Sycraft

I don't recommend using XP-64. We have it at work, as we are a VLSC site, and we do make use of it for some things like HFSS that need tons of RAM. However, driver support is not good. Workstations usually have drivers, though new ones aren't so much, but desktops often don't. If you want 64-bit, I highly recommend Windows 7 64-bit. We have that too (it is out for volume customers) and it is great. Driver support is extremely good at this point, and compatiblity is high. Other

I have to agree that great computer AI is key. Multiplayer is fun and all, but I don't really care for it in turn based strategy. I like the big epic games that take weeks to play and that is hard to arrange with other people. A good AI is really important to me. Another reason a good AI is important is I want it to be challenging without cheating. I've never liked games where the AI has to cheat badly (higher production, better trade with other AIs, etc) to be hard. I want one that c

I should note that a card with Shader Model 3 can be had for as little as $25. For less than half the cost of a game, you can get a SM3 card. For that matter, for $100 you can get a Radeon 4850, which has SM4 and is fast as hell. Quality graphics are not expensive these days, and thus gamers really don't have room to complain and not get them. As for market share, according to Steam, who has some of the best numbers on things (since they take data form actual systems and they are syst

Rather than having movement as it is currently, where a right click results in instant movement, consider changing it so that a right click draws out the path of movement your character will take, and then a second right click on the same square confirms and commits the movement. I would have it work something like this: Here the cross shows the target destination. The blue l

I really hope that is how you'll keep them for the release, or if you can't make it an optional download pack. For me, music is more than half the experience. I've got a nice sound system attached to my computer, and I really dislike when games take the time to have a good soundtrack made, but then store it in low quality 96k compressed files or the like. A high quality soundtrack is an awesome thing, IMO.

So while it is very far from being complete, I've got a wiki up that is going to sort of be like a manual. Obviously with a beta changing all the time there'll not be a definitive manual, but I (and hopefully others) will be adding info to it as we go. http://elementalbeta.wikidot.com/

Well all I'm committing to doing is setting up a site [e digicons]:grin:[/e] . We'll see how much use it gets, and how much help I get. If it is all left up to me, it is likley to be somewhat basic. If we get community contributions, it will probably be fairly good. At any rate, I'll give it a spin since in a couple other betas I've done, such a thing ended up being really helpful.

So I see a lot of posts with people asking how to make various things in the game work, Reasonable enough. So my though is, let's have a little wiki that is a repository of community knowledge. Obviously the actual Stardock writers are busy working on the game and there's no reason to write a manual for something that'll change radically. However we tester types can maintain a wiki. So, I've set one up. It is intended to be a living document that we update, as the beta changes so that when we

That, or somethng else like it. Skirmish carries the connotation of a fast, impromptu game, which of course is not what that option is for in Elemental since you could well create a massive game lasting months. Custom Game, or something like that, offers a more accurate explination of what the button does as opposed to the Campaign mode.

I somewhat doubt they'll be depressed by bug reports. That is the point of a beta. You know your software isn't ready to go so you have it tested.

When the game creates a river, it continues rendering it, even on ocean tiles as in the following picture:

Two cities constructed imrpovements to their respective water shards at the same time. After this, the game would no longer respond. Music continued playing, and the mouse would move properly, however the notification windows could not be closed, and the game woudln't respond to any commands, including alt-f4. Debug follows: Normal 0 <w:PunctuationK

As the title implies, the title screen is stretched when you run the game in a widescreen mode. Either a widescreen title should be generated, or the existing screen should be zoomed in on in the verticle dimension to keep the aspect ratio correct.

While I realize that a major point for the cloth map is lower end systems, it is still a useful tactical view on higher end systems. As it might be nice to add some additonal effects that can be turned on, if the video card supports it. I would suggest a detail texture and shader to give it an apperance more like real cloth, especally when zoomed in close.

I run ESET Smart Security on my system and upon first run, Elemental tries to communicate with the Internet. It appears to be unable to continue loading until it establishes a connection. This requires switching out to the dialog box ESET pops up. After that, the game crashes. Once a rule has been added, the game runs properly.

Just wondering, has Stardock decided on this yet? Reason I ask is if you have decided to do the longer beta, might be a good idea to update the release date on Impulse. While people are going to be chomping at the bit for this game no matter what (after all, it has been too long since there was a good fantasy 4X) I know that it angers people when they feel like the release schedule "slides." As such, if you've decided on a longer beta, make the new release date known sooner rather than later.

I would add, in response to your original post, that I don't see why people are bothered that there's more than one distribution network. The thing is it is next to no effort to use both. Neither one costs anything to use, neither one takes up any real amount of resources either running or on disk, and neither interferes with the other. I've had both Steam and Impulse running at the same time and they didn't care at all. So it isn't as though it is some massive inconvenience. I could