Boycott PC games

[Sava]

Originally posted by Lorizael
It's that kind of deception, though, that people don't like. My laptop's a year old. According to what Firaxis has told me, it should be able to run the game. But it doesn't. That's bad. Hunt Valley is only an hour away from me. Makes me want to do bad things. (not really)

And I'm too lazy to post the recommended reqs.

Um.

1.8 ghz
512 mb ram
128 mb graphics card with pixel shading
1.7 gb

I think.

ahhhh


you are being somewhat deceptive...

what is your exact processor?

what type of ram? DDR 400 (probably not I suspect)

what exact video card?

laptops are not gaming machines... sorry to be the one to tell you this... I'm not trying to be insulting or anything, but if you expect to be able to play newer games you need to have a desktop with decent hardware or a laptop designed for gaming.

a laptop graphics card, even though it may have 128 meg memory... will suck horribly... it is not the same as say, my geforce fx5900 that I used to have in my PC with 128 meg memory

you can't really fault firaxis for this... they can only release a general set of requirements... they can't release a guide to building a pc to people...

my advice, I'm not sure how much cash you have at your disposal, but if you want to be able to play PC games... build a PC capable of playing games. That is the only way I can say this. It's not hard and if you know how to buy stuff online, it won't cost that much. You can get good stuff (not high end) that will run games for cheap. Especially since civ4 does not need top of the line hardware.

[Lorizael]

I know laptops are not gaming machines. I expected the game to run a little slow on my computer. And while I heartily agree that users should have modern hardware if they expect to be able to play modern games, I think it is the onus of the game developers to give realistic requirements for their games.

[Nostromo]

@ Sava Yes, but even if your PC is in principle capable enough to run a game, there's always a risk it won't work properly, or not work at all. And I'm not talking about a 0.0005% chance it won't work here: when you buy a PC game, you have a 5 to 10 % chance it won't work out of the box (my estimate), even if your system exceeds the requirements. Agreed, there's almost always a solution, but its not always easy to find, in fact locating the source of the problem is frequently a royal pain in the butt. If you say you never had a problem, all I can say is that you're one lucky SOB.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Lorizael
I know laptops are not gaming machines. I expected the game to run a little slow on my computer. And while I heartily agree that users should have modern hardware if they expect to be able to play modern games, I think it is the onus of the game developers to give realistic requirements for their games.

well, realistically speaking, I think the lower on the line you go, in terms of hardware, the more problems running the game you will have...

I think laptop users will undoubtedly have more problems running the game...

that is just the reality

laptops are just not as powerful as desktops

they aren't built for gaming

all things being equal with hardware, I think you would have had an easier time running the game if you had a desktop...

my buddy has a dell laptop and we play counter-strike source a lot and he is having a ton of problems lately... he is really regretting his purchase... he just bought his laptop like 6 months ago... it cost him like $1000

he could've built an really good desktop, but he wanted the portability

he still loves being able to take his laptop places... but he does kick himself at times when the thing overheats every 15 minutes when we play on LAN

but me? I don't mind packing up my PC and carrying it in a huge duffle bag when I go to LAN's

I even got me a nice 20.1 inch LCD monitor that is easy to carry!

I can get everything in one trip from the car!

talk about portability and awesome gaming!

athlon 64 3500+
geforce 6800 ultra
1 gig ddr400

[Lorizael]

I love the portability of a laptop, too. I've been thinking of putting together a nice little gaming machine (desktop) to run Civ 4 and other things, and then using my laptop for everything else.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Lorizael
I love the portability of a laptop, too. I've been thinking of putting together a nice little gaming machine (desktop) to run Civ 4 and other things, and then using my laptop for everything else.

yeah, and I'm thinking about the opposite (or was when I was working)...

I wanted a laptop (albeit a higher end one) that I could use on-the-go for some of my less hardware-intensive games


when I went to Arizona by train to see the Grand Canyon, I had my mom's work laptop and I was playing the RTS game Pharoah... it was great fun

it made the long stretches of traveling through Iowa and Kansas go by real quick

seriously, those states hold no redeeming value whatsoever... there is absolutely no reason to travel there at all... it is just on the way to Arizona

[Lorizael]

Someday I plan to go farther west than Indiana...

[Skanky Burns]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
I think he's refering to the CivIV forum poll, which I don't find that reliable (chances are that people who got the game to work and don't post on internet forums aren't voting in that poll).

The very same. Not only is the source unreliable, but I didn't even bother to check the actual numbers. Still, it indicates that a significant minority are having trouble.

[Cookie Monster]

Have you gotten new drivers? Not from Dell or NVIDIA (which doesn't have laptop drivers) but from laptopvideo2go.com? I find the 77.56 ones work really well with Dells.

Imran

Good point I'll look into this. Thanks for the tip.

Why should a TBS purposely have crappy graphics to satisfy people with old computers? Why is it ok for Pirates to have better graphics, but not Civ? I've never understood that argument.

Imran

Well I'm all for a TBS game having nice graphics but even a tricked out TBS game that has a fairly static main screen shouldn't burn holes in my card the way a FPS does with it's dynamic environment.

dude, if Civ4 performance is bad because of "memory leaks" then your PC just sucks...

Sava

Dude I know my laptop does suck but that doesn't change the fact that Civ4 has a memory leak. A memory leak affects all users. Your super mega Alienware is lightyears ahead of the curve and it can probably deal with it. I don't have 50gigabillion dollars to afford such a masterpiece though.

However when I do have the money saved up I'm definately buying a desktop and packing it up with me the way you do. I like your idea.

[muxec]

Recomended Civ4 system requirements is PR bull****. 512MB RAM do not hold long and I get out of memory error and crash to desktop. Adding hundreds of megabytes of swap solves the problem but when it uses hard disk as RAM it is very slow. I suspect massive memory leaks. I think that declared recomended must be 2GB RAM, minimal on XP - 1GB RAM. I had no problems with drivers.
Yes, I agree, too many games are not fun before patch at least 1.1. Do you remember how buggy SW:KotOR 2:tSL was before patch and how buggy it remained even after patch? What else? Ah, yes, where gamers did not have internet connection developers and publishers did not release raw games and did put serious effort on testing. Did you patch your civ1?

[Imran Siddiqui]

I wonder if people would be mad if I revealed I'm running the game well with LESS than MINIMUM spec?

Well my processor and RAM are above the min, but not above the recommended.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Imran

Good point I'll look into this. Thanks for the tip.

Just be sure to read up on the installation instructions. They can be a bit tricky (have to replace the INF file in the zip with one on the site).

I think one of the reasons that laptops aren't working well with the game is because the problems with drivers. I know NVIDIA doesn't support the laptop drivers (they leave it to the manufacturers), and manufactures update it maybe once and say screw it. So you have to go third party which converts the desktop card driver to laptop usage.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by nostromo
@ Sava Yes, but even if your PC is in principle capable enough to run a game, there's always a risk it won't work properly, or not work at all. And I'm not talking about a 0.0005% chance it won't work here: when you buy a PC game, you have a 5 to 10 % chance it won't work out of the box (my estimate), even if your system exceeds the requirements. Agreed, there's almost always a solution, but its not always easy to find, in fact locating the source of the problem is frequently a royal pain in the butt. If you say you never had a problem, all I can say is that you're one lucky SOB.

Not if you buy from Dell. I've never found a game I couldn't run.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Skanky Burns
The very same. Not only is the source unreliable, but I didn't even bother to check the actual numbers. Still, it indicates that a significant minority are having trouble.

Or that a hell of a lot of people bought Civ4, enough to look like a significant minority in a poll on a single website.

[Nostromo]

Not if you buy from Dell. I've never found a game I couldn't run.

I doubt Dell machines are less problem prone. You're just lucky. A friend of mine bought Disciples II a while back but it seems the game was incompatible with the CDROM on his Dell... At least, that's what Strategy First and Dell told him. And if you go on the CIV help forum, you'll notice that Dell owners aren't immune to problems.