Main screen menus disappear

[markob]

Hi all,

Just bought civ and getting really annoyed with some sort of bug that I've got several times.

Usually it happens after a combat animation.

What happens is that all the "menus" in the main screen disappear, yes - the "details box", "unit action box", "banner", "mini map", "advisor buttons" and so forth..
I'm left with a zoomed in view of the world, and no graphical response to my actions (like ctrl-s to try to save what ever can be saved when this happens..) Coincidentally the autosave feature doesn't work either when this happens (?)

Only way to get out of this situation is to ctrl-alt-del to task manager, kill civ, restart, re-load last proper save game and play again. Mighty annoying as you understand.

Anyone with the same problem or even a remedy to this?

Thanks in advance,
markob

 

[w00tburgers]

I have that problem, except my interface never shows up, ever.

 

[markob]

Never ever as in not even when you re-start Civ again?

To me it looks like there is no way to get the interface back in a game when it has disappeared. The only way is to shutdown civ and re-start the game and hope for a recent save game.

Anyone with any ideas?

 

[w00tburgers]

Never ever. I can move units, and use shortcut keys to play the game, but its pointless because I can't see the menus to manage my cities, or save my game, or do anything. I don't even know what i get when i move units over barbarian huts. It's unplayable and beyond frustrating

 

[Crite]

I have exactly the same issue as w00tburgers, no menus at all, ever. I suspect it's an overlay issue as I also don't see the start sequence videos (any of them, just a blue screen) either.

GFX is Mobility Radeon 9700, so it meets the minimum requirements. I'mm quite stumped...

 

[Crite]

I seem to have fixed it by installing the latest Omega drivers (I had the latest drivers from my laptop manufacturer, but they apparently weren't good enough). That is to say the menus work, but the game does crash a lot after playing for a while...

 

[markob]

crite & w00t ;

I've managed to recover from the disappearing menus problem by alt-tabbing.. or ctrl-alt-delete if you have nothing to alt-tab to. swtich to windows, let it come up properly, then switch back.. it'll take you a while (2-3 minutes on my 3GHz / radeon 9800 pro 128MB / 1 GB RAM machine).

It serves as an excellent reminder to save your game quite often, since it does not always do the trick.

OT:
After playing a full day, coming close to the end and constructing SS parts, I saved and called it a day. Loaded up the following day and everytime I end that round where I saved, the game crashes to desktop.

How's that for quality...

 

[markob]

crite & w00t, you might also try to reduce HW acceleration on your gfx card.. I reduced it two marks from maximum acceleration, and that cleared away a lot of gfx problems.