Lord_Hill
Prince
This post is designed to cover the workarounds and enhancements needed to play Civilization III comfortably in the year 2023 on a modern PC. It's not exhaustive by any means, but should act as a good starting point for anyone having issues with the game.
Where can I buy Civ III in 2023?
Civilization III Complete is available to purchase as a digital download on both Steam
store.steampowered.com
and GOG.com
www.gog.com
You may wish to have a look at the 'quirks of the Steam release' and 'quirks of the GOG release' sections to help decide which version is best for you.
Second hand versions of the physical release can still occasionally be found in stores, on ebay etc, but read the next section before picking up a physical copy.
Can I use my original CDs?
Not easily. The majority of retail releases of Civ III contain a particularly nasty copy protection scheme called SafeDisc. This scheme was considered sufficiently unsafe by Microsoft that it was globally disabled in a Windows 7 patch and all subsequent Windows versions. This means that your Civ III CDs will NOT work on a modern OS.
See thread https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-3-windows-update-kb3086255-safedisc.552308/ for more details.
There are a few workarounds for this
-there are a small number of CD releases which do not contain Safedisc (instead either using the still functional SecuRom protection or having no protection at all) and can still be picked up second hand. Confirmed to work so far is the Civilization Chronicles boxed set, the US PTW disc and the German 'Green Pepper' budget release
-the recommended work around is to replace your installed EXE with a drm free version provided by Firaxis to the German magazine pcgames.de and made publicly available with Firaxis' consent. This version is also supported by the unofficial patch discussed below
CivFanatics does not support software piracy of any kind, the only replacement EXE that has been officially provided by Firaxis and is publicly available is the pcgames.de EXE described above.
I get a black screen when I start the game. What can I do?
Civ III is an old game that was not designed to work particularly well with modern high resolution monitors. By default the game runs in a forced 1024x768, with the intro movie playing at 640x480 and this can cause problems starting the game.
In the Conquests sub-folder of your install directory there is an ini file called 'conquests.ini'. This can be opened in any text editor and provides some advanced options which can be modified.
The important ones for starting the game are
KeepRes=1
Setting this to 1 will force the game to display at your desktop resolution. The title screen is not resized so will be letterboxed, but the in game resolution is changed and the whole screen is used. This will often be enough to get the game starting.
PlayIntro=0
The game often does not like switching resolutions to play the intro video, disabling it can work around this.
Video Mode
Combined with KeepRes=1 you can force the game to run in a window at a specific resolution. Only a small number of resolutions are available (see the linked thread for the full list). Note the space between Video & Mode
For a full list of options available in conquests.ini, see this thread
And finally, check your high DPI settings and make sure 'Override high DPI behaviour' is set to 'Application' as per this thread. You might have to click on 'Change settings for all users' and change it there if the setting is greyed out in the normal properties menu.
Do I need to run the game in XP compatibility mode?
In my testing, despite what some advice says online, you actually don't, and it appears to improve performance slightly if you switch it off.
I did have an issue where the game wouldn't start on first run without it, but was unable to recreate that issue again.
My current advice is to enable XP compatibility mode the first time you start the game, then switch it off for subsequent runs.
The music & sound on the diplomacy screen is glitchy or completely broken
This is a well known issue on modern PCs due to modern Windows poor handling of legacy multi-channel audio. The only known fix is to use a third party program, IndirectSound by John-Paul Ownby which is a drop in dll file that emulates the multi-channel audio. Download it from here https://www.indirectsound.com/ and follow the instructions (basically copy the files into your Conquests subfolder)
However, there is a further issue with this. IndirectSound itself is an older program which relies on the Visual Studio 2010 x86 Redistributable. This redistributable is no longer provided by default with modern windows versions, so must be installed manually. You can currently get it from here https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cpp/windows/latest-supported-vc-redist?view=msvc-170 but this may change in the future.
Even with KeepRes=1 and PlayIntro=0, Civ III doesn't work on my UHD / Multi monitor setup, anything else I can try?
Unfortunately Civ III does not cope well with particularly large monitors. KeepRes appears to have an upper resolution limit (and the text does not rescale and will get smaller and smaller). The suggested workarounds here are not perfect and will be very much dependent on your particular setup.
-Check your high DPI scaling settings as per the black screen section above.
-Drop your desktop resolution before you play and continue to use KeepRes=1 (not ideal because it will mess up your desktop and is tedious to change every time)
-Play windowed using Video Mode in conquests.ini and experiment with sizes to get the best fit.
Quirks of the gog release
The GOG release is completely DRM free and does not require any storefront to run.
XP compatibility mode is set by default (you may wish to switch this off)
GOG provides a separate launcher EXE instead of just running the Conquests.EXE directly. The launcher has a single function, to disable Windows' ClearType feature whilst the game is playing, which fixes the pink highlighting around some of the text (eg. the Domestic Advisor). You can ignore the launcher and just run the game from the EXE as well.
LAN support but no internet multiplayer. Use steam if you want that feature.
The Rise of Rome conquests scenario is inexplicably missing.
Full mod support.
Quirks of the steam release
Requires the steam storefront to run
XP compatibility is off by default
Steam based multiplayer available but LAN removed
Broken mod support (requires workaround, see below)
My mods have broken text with the steam release
The steam release has a modified labels.txt file which breaks support for a lot of mods which were made assuming labels.txt would match the retail/gog versions.
This can be fixed by modifying your labels.txt file in a text editor as per this thread
Can I play the Mac version on a modern Mac?
It is not possible to play any of the Mac versions of Civ III on a modern Mac, for many reasons but the biggest one is that support for 32bit applications has been completely removed. For a list of supported OS's as well as an in depth history of the Mac version, see this thread, which also suggests some options for emulating the Windows version on a Mac.
Can I play on Linux using Wine?
Currently, Linux support for Civilization III is poor. There are a number of graphics bugs related to the use of GDI and OpenGL based graphics at the same time which can cause a black screen as well as broken diplomacy lines.
See here for a very detailed explanation, note that the workarounds for the black screen in that thread do not fix the diplomacy lines.
The sound is also badly broken, and will eventually start skipping, and cause crashes as per this thread
There is however, a new work around for the graphics issues, see the 'unofficial patches' section below.
Can I enhance Civ III with an unofficial patch?
Yes, you can! There have been a number of unofficial patches made over the years, starting with the EXE hacks 'no raze' and 'no city limits'. No raze stops size 1 cities from being razed when they are destroyed, and no city limits attempted to remove the maximum number of cities cap. Note that none of the 'no city limits' patches actually worked and would always cause crashes. The next step was the work of Antal who through reverse engineering, produced a number of patches which fixed bugs and added a few features.
This work was built upon by Flintlock who created the current recommended unofficial patch, known as 'C3X'. This is a full patch/modding framework which incorporates all of the features of the older patches (except the broken 'no city limits'), fixes a number of bugs, adds a whole bunch of quality of life improvements, enhances the AI in certain areas and adds a large number of features for modders to extend the capabilities of the game.
All features can by switched on and off via a global ini config file or even a scenario specific file, so if you just want the bug fixes and quality of life stuff you can have it.
You can find the patch here
The development thread is here
A list of famous Conquests bugs fixed by this patch includes
-barbarians only attacking diagonally
-AI blundering through stealth units and starting wars (aka the sub bug)
-The dreaded phantom resource bug in large mods
-The houseboat bug (game won't crash anymore if an AI settler is hiding in a boat)
-Science golden ages actually work
And as a bonus for Linux users, the patch features a 'Wine compatibility' mode which replaces the OpenGL calls which caused all the bugs with GDI calls so you don't get graphics bugs anymore (but be sure to disable the sound).
Where can I buy Civ III in 2023?
Civilization III Complete is available to purchase as a digital download on both Steam
Sid Meier's Civilization® III Complete on Steam
Sid Meier's Civilization III: Complete, the latest offering in the Sid Meier's Civilization III franchise, provides gaming fans with Sid Meier's Civilization III, the highly-addictive journey of discovery.
Sid Meier's Civilization® III Complete
Sid Meier’s Civilization III Complete provides strategy fans with the classic Civilizatio
You may wish to have a look at the 'quirks of the Steam release' and 'quirks of the GOG release' sections to help decide which version is best for you.
Second hand versions of the physical release can still occasionally be found in stores, on ebay etc, but read the next section before picking up a physical copy.
Can I use my original CDs?
Not easily. The majority of retail releases of Civ III contain a particularly nasty copy protection scheme called SafeDisc. This scheme was considered sufficiently unsafe by Microsoft that it was globally disabled in a Windows 7 patch and all subsequent Windows versions. This means that your Civ III CDs will NOT work on a modern OS.
See thread https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-3-windows-update-kb3086255-safedisc.552308/ for more details.
There are a few workarounds for this
-there are a small number of CD releases which do not contain Safedisc (instead either using the still functional SecuRom protection or having no protection at all) and can still be picked up second hand. Confirmed to work so far is the Civilization Chronicles boxed set, the US PTW disc and the German 'Green Pepper' budget release
-the recommended work around is to replace your installed EXE with a drm free version provided by Firaxis to the German magazine pcgames.de and made publicly available with Firaxis' consent. This version is also supported by the unofficial patch discussed below
Civ3 base game and Conquests No-CD patch
Taken from: https://www.pcgames.de/Civilization-3-Spiel-20090/News/Probleme-mit-Civ-3-Vollversion-Hier-gibts-Abhilfe-401682/ Please first make sure that your Civ3 installation is patched to the latest patch! For Vanilla, rename the...
forums.civfanatics.com
CivFanatics does not support software piracy of any kind, the only replacement EXE that has been officially provided by Firaxis and is publicly available is the pcgames.de EXE described above.
I get a black screen when I start the game. What can I do?
Civ III is an old game that was not designed to work particularly well with modern high resolution monitors. By default the game runs in a forced 1024x768, with the intro movie playing at 640x480 and this can cause problems starting the game.
In the Conquests sub-folder of your install directory there is an ini file called 'conquests.ini'. This can be opened in any text editor and provides some advanced options which can be modified.
The important ones for starting the game are
KeepRes=1
Setting this to 1 will force the game to display at your desktop resolution. The title screen is not resized so will be letterboxed, but the in game resolution is changed and the whole screen is used. This will often be enough to get the game starting.
PlayIntro=0
The game often does not like switching resolutions to play the intro video, disabling it can work around this.
Video Mode
Combined with KeepRes=1 you can force the game to run in a window at a specific resolution. Only a small number of resolutions are available (see the linked thread for the full list). Note the space between Video & Mode
For a full list of options available in conquests.ini, see this thread
Conquests Ini Settings
Mike B of Firaxis posted the settings: Originally posted by Mike Breitkreutz FIRAXIS OK, here's a list of all the INI settings for Conquests (some of these may not be in Civ3 or PTW). I'm not sure if these are documented anywhere or not (probably some of them are in the readme)... I just...
forums.civfanatics.com
And finally, check your high DPI settings and make sure 'Override high DPI behaviour' is set to 'Application' as per this thread. You might have to click on 'Change settings for all users' and change it there if the setting is greyed out in the normal properties menu.
Civ3 and Windows 11
I have a new WIndows 11 laptop and have been playing Civ3 via Steam on my old WIndows 10 machine with no issues whatsoever. However when I try to launch the app on my WIndows 11 the game locks into 640-480 mode and I can never get it to display full screen. I have tried running it as an...
forums.civfanatics.com
Do I need to run the game in XP compatibility mode?
In my testing, despite what some advice says online, you actually don't, and it appears to improve performance slightly if you switch it off.
I did have an issue where the game wouldn't start on first run without it, but was unable to recreate that issue again.
My current advice is to enable XP compatibility mode the first time you start the game, then switch it off for subsequent runs.
The music & sound on the diplomacy screen is glitchy or completely broken
This is a well known issue on modern PCs due to modern Windows poor handling of legacy multi-channel audio. The only known fix is to use a third party program, IndirectSound by John-Paul Ownby which is a drop in dll file that emulates the multi-channel audio. Download it from here https://www.indirectsound.com/ and follow the instructions (basically copy the files into your Conquests subfolder)
However, there is a further issue with this. IndirectSound itself is an older program which relies on the Visual Studio 2010 x86 Redistributable. This redistributable is no longer provided by default with modern windows versions, so must be installed manually. You can currently get it from here https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cpp/windows/latest-supported-vc-redist?view=msvc-170 but this may change in the future.
Even with KeepRes=1 and PlayIntro=0, Civ III doesn't work on my UHD / Multi monitor setup, anything else I can try?
Unfortunately Civ III does not cope well with particularly large monitors. KeepRes appears to have an upper resolution limit (and the text does not rescale and will get smaller and smaller). The suggested workarounds here are not perfect and will be very much dependent on your particular setup.
-Check your high DPI scaling settings as per the black screen section above.
-Drop your desktop resolution before you play and continue to use KeepRes=1 (not ideal because it will mess up your desktop and is tedious to change every time)
-Play windowed using Video Mode in conquests.ini and experiment with sizes to get the best fit.
Quirks of the gog release
The GOG release is completely DRM free and does not require any storefront to run.
XP compatibility mode is set by default (you may wish to switch this off)
GOG provides a separate launcher EXE instead of just running the Conquests.EXE directly. The launcher has a single function, to disable Windows' ClearType feature whilst the game is playing, which fixes the pink highlighting around some of the text (eg. the Domestic Advisor). You can ignore the launcher and just run the game from the EXE as well.
LAN support but no internet multiplayer. Use steam if you want that feature.
The Rise of Rome conquests scenario is inexplicably missing.
Full mod support.
Quirks of the steam release
Requires the steam storefront to run
XP compatibility is off by default
Steam based multiplayer available but LAN removed
Broken mod support (requires workaround, see below)
My mods have broken text with the steam release
The steam release has a modified labels.txt file which breaks support for a lot of mods which were made assuming labels.txt would match the retail/gog versions.
This can be fixed by modifying your labels.txt file in a text editor as per this thread
Text always offset when playing mods
Whenever I try to play a mod I get issues with all of the text being 'off'. As you can see in this image of the fallout mod it has Random in a generic spot, and where the random selection would be has put the word Difficulty. This persists throughout the entire game, replacing upkeep costs...
forums.civfanatics.com
Can I play the Mac version on a modern Mac?
It is not possible to play any of the Mac versions of Civ III on a modern Mac, for many reasons but the biggest one is that support for 32bit applications has been completely removed. For a list of supported OS's as well as an in depth history of the Mac version, see this thread, which also suggests some options for emulating the Windows version on a Mac.
Details on the Civilization III Macintosh port - versions and OS compatibility table inside
This thread will focus on the two main versions of Civilization III released for Macintosh computers, discussing their differences and caveats as well as providing the OSes they are compatible with. Compatibility Table + Notes Vanilla and GOTY versions of Civilization III support the following...
forums.civfanatics.com
Can I play on Linux using Wine?
Currently, Linux support for Civilization III is poor. There are a number of graphics bugs related to the use of GDI and OpenGL based graphics at the same time which can cause a black screen as well as broken diplomacy lines.
See here for a very detailed explanation, note that the workarounds for the black screen in that thread do not fix the diplomacy lines.
There is however, a new work around for the graphics issues, see the 'unofficial patches' section below.
Can I enhance Civ III with an unofficial patch?
Yes, you can! There have been a number of unofficial patches made over the years, starting with the EXE hacks 'no raze' and 'no city limits'. No raze stops size 1 cities from being razed when they are destroyed, and no city limits attempted to remove the maximum number of cities cap. Note that none of the 'no city limits' patches actually worked and would always cause crashes. The next step was the work of Antal who through reverse engineering, produced a number of patches which fixed bugs and added a few features.
This work was built upon by Flintlock who created the current recommended unofficial patch, known as 'C3X'. This is a full patch/modding framework which incorporates all of the features of the older patches (except the broken 'no city limits'), fixes a number of bugs, adds a whole bunch of quality of life improvements, enhances the AI in certain areas and adds a large number of features for modders to extend the capabilities of the game.
All features can by switched on and off via a global ini config file or even a scenario specific file, so if you just want the bug fixes and quality of life stuff you can have it.
You can find the patch here
C3X
INCLUDES (** = new in latest version): Convenience features: Stack unit commands Stack bombard Worker buttons (irrigate, road, etc.) become stack buttons by holding CTRL Stack fortify, upgrade, and disband also with CTRL Disorder warning...
forums.civfanatics.com
C3X: EXE Mod including Bug Fixes, Stack Bombard, and Much More
Update July 21 '22: This mod started as a fix for the submarine bug and since then has evolved into much, much more. See the full feature list on the resource page here: https://forums.civfanatics.com/resources/c3x.28759/ For the past month or so I've been working at reverse engineering Civ...
forums.civfanatics.com
A list of famous Conquests bugs fixed by this patch includes
-barbarians only attacking diagonally
-AI blundering through stealth units and starting wars (aka the sub bug)
-The dreaded phantom resource bug in large mods
-The houseboat bug (game won't crash anymore if an AI settler is hiding in a boat)
-Science golden ages actually work
And as a bonus for Linux users, the patch features a 'Wine compatibility' mode which replaces the OpenGL calls which caused all the bugs with GDI calls so you don't get graphics bugs anymore (but be sure to disable the sound).
Last edited:
(yeah yeah i know, 25 years, 3 sequels, bah!)
)
