Note to new users regarding Civ3 Complete and Win 8.1

[Balthasar]

While surfing about tonight I came upon a thread in the Take2 forums regarding someone trying to use Civ3 Complete on a newer windows platform. It seems that after installing, they couldn't find or mod their game because certain files were locked or missing.

Well I had that exact problem with Civ 3 complete about two years ago, when I upgraded from WinXP to Win 8.1.

There are actually two problems that I identified: first, the game disks want to install the LSANS font file, which comes already loaded on most machines these days, and that can hang you up, and the second is that Win 8.1 wants to keep some files, like saves, in the Virtual Store.

My fix: before I did anything, I uninstalled the LSANS (Lucinda Sans) font from my machine. The 3 discs were then able to install the game without hanging. Also, I installed the whole thing into a folder I created on my desktop, rather than putting it in the Programs file. This seems to have prevented the machine from putting my game saves in the Virtual Store, and the machine doesn't seem to mind if I change any files, either (you can also click 'run as administrator' when starting the editor, although my machine doesn't force me to do this).

I also used the 'compatibility function'.

But after that, it all worked great. Hope this helps. As far as I know, this only works when installing Civ3 Complete from disks onto the PC. If you're trying this with Steam or other exotica, I dunno, might work, might not.

PS. I'm not an expert, so if this doesn't work for you, don't come running to me about it.

 

[Quintillus]

I upgraded to Windows 8.1 from XP this summer, although I didn't actually move my CivIII install over until last month. On the whole, it went smoother than I expected, although I did install it to a non-default location (C:\Games\Civilization III in my case), which I suspect helped. I didn't run into the LSANS issue - perhaps that's specific to certain versions of the disc. I had Vanilla 1.07f + Conquests 1.00 on disc.

The one issue I did run into was that Vanilla 1.07f would not start - it would always crash when trying to start the intro video, or just after. Setting SkipIntro=1 in Civilization3.ini didn't fix the issue - that option may not have been present in that early version of the game. But Conquests 1.00 (and 1.22), PTW 1.27f, and Vanilla 1.29f did work as expected; I didn't try all the intermediate versions.

 

[tjs282]

I upgraded to Windows 8.1 from XP this summer, although I didn't actually move my CivIII install over until last month. On the whole, it went smoother than I expected, although I did install it to a non-default location (C:\Games\Civilization III in my case), which I suspect helped. I didn't run into the LSANS issue - perhaps that's specific to certain versions of the disc. I had Vanilla 1.07f + Conquests 1.00 on disc.

Re: Steam etc., for anyone else who's reading this thread: I have a download-version of C3C from GamersGate, installed in D:/Games/CivIII, and the game (also all 3 of the Firaxis Editors) runs just fine under Win8.1 (although it needs a NoCD patch to run Vanilla).

The one issue I did run into was that Vanilla 1.07f would not start - it would always crash when trying to start the intro video, or just after. Setting SkipIntro=1 in Civilization3.ini didn't fix the issue - that option may not have been present in that early version of the game. But Conquests 1.00 (and 1.22), PTW 1.27f, and Vanilla 1.29f did work as expected; I didn't try all the intermediate versions.

The 'no intro' switch for the conquests.ini is PlayIntro=0. I tried putting that in my civilization3.ini on my Win 8.1 machine, but it doesn't seem to do anything for me -- although LauranaKanan said it works fine on his/hers.