PROJECT: Playest II

[The Big Mc]

Something I would like to see is a play test .rar/.zip with just the updated stuff after the last play test.

[Martin Gühmann]

Re: Re: 2004.05.19

Originally posted by J Bytheway
The state of the sound is slightly strange - I won't go into details, but we can't really be sure that we fixed it properly. In fact, one person asserted that what we had done was certainly wrong. I guess this might easily lead to system-specific problems, and I don't know if there's anyone around who will be able to deal with them, especially if they cannot be replicated on other machines.

My first idea was that this has to do with the bug fix they did for the patch, but actual it is not the sound bug that appears when a unit dies, but I don't think it is something we did, basicly we just filled the accoring sound functions with something useful. And I think that I had this bug also in the v.1.1 of the game, well I am not sure about this, but I think that this sort of problem is more likely to appear if you have enemy moves on.

-Martin

[J Bytheway]

Originally posted by The Big Mc
Something I would like to see is a play test .rar/.zip with just the updated stuff after the last play test.

The vast majority of the content changes every time, so that's not really worthwhile.

[Flinx]

Re: 2004.05.19

Originally posted by Frog_Gamer
About previous builds: At the end of the current game I have been playing, I have noticed that there is a problem with the sound. It has happened twice that the sound of a flying jet or troop transport ship stays on during the whole time that the computer is calculating the AI's movements. This can be quite annoying as it stays on for quite a while. Has anybody had this? Cheeers to all

I have experienced this before, but not recently. I am fairly sure it is a bug in the original game. And IIRC it only happens late game.

[BureauBert]

SLIC functions

With the latest playtest build I am still unable to use GrantAdvance() as I have been with patch 1.1, it doesn't work within the framework of my modifications with the current Apolyton Edition playtest as described here and here . Additional observation: With ctp2.exe running in compatibility mode for Win98 under XP GrantAdvance() just doesn't work (advance not granted, but no CTD) without applying any compatibility mode under XP the game crashes generating the crash.txt already reported.

Apart from that (and after having disabled all GrantAdvance occurencies in my humble mod) I had a game running pretty smoothly. That means I am now able to play my "Modern Times" mod on a (not quite ultra-) gigantic map with 13 players at least up to the middle ages - a great step forward compared to Activision's original. My impression is, that the repair of numerous memory leaks (and possibly other optimizations) will make it possible to play an extensivly modified game on more/less gigantic maps with an increased number of players in a reasonable way, which encourages me a lot to get back working on my own modding project.

Encouraged as I am , I had to give the new builtin government variable a try - which ended up in an immediate CTD. Here is the crash.txt:

  0x0055ddd3  [?GetDataSymbol@SlicStructInstance@@QAEPAVSlicSymbolData@@XZ + 0x3]
  0x0055cbf1  [?Eval@SlicStack@@SAJW4SS_TYPE@@TSlicStackValue@@@Z + 0x21]
  0x00544b05  [?IsEqual@SlicFrame@@QAEJW4SS_TYPE@@TSlicStackValue@@01@Z + 0x195]
  0x005451e2  [?DoInstruction@SlicFrame@@QAEHW4SOP@@@Z + 0x462]
  0x005460e3  [?Run@SlicFrame@@QAEHXZ + 0x43]
  0x005349c4  [?Execute@SlicEngine@@QAEXPAVSlicObject@@@Z + 0x94]
  0x0055c4f0  [?Call@SlicSegment@@QAE?AW4SFN_ERROR@@PAVSlicArgList@@AAPAVSlicObject@@@Z + 0x90]
  0x00545656  [?DoInstruction@SlicFrame@@QAEHW4SOP@@@Z + 0x8d6]
  0x005460e3  [?Run@SlicFrame@@QAEHXZ + 0x43]
  0x005349c4  [?Execute@SlicEngine@@QAEXPAVSlicObject@@@Z + 0x94]
  0x0055c5f0  [?GEVHookCallback@SlicSegment@@UAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_HOOK_DISPOSITION@@W4GAME_EVENT@@PAVGameEventArgList@@@Z + 0x80]
  0x00562709  [?Activate@GameEventHook@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@PAVGameEventArgList@@AAJ@Z + 0x29]
  0x00563152  [?ActivateHook@GameEventManager@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@W4GAME_EVENT@@PAVGameEventArgList@@AAJ@Z + 0x22]
  0x005613ce  [?Process@GameEvent@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@AAH@Z + 0x3e]
  0x00562eb7  [?Process@GameEventManager@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@XZ + 0x87]
  0x00562df7  [?ArglistAddEvent@GameEventManager@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@W4GAME_EVENT_INSERT@@W4GAME_EVENT@@PAVGameEventArgList@@@Z + 0x1c7]
  0x00562c0c  [?AddEvent@GameEventManager@@QAA?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@W4GAME_EVENT_INSERT@@W4GAME_EVENT@@ZZ + 0xcc]
  0x0040b724  [?InitializeGame@CivApp@@QAEJAAVCivArchive@@@Z + 0x4c4]
  0x0040d59d  [?Execute@StartGameAction@@UAAXPAVaui_Control@@KK@Z + 0xd]
  0x0040c4e0  [?ProcessUI@CivApp@@QAEJKAAK@Z + 0x1a0]
  0x0040c8e2  [?Process@CivApp@@QAEJXZ + 0x112]
  0x00407608  [?CivWinMain@@YGHPAUHINSTANCE__@@0PADH@Z + 0x3a8]
  0x004070c5  [WinMain@16 + 0x65]
  0x00795b8c  [WinMainCRTStartup + 0x134]
  0x77e7eb69  [__onexitbegin + 0x77386a91] 

I am not sure if I understood correctly how player[].government is supposed to be used. I used it this way:

void_f GetMaxCities() {
    int_t tmpPlayer;
    tmpPlayer = g.player;

    if(IsPlayerAlive(tmpPlayer)) {
        if(player[0].government == 0) {    // Anarchy
            MOD_MAXCITIES[tmpPlayer] = GovernmentDB(GOVERNMENT_ANARCHY).TooManyCitiesThreshold;
        }
.
.
. 

Actually this was an attempt to test both player[].government and database access (GovernmentDB(GOVERNMENT_XXX).TooManyCitiesThresho ld didn't work in patch 1.1) - but it seems pretty obvious to me, that in this case the evaluation of player[0].government == 0 causes the crash (?IsEqual@SlicFrame@@QAEJW4SS_TYPE@@TSlicStackValu e@@01@Z).
Is player[].government supposed to contain the db-index or the string of the government?

I am not sure about Terraform(): It is definitely not true that it doesn't work at all as stated here , but I am still suspicious that it doesn't work all the time as expected (possibly it is a problem of terraforming terraformed tiles similar to the fixed problem of improving terraformed tiles - but I will continue testing).

[The Big Mc]

Found a bug

When you get globe sat the new enemy cities that you can now see are not passed on to diplomacy. So I can’t threaten to destroy any of these new cities.

[BureauBert]

Just to finish this weekend with some good news from SLIC-testing. I now get correct access to the DB-constant below, which never worked (at least for me ) in the vanilla game:

GovernmentDB(GOVERNMENT_ENTRY).TooManyCitiesThreshold

This is a big step forward
I still have the impression that the game runs much smoother now (and I had no crashes - apart from my GrantAdvance() problem - under XP without selecting any compatibility mode until now, which was regularily the case with the vanilla game - but this certainly needs further observation, as there have already been arbitrarily differing experiences with ctp2/XP before).

[eRAZOR]

@kaan and the team: Thanks so much guys. CTP2 in the hands of the community is probably the best thing since the invention of sliced bread

One question:

My girlfriend and I are both CTP addicts since the release of the original game but our main gripe with CTP2 is that we were _never_ be able to complete a single LAN game. Resyncs and client crashes would occur with ever increasing frequency depending on how far we are in the game (or depending on the number of units?).

I am developer myself, yet I have been unable to find and hardware/os/ctp-patch combo that works stable.

Does anyboy know if network stability will be improved by the patch?

[Tamerlin]

This is not currently a priority, the current goal is to rise the CtP2 SourceCode to the level of the 1.1 patch. When the coders will have achieve this result the second step will be to correct the remaining bugs among which the network stability. I have no idea about the time the programmers will need but don't expect a result before several months if not a year... at the very best.

[GordonF]

I downloaded and played 2004(1).04.03.CTP2Playtest for 5 hours, and only found one flaw, which was a typo. Your work is fantastic! I installed a plain vanilla with the XP patch to make it work on Windows XP. I found it best to start a game before anything else, so I playtested to make sure it is running right, then I installed 2004(1).04.03.CTP2Playtest . The music worked great. I could access all the buttons across the top. The mouse worked flawlessly. The wonder movies played fine. I could go on and on... It works great. The only thing that I missed was the option to destroy the enemy city, absorb the population, or keep the enemy city (but that is in the best mods, and this is a vanilla game).

The typo is in the Great Library entry for Galileo's Telescope. It indicates that Galileo's Telescope "Gives: Increases Scienceratr of scientists in hose city by 5"

I will download the latest playtest and try it out. THIS IS GREAT! WAY TO GO! YOU HAVE DONE AND ARE DOING A SUPERB JOB. I wish that I could help more, but playtesting is about all that I can offer, and even that is on a limited basis. Gordon

[Keygen]

GordonF, simply playtesting is a great job and if you can do that it would be great

[eRAZOR]

Originally posted by Tamerlin
This is not currently a priority, the current goal is to rise the CtP2 SourceCode to the level of the 1.1 patch. When the coders will have achieve this result the second step will be to correct the remaining bugs among which the network stability. I have no idea about the time the programmers will need but don't expect a result before several months if not a year... at the very best.

Hmm so the Source Code by released by activision represents an older revision? That's a bit strange that they would do that.

[J Bytheway]

Originally posted by eRAZOR
Hmm so the Source Code by released by activision represents an older revision? That's a bit strange that they would do that.

Yeah, it's a long story, but we're not going to get anything better, so we'll just have to live with it.

[Flinx]

Originally posted by GordonF
The typo is in the Great Library entry for Galileo's Telescope. It indicates that Galileo's Telescope "Gives: Increases Scienceratr of scientists in hose city by 5"

I am fixing some typos in the GL so I will fix this too.

[odisseus]

Originally posted by J Bytheway


Yeah, it's a long story, but we're not going to get anything better, so we'll just have to live with it.

Long story?