Very jerky gameplay

[Zombieboy]

I'm using a GEforce4 MX4000. I'm getting 2 FPS. Been doing my best to deal/tweak for 8 hours. I'm done. This peice of garbage is going back to the store.

Maybe I'll check it back out in 6 months.

BTW, links to this forum from Firaxis DOES not work. 800 numbers on 2kgames DO NOT work. (Well, they didn't. Now they are simply gone.)

And to top it off......no uninstaller.


It's a shame, cause I love civ, but I've had enough agrovation. Good luck to the rest of you. I'm done with firaxis for a long long time.

Unfortunately, I don't even think I can get my money back from Ebgames... I don't get the giant need to rush this thing to market. Civ fans are a pretty patient lot. We would have waited another month or two to actually be ABLE to play the game. And frankly, regardless of what a few who can play it flawlessly have to say, there are GIANT technical issues with this game. It's not just the ATI screwup. Surely, ANY kind of playtesting would have found out some of the many,many issues that are popping up.

 

[TheBarnacle]

Unfortunately, I don't even think I can get my money back from Ebgames... I don't get the giant need to rush this thing to market. Civ fans are a pretty patient lot. We would have waited another month or two to actually be ABLE to play the game. And frankly, regardless of what a few who can play it flawlessly have to say, there are GIANT technical issues with this game. It's not just the ATI screwup. Surely, ANY kind of playtesting would have found out some of the many,many issues that are popping up.

i agree. no matter how great this game [may] turns out to be, i'm already severely down on the whole experience. [civ III was great, for this to compare, it better be orgasmic after all of this]. i remember 10 years ago having problems getting games to run, but that's like the dark ages compared to where we should be with PCs now. i wrongly assumed that despite the complexity of today's games, there was sufficient testing/compatibility built in to avoid these frustrations.

 

[Pushead]

I have a similar problem (perhaps not as bad as you guys). I'm using a no name card, which I think is using the ATI 9250 chipset (that's what I remember the system thingy saying.)

How do I check the FPS during the game?

I'll run the dxdiag when I get home, and try some of these fixes, but who knows what will happen.

Edit: here is what I put on the ATI thread:

VisionTek Xtacy 9200 series (after looking somewhere else, it said 9250)
Uses ATI driver 6.14.10.6530

Windows 2000 SP 4.

The game works, but the intro movie was glitchy, the audio cut out several times, and it looked very pixelated. It plays, but seems very slow with the unit animations. It also froze during the tutorial.

 

[Warflagon]

Unfortunately, I don't even think I can get my money back from Ebgames... I don't get the giant need to rush this thing to market. Civ fans are a pretty patient lot. We would have waited another month or two to actually be ABLE to play the game. And frankly, regardless of what a few who can play it flawlessly have to say, there are GIANT technical issues with this game. It's not just the ATI screwup. Surely, ANY kind of playtesting would have found out some of the many,many issues that are popping up.

Call your EB store and tell them what a piece of garbage it is. Tell them the game won't run properly. It's buggy. The company's responsible for it don't have their own support forums. The game does not even have an uninstaller.

In short, let them know they sold you a game that was not finished. When I called my EB store, they told me I could get store credit for a different game. Just call ahead and explain the situation. If they refuse to satisfy you call EB games 800 number and let them know how you feel.

 

[Tyrole]

When the game is functional, I'm sure it will be well worth everyone's $50. The problem now is that we have to be patient. Yes, Firaxis released a buggy, poorly tested game (though it is probably the publisher's fault). These type of releases are the cause of the current decline in PC game releases. Hopefully companies will figure out that they need to sell better functioning games right out of the boxes, or crappy console games will be the only thing left. And I hate console games.

 

[smellymummy]

hi, i have a fx 5200 also, and have same problems.

i noticed the lag starts up after conducting foreign policy. there is something in the displaying of leaderheads (and "those" kinds of graphics, theres a few in game) that causes everything else after to slow down.

 

[Warflagon]

Just one more thing I've noticed. My FPS starts around 10. All during intro's and game start/setup it's 8-12 fps. Once the game starts up and it's the screen with the map and the large box of text explaining your leader and history --While this is on screen, my FPS is 30! As soon as I click "ok" or "play" or whatever the bottom clicky is, FPS goes strait to 1. When I zoom all the way out, I get 14 fps.

Don't know how that makes sense, but maybe someone can make something of it.

 

[trint]

For those with fx5200 and possibly other low-end gf-fx cards there is a way to increase performance at the cost of losing graphics quality. However, it requires use of 3rd party program and, ... well use it at your own risk.

1)Download RivaTuner from http://www.guru3d.com/rivatuner/
2)Install and run it
3)In the "Main" tab, under driver settings click "customize" -> "direct draw and direct3d settings"
4)Go to "shaders" tab
5)Set both "override pixel shader version" and "override vertex shader version" to "force 1.1".
6)Click Ok, then Ok again. It will ask to restart. Do so.
7)Try running civ4 and see if it gets any better
8)Don't forget to set both settings back to "no override" when you no longer need it.

 

[Umm241]

Got above recommended on everything in my computer, though my GeForce FX 5500 is right on the line. I get the exact same problem as all of you, it seems.

alt-tab out and then reopening the game fixes it, for a while. But that's not good enough! PATCH PLEASE!

 

[sgtcasey]

Have you folks tried using DriverCleaner when you upgraded your graphics drivers to the latest version?

http://www.drivercleaner.net/

There is a readme file in the zip you download with step-by-step instructions on how to use the program. I've used it for many driver updates and it's worked great.

Also, Nvidia has the 81.85 drivers out now so if you're not using them I would upgrade.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_81.85.html

And Windows XP SP2 also contains bug fixes... if you're not using it by now you really should be.

Finally, chipset drivers could also cause problems. Something I helped with on another forum for another game was to have people having problems post the output of their dxdiag. This would allow folks to make driver update recommendations and see if there were problems with DirectX on the system. Among other things.

If anyone wants to give that a shot, just let me know.

Dave

 

[Zombieboy]

By the way, is anyone else having really weird bugs in the interface as well? I went to the options screen, and it was blank...Went to change the resolution another time and the drop down menu was filled with strange random numbers...

 

[sgtcasey]

By the way, is anyone else having really weird bugs in the interface as well? I went to the options screen, and it was blank...Went to change the resolution another time and the drop down menu was filled with strange random numbers...

I've seen the percentage for culture in the top left corner of the screen turn into @@@ signs, but that's about it. Clicking it up or down a notch and then back seemed to fix it.

Dave

 

[Zombieboy]

I've seen the percentage for culture in the top left corner of the screen turn into @@@ signs, but that's about it. Clicking it up or down a notch and then back seemed to fix it.

Dave

My bugs didn't freeze up my system or anything like that, but I had to exit and re-enter for the menus to reappear....

And Tech Support still haven't answered...

 

[sgtcasey]

My bugs didn't freeze up my system or anything like that, but I had to exit and re-enter for the menus to reappear....

And Tech Support still haven't answered...

Yeah, so far <knock on wood> the game hasn't CTD'd or locked up on me. It's a minor thing to have that number change to some weird characters since I don't generally use it anyway. So far.

Dave

 

[Pushead]

---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: VisionTek RADEON 9250 AGP
Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.
Chip type: RADEON 9250 AGP (0x5960)
DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_5960&SUBSYS_06111545&REV_01
Display Memory: 128.0 MB
Current Mode: 1024 x 768 (32 bit) (75Hz)
Monitor: Samsung SyncMaster 700(M)b (CGM7607*)
Monitor Max Res: 1280,1024
Driver Name: ati2dvag.dll
Driver Version: 6.14.0010.6561 (English)
DDI Version: 9 (or higher)
Driver Attributes: Final Retail
Driver Date/Size: 8/3/2005 23:10:38, 205312 bytes
WHQL Logo'd: Yes
WHQL Date Stamp: n/a
VDD: n/a
Mini VDD: ati2mtag.sys
Mini VDD Date: 8/3/2005 23:10:18, 1273344 bytes
Device Identifier: {D7B71EE2-1A20-11CF-546F-1B26A0C2CB35}
Vendor ID: 0x1002
Device ID: 0x5960
SubSys ID: 0x06111545
Revision ID: 0x0001
Revision ID: 0x0001
Video Accel:
Deinterlace Caps: n/a
Registry: OK
DDraw Status: Enabled
D3D Status: Enabled
AGP Status: Not Available
DDraw Test Result: Not run
D3D7 Test Result: Not run
D3D8 Test Result: Not run
D3D9 Test Result: Not run

-------------
Sound Devices
-------------
Description: SB Live! Audio [B800]
Default Sound Playback: Yes
Default Voice Playback: Yes
Hardware ID: PCI\VEN_1102&DEV_0002&SUBSYS_80611102&REV_07
Manufacturer ID: 1
Product ID: 100
Type: WDM
Driver Name: ctaud2k.sys
Driver Version: 5.12.0001.0252 (English)
Driver Attributes: Final Retail
WHQL Logo'd: Yes
Date and Size: 7/19/2002 10:47:52, 837548 bytes
Other Files:
Driver Provider: Creative
HW Accel Level: Full
Cap Flags: 0xF5F
Min/Max Sample Rate: 4000, 191999
Static/Strm HW Mix Bufs: 32, 31
Static/Strm HW 3D Bufs: 32, 31
HW Memory: 0
Voice Management: Yes
EAX(tm) 2.0 Listen/Src: Yes, Yes
I3DL2(tm) Listen/Src: No, No
Sensaura(tm) ZoomFX(tm): No
Registry: OK
Sound Test Result: Not run

 

[sgrig]

Guess what? I have Nvidia FX Go 5200 with 64MB, and the game is very choppy. As pointed out above, it's especially bad when meeting other leader, playing wonder movies, opening military adviser and turning on grid. The last one especially gets me - why do I have to wait for about 5min just to turn on the grid. That's got to be a bug if you ask me.

 

[GAZ082]

Definetely something is going on with the FX5200. I have a 128 MB one with a AMD64 3500+, 1GB RAM 2-2-2.5 CAS and the frame rate is low, it gets choppy when scrolling and moving the map and so. I think i have the latest drivers, i updated them a week ago or so, ill check back at home, also ill apply some performance modifications shown in these forums and figure out what happens.

But something must be done with the FX 5200.

FIRAXIS, FIRAXIS, HELLO!!? ^^

 

[Snow]

I don't understand what's wrong with this game. I play it at high settings much faster (still have black terrain though) than with low or medium settings. My computer isn't exactly updated with all the latest hardware for games but I can play games more demanding than Civ4 with much less difficulty.(AOE3 for example plays just fine on my computer and it requires the same stuff as CIV4.)

What sucks even more is that Gamestop won't take it back or let me trade for another game because it's "not their fault the game is glitched." I don't know who to be pissed off at the most, them or Firaxis. I just know it's gonna be a month(s)till a patch can fix this mess.

 

[sgtcasey]

AGP Status: Not Available

You either need to install your chipset drivers or enable AGP in your BIOS.

Check for new sound card drivers, too.

Dave

 

[i42]

Having the same choppiness issues as well.

He're my specs:

CPQ Deskpro 1.8 Ghz
512 Mb RAM
Radeon 9600 w/ 128 MB RAM
SoundMAX Integrated Digital Audio (on board)
Windows XP w/ SP2

Thansk to this thread I tried:
Upgarde to SP2
Installing latest video drivers
Turn down audi acceleration (turning it off completely does not work)

Unfortunately, there are no new drivers for teh sound

I've had moderate success - the choppiness is now at a reasonable, but still annoying, level.