After the code patch - Initial Reactions

[Ozymandous]

Originally posted by ChristopherC
Was it too much to ask for the code patch to allow games on which you are presently engaged to be played? I am in the middle of a very long and taxing though enjoyable one and would hate to give up on it.

As mentioned it's not that rare for a code patch to make save games incompatible. I have a game or two that I sarted hoping I could finish with the patch as well, but oh well, I'd still rather have the patch.

One question... How are you having a "long and taxing" game when the AI in the pre-patch game was virtually non-existant??

It seems to me I should wait for the revised code patch, which is compatible with the data patched game (one hopes!), before modifying the game.

Live long and prosper.

From the comments I have seen the "beta" state of the patch has more to do with the way the installer works and not the effect it has on saves from the pre-patch version.

[Baselope]

PD bug

I seem to still get the infamous PD bug occasionally, or at least the AI does.

Anyone else?

[krait23]

Ok, well the main things I would have liked to see changed: (in order of importance)

- More convenient ship design (a'la MoO2)
- More influence and feedback in combat (including better graphics)
- Ship refit
- Thorough rightclick info on items and stats (a'la MoO2)
- Less fighting against planetary governors AI
- Leaders that actually matter and stay for a long time
- less erratic diplomacy
- Stats on stuff you research (as in hard numbers)

I am sure theres tons more but I havent played for so long that these are the only things that come to mind immediately. I think some of these things were adressed in mods. But the most important havent, and as far as I can tell they haven't been addressed by the code patch either...

So yes, basically I would like to see a MoO 2,5... But I could even live with MoO3 if only they would fix that which was good in MoO2 but is bad in MoO3 (Ship design, combat to a degree, I agree turn based fleet combat aint gonna work perfectly but the current system is even worse., Leaders, rightclicks, ship refits)....
But apparently they dont...

No wonder today you can earn $ 2.01 if you take a copy of MoO3 off Amazon.com hehehe

Lata
Krait

[CharlesBHoff]

Originally posted by beandip242
Finally got the patch downloaded, and loaded.

I was expecting more from the patch really. Playability is better. I ahve not found the AI to be anymore aggressive though, but it is still early in my game. But I usually have at least 1 AI civ at war with me by now though........
Still having DX errors!!!!! Had 2 in this game already! On the second one the game just quit! thought this was to be fixed???????????????????????
and the other bug is when I click on a link from the sitrep for a specific col, then go back to the sit rep and click on a link for a newly explored star system and I go right back to the specific col page, not the new star system. Have to get out of the sitrep and use the Gal map to view the new star system. Not a big deal, but it is new since the patch.
It just seems that the developers dropped the ball with the initial release, and are now having to play catch up big time, and are still fumbling along the way. Lets just hope the game gets enough of a boost out of this patch, so another(better) patch will be possible!!!

I believe the DX errors isnot MOO3 fault but the fault of MS Direct X programs. I have afew game that went back to desktop on me for no reason in the past or have the computer reboot itself after craching when change graphic
display on me. I have one DX error so afar restart game from autosave with no ploblen and play 20 or 30 more turns with no DX error. Now the games like MOO3 are laying the blame where it belong on MS(MicroSoft).

[ACEofHeart]

With the earlier mods I got around most of what the Code patch offered. But the one area that has remained constantly bad thru MODS and Patches is Diplomacy.
Even QSI seems stiffled in how to fix it.
First you get NO real feedback on what they are even saying or complaining about. They almost always speak in riddles "as they angrily tell you they appreciate you
And despite visual differences they all seem to have the exact same personality!!
In MOO's predecessors , they introduced themseles, had some type of personality (shy, aggressive,etc) and you darn well knew what they wanted or were mad about (even if you were framed)
Until this is fixed,, it's just not going to hold any lasting interest for me.

[Proteus_MST]

Originally posted by krait23
Ok, well the main things I would have liked to see changed: (in order of importance)

1- More convenient ship design (a'la MoO2)
2- More influence and feedback in combat (including better graphics)
3- Ship refit
4- Thorough rightclick info on items and stats (a'la MoO2)
5- Less fighting against planetary governors AI
6- Leaders that actually matter and stay for a long time
7- less erratic diplomacy
8- Stats on stuff you research (as in hard numbers)

Let me see:
1 - 3 haven´t changed a lot from pre patch, so you will be disappointed there.
as for 4. there have been some changes. If there is for aexample another race which proposes a tech deal, you can right-click onto the technologies and see the complete description of the tech as well as which technology Level it is. There are other parts of the game where the right-click is also implemented.

5 has somehow become more extreme. The planetary governor now has the habit of building a lot of System Colonyships. Was probably implemented to let the AI-Players colonize more than just one Planet per System, but for the human player it means that you´ve got to be constant on watch or you end up having lots of System Colonyships in one System, but no System Defenceships.

6 depends on the other races you encounter. I had (after Patch) one game where I encountered the Evon. The result was, that my Leaders survived only a few turns.
But in my current game where I am in the Senate and have contact to a couple of other races (but the evons aren´t in the game) my Leaders survive. I have Problems with spies regularly blowing Seats of Government up, but my leaders remain untouched.
Looks like they maybe have tuned down the amount, most other races use spies against you (unless your enemies are evon )

7 is a little bit better now after patch. The other races don´t start Wars as frequently as they did before the patch. They also don´t change their attitude towards you as abruptly.

8 is now better than before. There are lots of new stats in the game. You can see what the technology does in numbers and inn case of Planetary Buildings even, what the likelyhood is, that they get destroyed if the planet is bombarded.
If you look at the planetary infrastructure you get the Population of every region (current/max) their Unrest Level, the Modifier for Mining and Harvesting the region gives you and even the Habitability Ring for the Race currently inhabiting the region of the Planet.
There is also a Diagram in the Victory Screen which you can access during the game, where you can see, how well your races developes against the other races (of course only the races you have contact with) in terms of Number of Planets, Population, Technology and Score.

Maybe those infos help

[Kahn]

Originally posted by statusperfect
where to put the files?
cheers

Directions are posted here!

[Kahn]

Originally posted by CharlesBHoff


I believe the DX errors isnot MOO3 fault but the fault of MS Direct X programs. I have afew game that went back to desktop on me for no reason in the past or have the computer reboot itself after craching when change graphic
display on me. I have one DX error so afar restart game from autosave with no ploblen and play 20 or 30 more turns with no DX error. Now the games like MOO3 are laying the blame where it belong on MS(MicroSoft).

Sorry Charlie, I hate MS just as much as the next guy, but it is painfully obvious when a company (QS) can manage to break the Bink API that it is not a DirectX problem!

[CharlesBHoff]

Originally posted by Kahn


Sorry Charlie, I hate MS just as much as the next guy, but it is painfully obvious when a company (QS) can manage to break the Bink API that it is not a DirectX problem!

I have games from bioware, interplay and afew order that crach on me when graphic was changeing for some reason unknow. In the last two year I have about 40 to 60 just crach alone. The thing I donot like is that you cannot unintrall Direct X and install than older or new version of Direct X.

[Kahn]

Just experience...

Originally posted by CharlesBHoff
I have games from Bioware, Interplay and a few order that crash on me when graphic was changing for some reason unknown. In the last two year I have about 40 to 60 just crash alone.

Unfortunately the gaming marketplace has bred some pretty shoddy releases from some of the more unscrupulous publishing houses out there. Bioware I have not had any experience with, but Interplay has been known for some time to release buggy merchandise, long enough for many gamers to shy away from them (though IMHO I do not feel they are the worst by a long shot.) You don’t have to use DirectX to have a bad piece of software, just look at Simon & Schuster Interactive, haven’t seen even one release that would run without crashing out-of-the-box! No DX at all, just plain bad programming. Many games you have may be crashing because of bad implementation of DirectX, not DX itself. For the ones that crash on startup, if you change your display resolution to match the resolution of the game screen, you should find that most will run OK. This is a result of the programmer not checking the screen metrics (GetSystemMetrics) and changing the resolution before attempting to draw the DX screen. This is a commonly encountered problem and is not the fault of DX, just lazy programming.

I would suggest that if you want to see some examples of good programming in DX, look at releases from Blizzard, CaveDog (at least TA was good), and most of EA’s releases (though they have had a few dogs). In terms of programming complexity Total Annihilation, Starcraft, Rainbow Six & Civilization III all run rings around the simplistic MoO3. Heck, even this web page is more complex that any of the GUI’s in MoO3, and it don’t crash.

Originally posted by CharlesBHoff
The thing I don’t like is that you cannot uninstall Direct X and install than older or new version of Direct X.

Actually, you can! Though these are third party tools, I have used them with no ill effects (though I always followed up by reinstalling the version of DX I wanted on my machine).
Here is an example of one of the better ones.
Here are some others...

[CharlesBHoff]

Most of these crach happen while in the middle of the game,
the worst one was Dungeon Seige.

Do anybody have any idear where I can download Vbe 2.0 which I need to play Battlespire it some type of video program I grather.

[KWAiRT]

- AI building too many System Colony ships and Transports.

I am still constantly babysitting and micromanaging the AI.

-AI is using Espionage WAY too much on human players.

Oppression is driving me insane. My people are revolting and the costs are high to keep them in check. I have so many spies I've lost count. All of which are doing internal security. I'm not losing to espionage but the constant baby sitting of oppression and money put towards unrest is getting tedious. I lost 4 leaders to assasination and that is with a tonne of internal security and such oppression my people are revolting.. Mind you I have killed litterly hundreds of spies at this point... go figure...

-Tech Speed too fast.

Grey's mod really does improve the game when the tech is slowed down. You get to actually use some of the tech you have spent all that money on researching =) Do altered spreadsheets work in multiplayer? Does the host require the update or will both clients function independently allowing one player to speed up his tech?!?!

-Alt Tab problems still.

I am still having problems when alt tabbing except instead of a surface error my mouse cursor looks funky and when clicking on things the target is way off to the left even tho the mouse cursor is in the right place. In effect it still doesn't work. Nothing I do will fix this. Latest Nvidia drivers and Direct X etc etc...

-Tech Sliders won't lock.

At first it seemed if I left one unlocked they would remain the same but they just change when they feel like it... Why have a lock if this is the case?


I am just getting my military up and running now so combat will be much more common. PD BETTER be working along with planetary bombardment of military targets or I'm going to break something...

[Stormhound]

Re: tech sliders, I recall hearing someone mention somewhere that if you only lock 5 of the 6 sliders, they'll all stay put. Counter-intuitive, but perhaps that's poetic.

[KWAiRT]

Yeah that was me that said that about the sliders as it did appear to work but after playing a while you soon realize that you can't really lock them...

[Vince278]

How well is that "Advance game x number of turns" feature working?