TY, I'd assumed by it's look combined with my GPU fan working overtime, that it was 3D.  So even 2D with "a dynamically generated mesh" seems to be pushing the line.  But at least SM maintains content.  I think SM is cluttered.  But I enjoy the depth of the game.

 

Simple as in computational power?  I find the Civ3 unit graphics to be more than adequate.  The units look well enough, but whats more, is just how many more different looking units Civ3 can support than Civ4.  Civ4 simply can't handle much unit diversity.  Kaels Fall from Heaven mod suffered this severely.  Much work was done do downsize the mod to limit the MAF errors.  Check the earlier versions versus the final release.  Even so, with the streamlined version of FfH2, I still get MAF errors playing on large maps.  This from a system bought more than a year after Civ4 was released.  And I get them playing Standard size maps playing the FfH2 modmod known as Rise from Erebus, which is based on FfH2.  RfE is great fun.  Due in large part to its faction and unit diversity.  But Civ4 can't handle it.  Civ3 could.  I'd rather have the fun of wide divesity, than unit fidgets and trees swaying in the breeze.  

100 Turns to move from one end of a map to another?  Thats way out of line to even conservative extrapolations of the map size I (and others according to Kael) are looking for.  I just finished the second to last map from AOW:SM's evil faction.  THAT is a large map with two playable levels.  That size is about as big as I want.  It doesn't even take 20 turns for a unit to travel from one edge to another.  I defeat that entire level in 66 turns.. after opening three battlefronts.  Civ4 could not possibly handle a map of that size with that much unit diversity.  From the games I have played, it is clear to me that the fancier the graphics, the weaker the gameplay.  I don't play games to look at the scenery.  I can however occasionally appreciate the scenery of an engaging game.  But only after the gameplay rocks.  If the gameplay is weak, then there is no point to playing it long enough to enjoy the scenery.  

 

 

 Speaking from once playing on a system with an integrated graphics card... playing on the cloth map is no answer.  I did, for a prolonged period of time.  The tactical battles crash.  You can't get far in the game allowing the AI to do your battling.  And no chance for the quest victory and more.  I don't see why this is.  I value the unique graphic style in E:WOM (though it was a tad on the spartan unpleasant side), but 3D gives me grief in general.  More so now that I'm back on a system that should be able to handle it.  Whats the point in fidget animations and other flashy spam when it limits the depth of gameplay?  I'd rather have deep play versus eye candy.  Eye candy which I would never zone out long enough to pay attention to unless the game was interesting enough to stick around long enough to enjoy it.  That junk gets in the way of the purpose to play.  Once the purpose to play is established, then I can enjoy the candy.

 

 

Simple as in level of complexity. That roughly translates towards the computational power, but I'm talking more about memory space since that's the real problem. Modern GPUs have insane raw performance, but it doesn't matter if you still hit that 2GB limit. Of course, console games work under much more drastic limits due to low physical memory and lack of swap space.

Part of that is that there's only so much money to spend on making the game. More on graphics means less on something else, and vice-versa. It's not all memory related, though some of it is. I'm pretty sure I've already demonstrated how you can have unit diversity without using much memory (so long as they look the same), so the idea that shinier graphics damages gameplay doesn't have to be true (though it certainly happens that way sometimes).
 
At the same time, graphics are pretty much a requirement. Ugly games don't sell outside of a certain niche.

Brad said, and I tend to agree, that 4x TBS games are a niche.  I've read this elsewhere as well (and from industry participants).  But then why are games like E:WOM, and Civ4+5 willing to give up gameplay depth over graphic pretties?  This niche is all about gameplay depth.  The point of play is to manage things... armies and empires.  Diluting the purpose of the game in order to make it look pretty makes little sense to me.  I'm one who doesn't mind the pretties so long as the meat of the game is well served.  The candy comes last.  It's just the icing on a cake that should otherwise be tasty enough on its own merit.  But recently it seems that the graphics are used to sell games. As in not sold on merit but on look.  The look fades fast.  Merit persists.  With E:WOM's hype, it really sounded like Brad and company was focusing on the niche.  This niche is founded in gameplay dynamics.  Something like 3D graphics should be icing after the fact.  Make an engaing game, THEN make it as pretty as resources allow.

Graphics are hardly the root of the problem with WoM. The patches and how they haven't really solved the gameplay problems should demonstrate that. There's systems that just aren't well designed and don't interact in a fun way with the other systems. Other ones have a large lack of content. Being ugly or pretty has nothing to do with that.

I think it's also worth noting that Civ 4 is strategically a much better game then Civ 3 is, on top of being nicer looking. The #1 component in this isn't the graphics, it's in the game design.

Civ3 could have been designed like Civ4.  Save for the graphics priority.  Civ3 could have had all the nice gameplay additions that Civ4 brought.  The only game design feature to note here, is the focus on graphics that Civ4 brought.  Then Civ5 came along and they spent millions on the voice acting and animations of leaderheads.  I mean come on!  A sandbox game meant for replayabilty!?!  That crap is only cool a couple times around.  Then it becomes spam to click past.    

 

I agree that E:WOM has issues beyond any memory issues the graphics may have introduced.  But in a conversation opening with the assertion that E:FE should be 64 bit versus 32... well I think it was worthwhile to point out that it's not graphics that make a 4x TBS game.  So long as the interface is clear, and the pieces are easily and interestingly identified on a pleasing to look at map... well then your covered graphics wise.  Do people who are looking to play an in depth game really care about a swordsman scratching his ass when he's idle?  Or that the trees sway in the breeze if you zone out long enough to watch them?  Bah.  Rather than sit around and watch the grass grow, I'd rather be playing footie.  

The mesh is used for terrain to make hills. That is 3D, but because the art is 2D it is easier to maintain content. Assuming that the animation is not too complicated it is easier to create a large quantity of 2D art than 3D. Therefore it is also a budget and time issue in addition to a hardware issue.

 

I bought Civ 5 because I love Civ 4 and love Civ 3, but when it came down to it my PC couldn't handle Civ 5 and I began to think. What the heck happened between 3, which plays smooth and has amazing gameplay and 5 which looks pretty and has this gratuitous opening movie but lacks the real meat of the game. (Not to mention the horror that is Steam, I would rather kill myself then have to deal with Steam again.)

 

Elemental is and will be a niche series, why waste time and money on things that people don't really want. I mean nice graphics are fine, but I personally can't play them and where is the meat of the game under all of that eye candy? As another user posted: As long as the map is nice looking, I can tell one thing from another, and the interface is moderately player friendly what more do you need in a 4X TBS?

 

Another example, I don't know if anyone of you have played the 4X Space Sim X3 but it was a great game. Huge 3d universe filled with thousands and thousands of things to do, and I can run it with a steady frame rate. Why can I play this with 40+ FPS but I can't play the graphical map of a TURN BASED STRATEGY game?

The problem is if your game has graphics from the last decade, reviews will be negative, and you won't get new players.  A game can only be interesting if you play it.

 

 

 

I'm more concerned about FE using the same game engine as WOM, just look at all the stuff they had to remove and the time it took just to make WOM stable.

 

As the owner of 1 64-bit system, I can honestly say this is one of the stupidest requests I've read on here so far.

Focus on the game mechanics. The games reviews were not negative because of graphics. Performance improvements are coming already, and will continue to come in time.

 

It will be a lot easier to do performance improvements if you no longer have to worry about 32bit RAM limitations.  That was the #1 cause of crashes in WOM.

 

It won't stop the problem, but it will make the problem come much later.

I would like to see FE be optimized like other games are then. THEN we can talk about using maybe 4gb or even more for the next game. But first they have to prove that they can effectively use whatever memory they have available. There shouldn't be any OOM crashes, period. Every other game out there can do it, so can they. There should be no need to delay anything. Use 64-bit if you can truly utilize the power to the benefit of the player, don't use it as a stopgap to fix shitty code.

Giant maps would be one of those things that I would like to see. A 4gb memory program that does nothing new or innovative, I really don't care for that.

Graphics are important to a lot of us though it should always take a back seat to game play. But that does not mean that you can either have one or the other, it is possable to have both.  Some of us also perfer the 3D over the 2D as in AOW:SM IMO is the best game both in graphics and game play of the AOW series (and does not look cluttered to me but this is just a personal opinion.)

You're right there shouldn't be crashes, but the crashes are caused by RAM limitations.

Get rid of the RAM limitations, crashes become much rarer.

 

That said, I don't think people would use this to build giant epic maps like people think- I think most people are limited as to the size of world they wish to handle.

 

Also, with Windows 8 coming out, it's getting more and more difficult to code a game for XP machines and modern windows.  That's going to play a factor also (Stardock mentioned this with Object Desktop stuff)

 

I don't mind if they don't make a 64 bit client considering I'd honestly rather they spent their resources elsewhere, but it'd be nice if it at least used the LargeAddressAware compiler flag so 64 bit OSes could use more mem for the app.

Whatever happens, I'm getting it free so I'm not complaining.  But hopefully after Fallen Enchantress they'll be looking into futher improvements to everything.

Repetitive data structures are what hashes and maps are for ... Unless Stardock did a brute force approach I'd be surprised if more then meg or two is used. Plus 8-12 byres per unit (A hash/map reference, a HP counter, and a units X/Y position stored as a 16-bit integers.) Maybe a byte or three more storing a birtwise flag or hash for spell affect(s).

Tiles could be summed up as a constant reference to a hash or map entry. IRC, In C that would be a extra pointer to deference, in C++ that would be machine code to literally be the object in question. Making each map tile no more then a single 4 or 8 byte structure. With the map consisting of a few dozen or so unique tile types and/or city improvements.

Storing each unit's equipment list on each unit would just be silly. (Especially if you used an array. Simply allocate the array once, and as an array is really just a fancy pointer, each unit types just stores that array's address.) Unless their using a data dated C/C++ standard (AKA visual studio's, oh how I loath Microsoft's "We can not only do it better then you, but force it down your throat approach." approach. I especially loath C#.)  A good chunk of the C++ and resonantly finalized C++0x standard are devoted to efficient memory management.

Even then, the actual management of memory is the OS's providence and what a "swap file/partition" is for. It may slow things down if a program thrashes, but I don't image the actual memory limit is in fact THE limit.

If you've every done any low-level memory management systems, physical memory is a limit, but it's nothing more then a soft tissue paper barrier. Your actual limits are your imagination and how much processing power your willing to divert to keeping things small.

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Which is just coder speak for, What's it matter to you? Unless Stardock sees fit to hirer my meager self or the "?humble?" reader on the spot and say "Here is the source code, improve it", the thread is just a fun romp.