I'd like to be the first to say Civ 4 sucks

[Ozymandous]

Any of you with problems reading the CD's have any issues with the copy protection scheme used with other games?

I know Safedisk has or had, problems in the past with certain brands of CD/DVD drives, but that's usually solved by people updating the drivers for their hardware (typical pretty much).

Expecting a modern game to work on a 64 MB video card, the -minimum- not even recommended card, doesn't sound like it's the developers fault now does it? A good 128 MB card can be had very cheaply compared to prices 4-5 years ago.

Install the DirectX FROM THE CD, it's a slightly different version than the standard, and update your drivers, all of them, and see if that works.

And yes, the vast majority, 99%+, of all modern games require the disk to be in the drive to start the game generally. If you're not used to that then 1) you only play really old games, or 2) you don't usually -buy- the games you play.

[LzPrst]

it shouldnt be necessary to have the cd to play in this day and age. its only a very stupid way of copy protecting games and inconvenient for the player.
and not 99% of games require the cd.

world of warcraft, all paradox games, civ3 (or did i crack it cause I got fed up, dont remember), rome total war, and many others dont have cd requirements for start.

seriously, its not a commodore 64. nothing is read off the cd is it? and if it is, i've got room on my drive.
why bother us with it?

regardless, no-cd cracks will come soon and the problem will then be solved.

[Peets]

Originally posted by LzPrst
it shouldnt be necessary to have the cd to play in this day and age. its only a very stupid way of copy protecting games and inconvenient for the player.
and not 99% of games require the cd.

world of warcraft, all paradox games, civ3 (or did i crack it cause I got fed up, dont remember), rome total war, and many others dont have cd requirements for start.

seriously, its not a commodore 64. nothing is read off the cd is it? and if it is, i've got room on my drive.
why bother us with it?

regardless, no-cd cracks will come soon and the problem will then be solved.

If I don't put Rome total war in my cd, it can crash at times. I don't have it when cd is in it.

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by LzPrst
civ3 (or did i crack it cause I got fed up, dont remember), rome total war, and many others dont have cd requirements for start.

I think you cracked it, because mine ask for CD every time (some time also when CD was in place and clean.
Upgrading to C3Conquest was a relief, because the CD works (but it's needed in place, once again).

[Willem]

Originally posted by LzPrst
it shouldnt be necessary to have the cd to play in this day and age. its only a very stupid way of copy protecting games and inconvenient for the player.
and not 99% of games require the cd.

What's so inconvenient about sticking a CD in the drive and leaving it? You must have 0 patience. And yes, pretty much 99.9% of games today require the CD. It's the only way they can prevent people from pirating their work. Even that doesn't work very well.

Oh and Civ 3 did require a disk in the drive.

[khines]

I had a problem loading the game at first. When it asked for the second CD, I didn't wait for the "autoload" to open it before I clicked Next and the computer froze. I had to exit the installation and start over, but the second time I did, I waited for "autoload" to open a new window with the contents of the disk on it, closed that window, THEN pressed Next and it continued to load fine.
Then when I tried to play it with the disk that says Disk2/Play on it, it wouldn't do anything. Come to find out, you have to put Disk 1/Install in the drive in order to play. Go figure. Since then, everything is working okay, so far.

[mikeasdf]

"What's so inconvenient about sticking a CD in the drive and leaving it? You must have 0 patience."

this is a very accurate statement for me, especially after dishing out 50 bucks for a game and 100 bucks for a new video card.

My game works fine with my new video card, except it only works once on for every reboot. When i put the CD in play a game, then exit Civ, the CD rom just keeps going and won't come out, eventually giving me a system error and automatic reboot...I anticipate this, so I reboot my computer after every play.

The CDs are not bad, as proven on antoher system on mine with no problems at all with the CD rom.

Had they not forced me to play the game they want it to be started (so it's more difficult to pirate) I would have ZERO problems and I wouldn't have even had the need to create an apolyton account, which I never had for Civ2/3

The moving of units is gabage...slow, not easy to see the difference between units unless you are zoomed all the way in. Other than that, that's my only complaint about the actual game so far.

[The_Reckoning]

This is why the PC games industry is going down the crapper.

Pushy publishers make developers release unfinished product. + Raise price of buying games. --->

People resentful of having paid for buggy software. --->

People more likely to pirate game. Proportion of piracy goes up. --->

Less money for publishers+developers. --->

Publishers determined to make more money than last release. --->

And repeat. Combine this with rising development costs for the standard level of graphicss in games now, and you have one downward spiral of industry.

The only way I see to really fix this is for a solid distribution platform like Steam to take off, cutting out the physical publishers entirely. Steam prevents piracy, and gives people an easy way to update. Is also very effective counter to hackers.

Also a good defense to losing game/getting broken discs. etc. Can re-download it easily for free.

All we need for that is cheap sattelite internet. Which is right around the corner.