Macintosh Tech Support/Game FAQ

[Mxzs]

I just got my new MacBook Pro 17" today; I transferred over my copy of Civ III Complete, and I'm having some peculiar issues. I'd appreciate any help.

Though I have all the sound turned up (the computer makes all the right noises), no sounds play on the game: not the "2K" logo, not the music, not the sound effects.

I'm also seeing persistent "hiccups" in certain game actions, especially the dialogue screens. When I hit the main menu icon, for instance, as many as five seconds will elapse before the dialogue screen comes up. This kind of delay also appears in the city view when clicking on the production box, and in many other spots.

I've not had these problems with the pre-patch C3C on my desktop machine. I'm at a loss to understand why this laptop, which otherwise is quite a bit faster than my desktop and has more processing power, should have these quirks.

EDIT: Vanilla Civ3 (patched to 1.29b2) also is showing these problems.

 

[AlanH]

I can't think why your installation would be slow. Maybe there's some file permission issue? The only thing I can suggest is to install it cleanly from the DVD, rather than using a copy transferred from your old Mac.

 

[Mxzs]

I did clean install, and it didn't make a difference.

What file permission issues might there be?

 

[AlanH]

No idea You didn't get any intelligent suggestions, your post indicated that you'd done a drag transfer to the new machine, so I'm clutching at straws.

If you've done a clean installation then there should be no permission problems. It all runs fine on my Mac Pro.

Still clutching ...The patch is a Universal Binary. Are you sure you've applied it? Without it the Aspyr software is running in Rosetta emulation, as is vanilla, so maybe affecting performance? And before the patch there were problems with sound.

 

[Mxzs]

I really do appreciate your help, AlanH. I know I'm not giving anyone much to go on, but I truly am grateful for all suggestions.

I just now did another totally clean install from the DVD, and I applied the RevA patch. No changes in performance: Weird delays, and no sound at all. I've tried running it with the original disc in, and with the original disc out, and that doesn't make a difference either. I've also tried changing resolutions without seeing any change in performance.

I'm totally baffled, because this is the only piece of software that is running at less than blazing speed on the new laptop.

Well, unless someone has a Brilliant Idea, I guess I'll have to just suck it up and deal with it. Which hurts, because it's a sweet machine and my favorite game.

EDIT: Could the Color choice in the System Preferences make a difference? This machine is defaulted to Color LCD. I switched to ColorMatch RGB and the speed seemed to improve. But Color wouldn't be making the sounds and music disappear.

 

[AlanH]

I doubt very much if the color setting has any effect whatsoever.

Can we verify that your build really is the patched version? Maybe the patch is not being applied. If you Get Info on the Civilization 3 Complete.app file you should see Version: 1.27 Rev. A (v10667), and Kind: Application (Universal). And it should NOT be set to "Open in Rosetta".

Do you run it in window mode? In window mode you may be able to run Activity Monitor, with the process list sorted by decreasing CPU utilisation, and see what's jumping to the top during the five second pauses.

 

[Mxzs]

Double-checked: It is version 1.22Rev A (v10667). Kind: Application (Universal). The box for Open using Rosetta is NOT checked.

Smack me upside the head, I didn't know there was a window mode. How do you get it to run like that?

 

[AlanH]

Hold the Command key down as you launch to get a settings dialog for screen resolution and display arangement, plus a couple of other options. Works with Civ3 Complete or PtW.

 

[Tuna]

I am new to this group and like to play C3C on my iMac. Are the downloads compatible with Mac or only PC versions?

 

[Blue Monkey]

Welcome!

It's my understanding that the GotM d'ls are Mac C3C compatible. If you're looking at other mods as well, check out this thread. The solutions offered are pre-patch, but I think the general guidelines are still useful.

 

[Tuna]

Thank you for the reply. I will give that a try.

 

[rio1]

I'm running Civ3 on a lombard laptop in Mac OS 9.2.2

v. 1.21g

Somewhere after 500 or so AD (maybe as late as 1996AD) the game will suddenly crash/hang. That's not really news...
(I had not played civ for awhile, but having houseguests during the recent flooding, Civ got dusted off for entertainment till waters receded and folks could go home).

Unfortunately, Civ not only crashes, but there will be NO autosaved games for hundreds of years (last game was at about 1875AD and the last auto-save was for 960AD). Worse, I do manual saves incrementally (and always before I quit for awhile) and THOSE don't exist on my drive/partitions anywhere either! (they will show up in the dlog boxes during the save, but be GONE after crash or quit-- and it usually crashes on quit, as well)

I have yet to complete a game with v.1.21g (I had previously been using 1.17g... and saw the updaters online).

Two other people I know of are playing Civ, one on OS 9.1 and one on 10.2.x and neither of them are having problems with it not writing save files at all. I tried using Norton Unerase and it found *nothing*. Not a single manual file I know I saved, no autosaves past a particular date.

I have reinstalled civ from the cd twice now, and ran the updater fresh. Trashed the prefs and all that.

While the evidence is flimsy I suspect the prefs (at least) are being trashed? (since, in escaping to start new games... the new game settings revert to "defaults" like "chieftain", rather than the last settings used (or is this a "feature" in 1.21 over 1.17?) I do know that at some point the audio prefs will revert and not stay put any longer, despite resetting them repeatedly.
Will trashing the prefs allow me to continue? I can deal with crashing and/or missing a few turns, but 500 or 1000 years late in a game is a bit much to lose. Other than the "hint" with the audio... there's no way to know things are going to go awry-- or exactly when. And even if I do choose to quit and check... the last visible save file was hundreds of years ago. Every single time.

I tried restarting with pared down inits, in case there was a conflict there, but... any obvious culprits (about half the system) didn't help. Maybe I'm missing something for the system...

Still, I don't get the missing saves... especially when I could SEE them in the dialog boxes while playing/saving. (This happened both using the civ dlogs and macOS dlogs). I've _never_ seen this behavior with any app in the 17 years I've had a mac.
___________________________________

I see where there's a 1.29b2 updater, (I snagged it) but that's a .dmg file, which I can't open on this system. I can have it opened up on an OSX machine for me, to get to the installer I presume, will that update work for OS9?

Will that solve my problems?
Should I try reinstalling and go back to 1.17g? It was crashy too, but... I don't think it lost any saved games. I don't remember losing any more than a turn or so, depending on when it crashed.

I know, it's old and antique equipment I've got here, but there's no help for it right now.

Civ is still a wonderfully engrossing game, and it's not like anyone is out there making NEW games for this old rig I'd like to complete *one* game before I put it back on the shelf and go back to real life awhile Til winter anyway LOL

 

[AlanH]

Hello, welcome

1. I'm pretty sure that version 1.29b2 would be more stable than 1.21. You can get an updater for OS 9 here. Or, as you suggest, extract the updater from the .dmg using an OS X system.

2. It sounds as though Civ3 is simply not writing to your disk for some reason, since it is not updating your preferences as well as failing to save game files. Give 1.29 a whirl and come back if it's still not saving stuff. I doubt if I can help, as my last sight of OS 9 was probably six or seven years ago, and I don't recall ever playing Civ3 in OS 9.

3. I suppose you could go back to 1.17g (Was that the previous version? I thought it was 1.14), but I doubt if that's very stable, either.

 

[rio1]

Hi Alan...

Got the updater, got a fresh copy reinstalled and all and have been happily civving ever since Meant to get back here and let you know things are working.

Every now and again I get a random freeze, but it is saving as it should. Every now and again the prefs corrupt, etc. But I have been able to finish quite a few games

Now I'm off to figure out how to master Regent level (working my way up and still getting my butt kicked)

Thanks again!

 

[Daghdha]

I'm about to get a macbook and I've heard that you must have windows to run c3c properly. I should really look through all the pages in this section to find out whatever problems can occur when civving on a mac, but I don't have that time. My humble request is to get a link to some post explaining how to install c3c on a mac to get it up and running.

 

[AlanH]

I am running Civ3 Complete for Mac OS X with no problems. Buy it from any online store, install it on your Mac, and update it using the updater here.

The only limitations I'm aware of are (1) there's no scenario editor and (2) you can't play multiplayer games against Windows users.

If you need those capabilities then you should consider running the Windows version of Civ3, either in Bootcamp where you have to reboot into Windows, or in Parallels or VMWare which run Windows virtual machines within OS X. In either case you will need a copy of Windows to install on your Mac.

 

[Daghdha]

Tnx a lot Alan. Now I see what he ment 'cause we're playing a pbem and he is running a pc.

 

[AlanH]

The cross-platform limitation is only for online games due to the network protocols.

There's no problem playig PBEM with Windows users using the OS X version ... Well, there is one slight hiccup. Sometimes you will get a file from a Windows user that either won't load on the Mac version, or, worse, it loads but will not allow you to save it later - after you have played your turn. However, the solution is in my sig. Download FileValet, and use it to vet incoming Windows saves before playing your turns. It will clean out any problems left by the PC, with no ill-effects as far as I am aware.

 

[Skill83]

I'm try to run civ3 1.21g and not civ3c on a macbook with leopard but he said me always that he can't switch the resolution 1024x768 16bit
Anybody knows how to solve it?

 

[AlanH]

Hi, Welcome

As far as I can tell, the old Civ3 will not run on an Intel CPU in Leopard. I have no idea why, and MacSoft stopped supporting Civ3 a long time ago, so I doubt if there will be any solution.

I saw that you were looking for the 1.29b2 updater on another site. Have you tried the link in my signature?