Terrain is Dark

[Snackwell]

So I emailed Firaxis about this problem, since my 128 m nVidia 5700 LE is way above the requirements and still has all kinds of problems. Surprisingly, they got right back to me, and I sent them some screen shots. Part of the exchange:

I sent this onto our lead programmer and we're looking into it. Might be already fixed in a patch we are releasing next week. A lot of tweaking on
the movies was done.

Thanks for looking into it, too. I have to say I didn't expect this kind of responsiveness, given that you guys might be a wee bit busy at the moment...

We are waaay busy, but our main goal is to get the best patch out
possible, so I'm running around collecting info like yours and making sure
our programmers have it on their to-do list for the patch.

So, at least we can expect a patch that addresses this stuff.

EDIT: I'm starting another thread so people see this...

 

[Slackeyed]

I have the same problem and the same system

So am I. Cheshire cat leaders, skipping sound during the opening cinematic.
At least I can see the resources so the game is playable.

My girlfriend's Dell computer has a 2.8 P4, I've upgraded it with 1 gb of ram...

It's the mobo mounted graphics card, right? Wondering if her computer has an AGP port...

 

[Slackeyed]

Has anyone else seen the "phantom unit" flying in from the side and/or moving to another spot, even though the "right" unit moved to the "right" spot

During tutorial, my warships would fly in to the right and "splashdown" while I was scrolling the camera near the shore.

 

[nivam]

bump
Hurry on that patch Firaxis. Come on.. You can do it!!!!

 

[controlledchaos]

On Intel 82852/82855 the "center map tricks" don't work.
Any other ideas?

You don't have T&L. Even a patch won't fix your problem unfortunately. I have the same video "chip" and finally just upgraded to a GeForce FX 5500. Everything works great now.

 

[sbrzuc]

You don't have T&L. Even a patch won't fix your problem unfortunately. I have the same video "chip" and finally just upgraded to a GeForce FX 5500. Everything works great now.

Yeah. But with a laptop it's not so easy...

 

[richie46894]

well i feel smart i had the game in my hands at walmart ready to buy it for 58.99 canadain then i thought to my self OOOO FIREAXES OR WHAT EVER IS A TRICKY COMPANY so il go download it , even if itl take 3 days , try it , if it works perfectly then go buy it , i personaly like having the box there and supporting good games and buying them like the civ series and like everyone else i was waiting for it to come out to , i gatta say its an amazing game , amazing graphics i can c that there good at making teeth and eye balls ,, and pitch black terrains thank the lord i didnt buy it , and im not ganna untill this stupid problem is fixed i sat here for 2 hours reading all of the posts i really hope you guys get to play this game lol by the way i like the menu song its good

 

[civ_steve]

This is the first version of Civ that hasn't played out of the box for me, which is very disappointing. Bugs are bugs, but to not be able to see the Terrain?

I don't really care about the leaderheads!! For me Civ has been primarily a strategy game.

I have a Desktop (2.4 Ghz P4, 512 MB Ram) with an Intel 82845G graphics card. I've downloaded the latest driver patch (June 05) ... still dark, but I haven't tried uninstalling and reinstalling CIV yet.

I know Willem has mentioned multiple times that Intel 8xxxx card users are just out of luck, because of the website listings. I think that is too simplistic; I can start the game, I see units, buildings, I can see resources, I can see Bread/Hammer/Commerce indicators. The game functions nearly as one would expect it to. However, the FOW is not mapping to my monitor properly. As I move scouts around, I eventually started to see the terrain in a few squares at the top of my screen. When I scroll the map, the same revealed 'squares' on my monitor revealed whatever terrain was below them; even areas far outside of where I'd scouted. This can't be simply a hardware problem!

 

[Yokel]

I figured out a work-around for the black tile phenomenon. You have to bear with it for a while, but the key is to "explore" the center of the map, as in Longitude 0, Latitude 0. One game, that was on land, and I managed to found a city there, before I knew what I was doing. On another game, it was ocean, so I put a boat smack-dab in the middle and just sat it there.

Once you do that, the game pretty much works like it ought to, aside from the eyeballs and teeth of the leader-heads. But I consider that the foreshadowing of what my armies will do to them.

(I've got one of the crappy Intel cards)

This leads me to believe there may be a software back door to the issue.

Also, I was reading the spiral instruction book, and in Soren's article at the end, in the thank-you section, he mentions the beta-testers having to put up with "invisible terrain."

This leads me to hope that maybe it will be handled in a patch. We shall see.

 

[bshirt]

IThis leads me to believe there may be a software back door to the issue.

Also, I was reading the spiral instruction book, and in Soren's article at the end, in the thank-you section, he mentions the beta-testers having to put up with "invisible terrain."

This leads me to hope that maybe it will be handled in a patch. We shall see.

I desperately hope you're right.

 

[Scipioness]

Yeah, I'm having all of the same problems that everyone else seems to be having. Intro movies choppy, Cheshire Cat leaders, and total fog of war. From all that I've read, this has to be a softwear issue due to the fact that terrain can be revealed through the world editor, so, c'mon Firaxis, patch!

AMD 2800, 512RAM, it is onboard gfx though.... If the patch doesn't work the hand will have to go into the pocket, but it's a pain!

 

[ndsioux]

I have the intel 82845G and i get the errors like dark terrain the teeth with the leaders however when i play the Revolutionary War scenario the dark terrain is gone, is that really a chip issue or a bug? The dark terrain is there for ice age and other early scenarios but not for the Amer Rev.

Very confused!!!

 

[vonrobbobob]

I started out with the infuriating "Dark Territory" problem and I have an Nvidia GForce card.

I went to the Nvidia website, updated the drivers, and then it shifted to the "renderer" error, also posted.

I uninstalled, then reinstalled Civ IV and then on startup I got a system below minimum requirements warning... BUT it runs, only with the only seeing food problem. It is at least playable now...

 

[seamus75]

Have the dark terrain and dentured cheshire cat errors too. After testing the system reqs @ srtest.com I found that my 2 year old upgraded Vaio is missing the tnl function on the graphics card...so I installed the game on my husband's 4 year old factory issue Dell & it works fine insofaras I can now see the leaderheads. As for the dark terrain, who knows; the game won't load a map, it freezes after the loading process. Now I tested his computer @ srtest.com & he meets all of the minimum req, but not the suggested reqs. I was inclined to think the problem was with the graphics card, but now I don't know - I seem to have problems whichever system I try to play on.

 

[amirsan]

So the only two choices we have is go to church, or start saving up!

 

[scloopy]

Since I am fixing to build me a new computer anyway; what would be the recommended type of graphics card for Civ IV? I am going to have to chang out the one in my husband's also and I would rather not do it twice.

Any suggestions?

 

[amirsan]

Since I am fixing to build me a new computer anyway; what would be the recommended type of graphics card for Civ IV? I am going to have to chang out the one in my husband's also and I would rather not do it twice.

Any suggestions?

An answer to this question highly depends on your budget.

 

[scloopy]

An answer to this question highly depends on your budget.

I figure it will probably cost between 150 and 250 to get something that will be what is necessary. Am I in la la land with that estimate?

 

[amirsan]

I figure it will probably cost between 150 and 250 to get something that will be what is necessary. Am I in la la land with that estimate?

No, thats a perfect price range actually, you can find a ton of good cards for gaming, ATI and Nvidia. I will search through newegg for you tommorrow if no one else does.

 

[scloopy]

No, thats a perfect price range actually, you can find a ton of good cards for gaming, ATI and Nvidia. I will search through newegg for you tommorrow if no one else does.

Thanks much appreciated.