I've stopped playing this game until it is properly patched (and yes I have ver 1.16), CIV III is the buggiest piece of crap I have ever encountered, and I refuse to be an uncompensated beta-tester. Frankly, I'm not convinced the game is salvageable as a commercial product in its' current form."

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=14794

Very little valid information that allows people to actually try and help you, and at best 100% inflammatory. And you think that I'm trolling?

 

[etj4Eagle]

Originally posted by ainwood


There must be a few chem / process engineers lurking in this forum!

Yes, the simulator bugs. My personal favorite was the error in Provision that would (sometimes) happen when you tried to add another stream onto a flowsheet.

.... And in a desperate attempt to try to stay vaguely on-topic (ha!), at least in Civ III people can identify what the bugs are. The problem with process simulators is that it is often very difficult to deduce whether the result is "right" or not. I found a bug in HYSYS that would double the pressure drop across a heat exchanger. Took a long time to notice that one...

here here to the Chemes

Provision was the simulator I was referring to, and I just loved its rename a stream and I will crash bug. That was a lovely bug, especially by default it doesn't ask for a name when you place a stream. I also love how you can get some screwy results. My favorite one, was a heat exchanger that had to be broken up into 3 of the largest ones in ICARUS. Took a while to convince that senior that something was wrong.

And in my attempt to remain on topic to the original poster, we can't help you unless you help yourself. try posting a save game from just before a crash, we might be able to find at least a work around. Make use of the Firaxis tech support, but be polite. If you aren't polite your email is likely going to be sent to the trash.

 

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Not to be an eternally broken record, but "Firaxis Tech Support" is a misnomer, Infogrames are the party who provide all tech support for the game.

Those of us from FIRAXIS who frequent the boards will do our best to help out but it's best to follow Infogrames' support channels because everything is documented and troubleshot (is that even a word? ), which helps in bug-squashing.

Dan

 

[Troyens]

Originally posted by Zachriel


Great game, Dan. You earned my money. If you make an expansion pack, I'll buy that too.

Say Hi! to Sid and the gang.

I suppose Firaxis could sell Snake Oil to some people if they merely put Sid's name on it! "Sid Meier's Snake Oil"! $44.95; Strategy Guide $12.95.

The complaints about the game that many people have posted on this and the Apolyton forums are as long as they are accurate in their objections. The game has major flaws from the AI to unit values to playability and on and on. Read the many threads.

I EXPECT THEM PATCHED.

Corruption, culture flipping borders and cities, slow time between turns, lack of historical accuracy, a disappointing AI, pathetic use of navies, are just a few of the problems. The Tech Tree stinks too; it is now impossible to beeline for an advance as in Civ II.

Attacking the enemy capital is now pointless: there is no civil war and their capital just moves to another city automatically.

An attacking force canot use roads in "enemy territory". This is wrong; the defender need merely pillage his own improvements, as the Soviets did in 1941 agaisnt the Germans.

Yes, there are good points: AI invades en masse, for instance.
But the drawbacks far outweigh them. No Snake Oil for me. The lack of a Cheat Mode, or scenario-building, is EXTREMELY serious.


GUARANTEED:
This game will not have "legs" like Civ II. If you don't believe that just go to Ebay and see how many people are already trying to sell Civ III.

 

[Justus II]

I am not trying to downplay the problems that some users obviously are experiencing, but I would have to agree that in my experience, CIV3 is no worse than many other games out there.
I remember several years back reading a huge amount of hype over a new space colony game called OUTPOST. I bought the strategy guide before it came out, and actually advanced ordered it through Sierra, I think. Anyway, when it came out, over half the features never made it into the game. I felt betrayed and angry, like some of the recent posters, so I understand the feeling. In fact, in reading these forums before I got the game, I began to fear that I was repeating the same mistakes (I also bought the strategy guide early).

However, I have not had anywhere near the problems described. The game runs fine on my system, even though it is slow (400 mhz, internal video and sound drivers, etc). The only problems I have had are occasionally the music starts echoing after coming out of diplomacy, but I blame that on the generic sound drivers, which cause problems with other games as well. It is slow, but what do you expect for a system that close to the minimum specs.

I have not had a bad save game, or any of the other problems described. I HAVE had frustrating experiences with culture flips, high corruption, slow boats to China (Naval movement didn't seem this slow in CivII), and the occasional bionic spearman, but they are not BUGS. I appreciate posts like Dan's on another thread to explain the culture flipping factors, and the patch does seem to have helped with corruption, so I can understand them better, but they are obviously part of the game, so I have to accept them, mod them away, or play a different game!

As for the "missing" features, I was disappointed with the lack of scenario editing features (AKA the Cheat Mode from CivII), but most of those came out with the CivII expansions. Same for multi-player, in fact I never expected that to be included with the initial release, so I can't even call that a disappointment.

Overall, I enjoy the game, and continue to play it. I would like to see some of these issues addressed in a future patch, to at least make them easier to address in the editor (culture flipping, corruption), but I would be willing to pay for an expanpansion pack that added new features (MP, Scenarios). If you are not willing to, then don't! That is certainly your choice. I know what mine will be.

 

[hzm]

I want know what happened to all the functions from all the past games, especially SMAC.

 

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Completely different codebases (despite popular and incorrect opinion) and really more to the point, pretty different audiences. Civ III's target audience is much wider than the SMAC's ever was.

Dan

 

[ainwood]

Originally posted by etj4Eagle


here here to the Chemes

Provision was the simulator I was referring to, and I just loved its rename a stream and I will crash bug. That was a lovely bug, especially by default it doesn't ask for a name when you place a stream.

In the spirit of lateral learning and ideas exchange.... (non chem Eng CivFanatics please ignore!)

Not sure what version of ProVision you are using, but if you still get this problem, I had a work around that seemed to fix the problem (at least make the simulation recoverable).

If you have the 'newer' version of PV, then it will save the simulation as .PRZ files. These are actually winzip files - rename them to .ZIP and check. This bug was due to a corruption in the .SFD file, which stores the layout of the flowsheet. All you need to do is unzip the simulation, delete this file, and rezip it (changing the extension back to .PRZ). If you have the 'older' version that stores the simulation as .Pr1, .PR2 etc, just delete the .SFD file.

When ProVision opens the simulation, if this file is missing, it will just generate a new one. The only problem is that you lose the layout, and it goes to the (annoyingly complex) default one.

 

[SteveLS]

whstaff sez:

" Still, it is the publishers responsibility to release a game that will perform on any system that fits the minimum requirements listed. CIV III clearly dosen't. "

Let's examine this:

First, I believe the requirements are on the order of specifying processor type, speed, RAM, video/audio, CD speed, and HD space.

So ignoring CD's, RAM, and HD's for the moment, (assuming of course that they do meet the requirements), we're left with Proc, Vid, and Aud. With me so far?

Proc's. We have AMD K6-2, (2 versions), K6-3, Athlon (3 versions), and at least as many Intel chips. Then we have motherboards. Say 6 for AMD, and another 6 for Intel. Don't forget the unique drivers for each of those MB's! Say three different versions for each. Audio boards. How many do you figure are available, and that are DirectX compatible? Say 5, ok? Then you have a number of different drivers available for each of those boards....again, lets limit this to three per board. On to video! Just to keep things simple, let's limit this to 5, like the Aud boards above. Again, we count three seperate drivers available for each video board. Stopping right here, we have over 24,000 possible combinations of hardware and software, (for each processor).

I have'nt even mentioned OS's, patches available for the OS's, nor MB bios settings. Doing so would increase that 24,000 to tens of millions. While we're on the subject, it's only fair to mention that the order in which software is installed does affect system operation, as does the physical locations of installed cards. As does the type of card installed, (ISA, PCI, AGP). As does other installed software.

Verifying performance for each possible combination would take millions of years. Verifying performance on only the most up to date systems would still take years.

Expecting any software publisher to do this is an unreal expectation. It simply CANT be done.

 

[whstaff]

I've touched upon this in a post somewhere, but the fact is other game publishers somehow get around this monumental issue. I've installed CIV III on two different 'puters one was an amd and the other a p3, performance was crap on both systems. Op systems were different also win 2000, and XP. Next week I will install on a system that has to be considered high end, although I have little interest in actually playing the game, I still would like to see how it performs. I've moved on to other games, which BTW are performing fine on a system configured like this.
1.1 gig amd
512mb ram
nvidia powered video
soundblaster audio
win xp
This system far exceeds the listed minimum requirements for CIVIII. To my non geek eyes CIV III does not appear be "graphically intensive". At moment I'm playing wizardry 8, and the older Thief with only trivial problems. Again to my untutored eyes wiz 8 at least appears to a much more demanding game on a systems processing power. One other thing I'd like to add is that I played SMAC for 100s of hours with absolutely none of the annoying problems I've had with CIV III. In fact Alpha Centauri/Alien Crossfire was not only alot more fun than CIV III, it was a stable as a piece of software could be. I remember absolutely no tech problems with it at all. I guess I was/am being unrealistic in expecting CIV III to be at least as reliable as the older SMAC/AC.

 

[Ironikinit]

Actually, yeah, newer games tend to be less reliable than older games were. I don't know why, but I noticed that the Sims and Europa Universalis both crashed some. More than Civ III. I think Civ III has crashed less than 10 times and I've been playing heaps.

Anyway, what do you mean when you say "performance was crap"? It was slow? Did it run at all? Not that I'm really interested in your trifling problems or anything, because you've already made up your mind that all you're gonna do is complain and you're rude to boot.

 

[Sir. Martin]

Well all of you guys has in some perspective right. -But when at least 12 percent has the civ.exe crack something should be done about this. For free... You do not either send a computer out in the stores with a hidden problem, like missing grafik-card and then dont do anything about it.

I still have the problem, but I´ll countenue playing Civ III because of the great game it´s.

Looking forward for your new patch at friday Firerax!

 

[Cerryl]

Originally posted by whstaff
To Dan the Firaxian:
I've bought civ 1 ,civ ii, Alpha Centauri and even Alien Crossfire. I never say never, but CIV III is such a buggy piece of crap, you can no longer count on me buying any of your products in the future. CIV III is a good concept, but replete with tech glitches. CIV III in two months has caused more grief than any other 10 games I've owned, and I've been gaming since 1985. If you had any integrity this game would be recalled.

hehe, millions of people couldn't possibly be right. Plus, I'm yet to find a game site that rates Civ less than 8 out of 10, gamespot being a good example, a 9.2, which is pretty rare for them.

 

[Cerryl]

Btw, the graphics engine on Wiz 8 is 5+ years old. Not *too* bad for a game that took almost 10 years to finally come out.

Originally posted by whstaff
I've touched upon this in a post somewhere, but the fact is other game publishers somehow get around this monumental issue. I've installed CIV III on two different 'puters one was an amd and the other a p3, performance was crap on both systems. Op systems were different also win 2000, and XP. Next week I will install on a system that has to be considered high end, although I have little interest in actually playing the game, I still would like to see how it performs. I've moved on to other games, which BTW are performing fine on a system configured like this.
1.1 gig amd
512mb ram
nvidia powered video
soundblaster audio
win xp
This system far exceeds the listed minimum requirements for CIVIII. To my non geek eyes CIV III does not appear be "graphically intensive". At moment I'm playing wizardry 8, and the older Thief with only trivial problems. Again to my untutored eyes wiz 8 at least appears to a much more demanding game on a systems processing power. One other thing I'd like to add is that I played SMAC for 100s of hours with absolutely none of the annoying problems I've had with CIV III. In fact Alpha Centauri/Alien Crossfire was not only alot more fun than CIV III, it was a stable as a piece of software could be. I remember absolutely no tech problems with it at all. I guess I was/am being unrealistic in expecting CIV III to be at least as reliable as the older SMAC/AC.