Seriously: WILL CIV IV run in Win2000?

[Blake]

Originally posted by Locutus
I can't say I pity anyone who can't run a game because he has Win2K. That was never intended to be a gaming OS, you knew that when you bought it...

bought it.. *giggles*.

Okay I'm using a pirated copy of Win2K and have been for years. About a year back a friend gave me a pirated copy of WinXP, complete with cracked activation. I'm still using Win2K. Because I know the first thing I'd do after installing WinXP is "defluff" it back down to the Win2K interface. On my laptop I have legit WinXP and the fluff is a right pain in the neck.
Right now I'm using Linux with the Fluxbox window manager. Unfortunately the only commercial game I have installed under Linux is SMACX, which is pirated (getting Linux SMACX legit?! ).

I have a whole bunch of legit games, even the ones that suck like The Sims 2. If I like something I'll buy it.

I don't like windows, I just have to use it. I think it's immoral to make money by what is effectively coercion and will therfore shamelessly use pirated Windows. In fact I consider it Immoral to give money to M$.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Locutus
I can't say I pity anyone who can't run a game because he has Win2K. That was never intended to be a gaming OS, you knew that when you bought it...

The idea that Win2K was never intended to be a gaming OS is simplistic, focusing on how the operating systems were marketed rather than on their actual capabilities. The reason Win2K was never marketed as a gaming OS is not that it was not intended to be good at playing games, but rather was that Microsoft had not yet figured out how to resolve compatibility issues sufficiently well to market Win2K as the successor to Win98, especially where older software was concerned. Win2K buyers were not guaranteed that game developers would support their operating system, but did have a reasonable expectation that most new games probably would run on it.

I used to run CTP and CTP2 on Windows NT 4.0. I ran Civ 3 on Win2K for years. So why in the world would I not have a reasonable expectation of being able to run Civ 4 on Win2K?

[Locutus]

I know a lot of games for which people have trouble getting to run on Win2K, including both CtP games (there's pretty much always at least one thread on the first page of both of forums of both these games dealing with Win2K issues). Often it works for some people, it doesn't for others, MS just doesn't offer the same level of hardware support even today. Exactly because it was initially not compatible with many games MS never made a real effort to make it game-friendly. If you're a gamer, WinXP is the only way to go (ideally a dual-boot with Win98SE if you're into the classics). Heck, if you're a Windows user WinXP is the only way to go, it's superior to 2K in pretty much every way...

[self biased]

wait, so i'm running win ME. i'm screwed, right?

[Solver]

If you're running Win ME, you're screwed regardless of whether Civ4 runs on it or no .

[sophist]

Originally posted by Locutus
I can't say I pity anyone who can't run a game because he has Win2K. That was never intended to be a gaming OS, you knew that when you bought it...

That might be ok if that left more than one Windows version as an option, but it doesn't. In the windows world, there are still large numbers of computers running Win95, Win98, WinME, Windows 2000, and Windows XP. The first three have already been knocked off the list. Writing the game so that it runs on only one Windows version seems short-sighted at best.

Nowhere in this thread have I seen anyone state a technical reason why Windows 2000 might not be supported. It supports the Gamebryo engine (I assume). NVidia and ATI continue to release graphics drivers for it. It supports all recent versions of DirectX. It supports whatever the fancy sound things are these days, but even if it didn't, sound isn't that important. Python runs on Windows 2000 just as well as Windows XP. In short, I can't think of any reason that it can't run on Windows 2000.

[Adagio]

I assume it can run on Win2k, but I guess the reason they don't mention it is because they haven't fully tested it

[Kataphraktoi]

I'm sort of dissapointed though in the lack of aggressive moderator response to the overt suggestions of piracy here ...

overt? more like out and out statements

really,i bet at least some of the mods use pirated stuff themselves. is markg's or solver's winxp or whatever legit?

like many pro-devoloper sites,i expect that the anti-warez front is kept up to allow the devolopers to post here.

(ideally a dual-boot with Win98SE if you're into the classics)

whats wrong with vmware? it allows very strong options for running puters. like running linux on a winxp box(ive seen this done). i dont like dualboots except as backup to recover the normal bootup when something goes wrong

we have servers running in vmware.they are unhackable and can be rebooted anyway.the only small weakness in the whole system is the one master puter hidden behind layers and layers of shields and essentially invisible all hacking attempts to date have failed

[Solver]

We don't appreciate piracy, but we don't ban people for saying they pirated something. We do not, however, tolerate any links, suggestions or other help to pirate anything.

[dearmad]

That clears it up. I guess the stance is free speech but not free speech that enables the crime.

It IS a little freer in here than at Civfanatics- they get downright pushy over there with posting policies sometimes.

[sophist]

Originally posted by Cataphract887

whats wrong with vmware?

Can a virtual machine do 3-D graphics? Last time I used VMWare, its virtual graphics driver was limited to 2-D. There were also certain types of operations that were really slow, with some operations being slightly slow, and most operations being regular speed. Admittedly, the last time I used VMWare was the 1.0 version in like 1999. Finally, to dual-boot, say, Linux and XP, you have to pay for XP. To run Linux and XP in VMWare, you have to pay for both XP and VMWare.

[SIZE=1] Originally posted by Cataphract887
we have servers running in vmware.they are unhackable and can be rebooted anyway.the only small weakness in the whole system is the one master puter hidden behind layers and layers of shields and essentially invisible all hacking attempts to date have failed

Er... The only secure computer is one that's not connected to a network and powered down in an underground bunker. And that's still a maybe. It might be really hard to gain access to the actual machine, but it can be enough to hack the virtual machine. After all, that virtual machine is doing something useful. Breaking into the physical machine isn't necessarily harder than breaking through another kind of DMZ. It's not easy, but in one sense, at least, it's easier, in that the actual machine is physically connected to the same network and thus theoretically exposed to whatever the virtual machine is.

[MeaCulpa]

I am using vmware for some older titles like MoO2 or the Generals series. Admitted, those have pretty low requirements, but I haven't encountered any probs so far. It feels very much like a real W98SE system, so I think anything can be run.

VMware was kinda free for me. A few weeks ago, there was a trial version in a comp magazine. You could get a special serial that enables it for 1 year, but for me, it still says "no expiration date". I guess it stays that way as long as I don't let it phone home to its server. Do I feel bad ? Nope, it's not my fault they messed this up.

[LarryLard]

So much bloviation, and no actual answer to the original question.

Will Civ4 run on Windows 2000?

A five second job for someone who actually knows (hint hint Firaxis) to reply.

[Kinjiru]

Originally posted by Solver
We don't appreciate piracy, but we don't ban people for saying they pirated something. We do not, however, tolerate any links, suggestions or other help to pirate anything.

Arrrrr! Here do be the Excerpted Guide to Pirating!

Captain's Summary Checklist:
___ Eyepatch
___ Parrot
___ Skull & Bones Flag
___ Stolen Ship
___ Cutlass
___ Queen's English to Pirate Translation Guide
___ Swabey (x4)
___ Matey (
___ Wench (x2)

For more resources, do see they Mystical Oracle at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirates

[JamesDS]

amazon says civ4 should run on win2000 and xp.
Cvi4 uses the same (gamebryo? something like that...) engine as pirates, and pirates runs on win98 and winME. I use WinME, so I am being optimistic - why shouldn't civ4 run on 98se and me?