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Post by Keith Heitmann on Sept 21, 2002 2:56:49 GMT -5
I've been playing the release version the past few days. I've just been working my way through the various campaign games and doing a bit of online MP.
There have been a number of issues with the game's release that have made for a rocky start.
1. Seems that the copy protection software added to the disk wasn't of high enough quality that some older DVD drives can read it. Mine had no trouble by the way. The DVD would spin up for 15 seconds and stop. Exchanging the CD at the store seems to help in most cases.
2. There is a problem with the installshield program. It wants to install Pharaoh Gold if the player has it installed. Turns out the installshield was borrowed from that game but not all the information was updated before they added it to the install program of Emperor. So when a player has PG installed and wants to install Emperor, the installshield sees them as the same program and only offers to uninstall PG. If PG is uninstalled Emperor will install with no problems. Their working on a fix.
3. Most copies being released in europe were sent out with the wrong CD keys which is required to install the game. Since it has MP play a CD key is required and it's the first time a citybuilder has come with one. The CDs in question are being recalled.
4. As hard as the beta testers worked and tried to kill all the bugs some seemed to have slipped through. I personally filed over 100 bug reports and I know the total bug report count was somewhere over 1200 when the first phase of the beta test was brought an end. These are being looked into for a possible patch.
For the most part the game plays fine and looks great. Some folkes found their nVida detonator 4.0 beta drivers didn't work well with the game and had to revert to the last release version of 32.82 (?). Me I run a lowly ATI Xpert98 with Rage Pro Drivers and have no problems.
These will all be ironed out eventually. The game is still a worthy addition to the Impressions/Sierra citybuilder series.
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Post by Redbirdy on Sept 21, 2002 9:19:28 GMT -5
My copy was delivered Tuesday but I didn't get it installed until yesterday. (Darn EQ, hehe.)
My DvD drive wouldn't read the disk and acted just like you stated...only it's not an old drive it's less than 6 months old. The CD worked fine in my R/W drive though so I guess I won't fret too much about it.
I played it most of yesterday afternoon and like what I've seen so far, even though I'm still in the tutorial campaign.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Sept 21, 2002 14:54:13 GMT -5
My copy was delivered Tuesday but I didn't get it installed until yesterday. (Darn EQ, hehe.) My DvD drive wouldn't read the disk and acted just like you stated...only it's not an old drive it's less than 6 months old. The CD worked fine in my R/W drive though so I guess I won't fret too much about it. I played it most of yesterday afternoon and like what I've seen so far, even though I'm still in the tutorial campaign. Just out of curiosity, Jim, what is the brand and model number of your DVD drive? |
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Post by Redbirdy on Sept 22, 2002 9:08:41 GMT -5
It's a Samsung DvD drive, SD-616F.
One other weird little thing about the game: I had a hero in the city and after fighting a battle the Religion summary said No Hero was there even though I could see him wandering around. Clicking on the hero and then trying to place his flag in new spots dropped a Bronze Smelter at those positions instead. Very strange. No other problems encountered yet.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Sept 23, 2002 1:50:34 GMT -5
If you have a save of that problem that you can reproduce it with send it to me. I'll send it to the developers.
There is a chance that the save game might have some corruption. I haven't seen that particular thing reported before now.
Either that or you may have a bad install. The game requires a lot of HD space to run too.
I'm not sure about the brand but I think I've seen reports of other problems with Samsung DVDs. I'll have to check.
Mine's a Toshiba 1206. So far I haven't seen any of the crazy things people have been reporting when I play the game.
Let me know how you do in the game. I'm playing through the campaigns myself as I mainly spent two months just testing the Song Jin dynasty and a couple of playthroughs of the Xia dynasty. I'm up to the 3rd city in the Zhou dynasty campaign right now, that's the 3rd campaign.
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Post by Redbirdy on Sept 24, 2002 8:44:45 GMT -5
Nope, no save unfortunately. I may be able to recreate the problem using the last save of the campaign but I'm not sure. I'll give it a try.
Plenty of HD space left... 40GB or so.
About that Bronze Smelter, I meant the worker and not the building. When I clicked on him it said "Bronze Smelter" ... I don't know if they gave the same name to the workers as they did the building? I'll check on that too I guess. Anyway, the worker would pop up at the cursor and start walking toward the Smelters. I'm not sure whether it was an extra worker put there or whether the game picked up one that was already in play and placed him there.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Sept 24, 2002 15:41:49 GMT -5
Nope, no save unfortunately. I may be able to recreate the problem using the last save of the campaign but I'm not sure. I'll give it a try. Plenty of HD space left... 40GB or so. About that Bronze Smelter, I meant the worker and not the building. When I clicked on him it said "Bronze Smelter" ... I don't know if they gave the same name to the workers as they did the building? I'll check on that too I guess. Anyway, the worker would pop up at the cursor and start walking toward the Smelters. I'm not sure whether it was an extra worker put there or whether the game picked up one that was already in play and placed him there. Safe to say that the name thing was all part of the same smelter problem you mentioned. Definitely something screwy there. I have not seen a similar report so far so it must have been some sort of glitch. All the walkers should have their own names. Finished Zhou 3 last night and will do Zhou 4 "On the Edge of Ordos" (or something similar) tonight. Don't worry about reproducing it unless you feel like it. If it happens again keep a save of the game before the problem occurs; one from which the problem can be reproduced reliably. |
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Post by Redbirdy on Sept 25, 2002 8:56:09 GMT -5
The walkers do have their own names, but have the job title of "Bronze Smelter." You'd think they would stick to the title of "Miner." Ah well...I guess that since you don't actually have mines that would be pointless, hehe.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Sept 26, 2002 5:25:43 GMT -5
If you didn't notice one feature that was added this time was that all wakers should have a "home building" button. When clicked it jumps the map to the building that that particular walker is from. Makes it a lot easier to spot problems.
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Post by Redbirdy on Sept 26, 2002 8:45:53 GMT -5
I had noticed that "Home Building" button but haven't tried it yet. That will make things nice. I love the Gates options in the residential walls...finally a "smart" roadblock! I use Gates in certain spots even when I don't plan on putting up a wall.
I'm a bit rusty but this is close enough to Zeus etc. that it's all coming back to me.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Sept 26, 2002 19:03:28 GMT -5
Yes, I use free standing residential gates as programmable roadblocks too. They come in handy. I particularly use them around my market squares, which I build outside my residential walled areas. Usually there is a road running along and parallel to the residential wall between my market square and housing so at the "front" end of the market square where the road passes along the wall I place gates there and one at the "back" end of the market square. This gives my market pushcart only one direction he can truly go and that is into my housing area. This prevents him from wasting travel distance in areas he doesn't belong and makes him more efficient in delivering goods to more houses as result.
It also keeps the new years celebration parade heading into the right area too.
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Post by Redbirdy on Oct 23, 2002 8:52:06 GMT -5
Well I've put the Campaigns on hold, as I've found the political aspects just too difficult to deal with. Since the military model in all these games has never really worked well for me I've always been bribing the enemy armies... trading works out VERY well so I've never lacked for money to do this. Now the bribe-price has sky-rocketed (over 10,000) the last time I played and though I had the money for the bribe it really left me strapped.
Then there's the Conquer a City part. I finally did manage to take over another one and of course they were Bitter about the whole thing. I immediately sent them gifts as I'd done in Zeus, to get them feeling better towards me. Didn't work, and they Revolted soon after being conquered. Seems to be a domino-effect as the other cities began thinking along those same lines.
I guess I'll stick to Open Play for a while, as I'd rather focus on city-building than intransigent neighbors (it IS billed as a city BUILDING game, after all). Maybe I'll just put Zeus back on the ol' hard-disk, it's been a while since I've last visited Greece.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Oct 23, 2002 17:43:18 GMT -5
Well, I usually fight. There is a bit of a trick to the military. You must have at least a administration city to build one fort.
After that you can build forts in the following way:
City Palace = 1 more fort
Lavish Siheyuan = 1 per each such housing
Impressive Compound or higher = 2 per each such housing
You can have a maximum of 12 forts in your city.
As soon as you evolve a Lavish Siheyuan build a fort, even if you don't have any weapons for it yet. If the house de-volves the fort will remain. As soon as you develop that Lavish Siheyuan into a Impressive Compund or higher build a second fort.
This way you will have the forts when you decide to start filling them with troops.
You should always leave at least one manned fort behind when sending troops out to aid another city or to conquer a city. This keeps other cities from taking advantage of a defenseless city with a "opportunity invasion".
Some city rebellions are scripted events. You can send them lavish gifts (preferably those of the type they buy) or you can send army to re-conquer them.
If you have a weak army the chances of a vassal rebelling are increased. Your city should always have more armed troops than your vassal. You can tell the strength of the other cities by the number of shields next to their names on the global map.
Make use of spies to soften up the intended victim first. Send of a couple to sabotage the military, industry, housing, food, or random attacks. Let them work for a month or two and then launch an attack.
I generally set my invasion force's aggressiveness to the Tiger, moderate, and usually don't invade at invasion point 1.
If you choose military as the primary target of the invasion, you will win if your forces are greater than 2:1 than the defenders.
Some cities have walls. Those cities need to be attacked with catapults as well as troops.
Send along a fighting hero like Huang Di, Guang Di, or Sun Tzu if you have access to one of those heroes. Once summoned to your city, they can be selected as part of your invasion force from the military assignment menu.
Once you conquer a city its mood will be "Bitter". So immediately send some large gifts of goods they buy, if they buy wheat, fish, silk, and ceramics, I'll usually send them 8 wheat, 8 fish, 4 silk, and 4-8 ceramics, one right after the other in one fell swoop. This has a tendency to restor their mood to a more favorable condition.
In your case they either rebelled because it was scripted or your city was defenseless because you sent all your troops and didn't leave anyone behind.
Periodic gifts of goods to cities keeps their opinion of you under control. Even cities you don't control or trade will will react. Some may even open a trade route without asking when you do.
If you request items from a vassal or trading city their mood will slowly drop so you will have to send gifts in return to raise it back up.
If you need animals, once you have one in your city palace menagerie, you should send one to another city in a different climate. Then wait. They will usually send one back in return. Then you can send that one to other cities and get more back in return. A maximum of 9 animals is possible.
Be careful, keep your city goverment fully or adequately manned. If you let the government employment drop too low the animals will escape from the city palace and you'll have to start all over again, or have a hero re-capture the ones it can if the guards or wall/tower guards don't kill them first.
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Post by Redbirdy on Oct 25, 2002 8:53:07 GMT -5
Thanks Keith, I'll have to try some of those strategies. Emperor seems much more "touchy" in regards to other city's feeling for you, and I never could build enough forts to adequately defend the city AND send out a force. I should look over the PDF manual more carefully but it really irks me that they couldn't put it all in the regular manual. I'm just being stubborn I guess  |
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Oct 25, 2002 9:24:10 GMT -5
Full paper manuals are a thing of the past I'm afraid. Even full sized boxes are now "out." It's all cost cutting and "save a tree" stuff.
If you printout the PDF file it like a 152 pages so have lots of paper and a spare ink cartridge handy. ;D
There is a free official custom adventure available to download, but if you download it from the website its like 55MB in size. Unfortunately 98% of that is the graphics and advertising they put in the installer program. Go figure. Check your Email. I'll send it via attachment. The files themselves are only 520KB!
I sent it to your earthlink address.
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