Civilization 3

Civ 3 should be no problems on the One, however after intalling the "Complete edition" from an image and replacing the executable by a cracked one (may be illegal in some countries, but not here in Sweden) nothing happens when i run the executable. The process just terminates immediately without displaying any error messages, same thing happens whether i run conquests or the original civ. I have tried installing from the same image and replacing with the same executables on other computers and it has worked fine. I have also tried intalling the latest patch for civ but it doesnt help.

I have the 150 with the original XP Home install on it. Any ideas?

 

Have the same machine and I am facing the same problem.
I've tried everything- I have also a thread in this forum about Civ3. Nothing works! No-cd, cracks, updates, I've tried every possible compination!
So it would be cool if anyone knows how to make it run, although I am really losing faith here...
Funny think? Civ4 runs great!!! Go figure!

 

Anyone got any updates on Civ 3 running? I would so lurve to have this on my AAO.

 

You should try to edit the config file, and put it to run in windowed mode. It helped me with Civ 4

 

I also had no success. I looked to see if Civ3 had a windowed mode but I think it will only run in XGA format.

However I couldn't even get it to run when I set the screen to 1024x768 (i.e. XGA). With an SSD I can't be bothered to waste the space on trying to run Civ4 so until I can get Civ3 to go I will play Alpha Centauri to get my fix of strategy games. Although I had not been playing SMAC for several years it runs fine on the ONE and in laptop mode only needs about 50MB of space whilst having (IMHO) as much (if not more) playability than Civ3 or Civ4.

 

Finally got Civ 3 working!

The program tries to run at 1024x768 at 70Hz which the AA1 doesn't support. To get round this it is necessary to add the line Refresh=60 to the Civilization.ini file which forces Civ3 to run with 60Hz refresh. This is created the first time the program is run so is probably not present as it will have crashed on start up but it is straightforward to add this file to the game directory. Secondly, I used Astray (which is a utility to downscale the display for the EEE but works for the AA1: http://wiki.eeeuser.com/astrayplus) to map XGA onto the AA1 screen (with 16 bit colour depth). (For some reason simply changing the display resolution to XGA in display properties doesn't work).

So far have only payed a few turns so can't be sure that everything is OK but it seems fine and to my mind preferable to Civ4 which was very slow, even with the graphics set to their minimum levels. Also, I haven't yet tried the Conquests.
Also, I would like to see if there are settings that would allow 1280x768 to be downscaled onto the AA1 display as this shoulld map better as the aspect ratio is much closer to 1024x600.

 

CivII is better.

 

Thanks for the info Achilles

I've been playing a lot of Civ Rev recently, but when I get my AAO, I'm going to want to play some Civ III inbetween classes.

 

hey guys. I am folllowing the instructions that are left on this post to setup civ3 on my aa1, but it is NOT working plz plz help. i really wana play civ3

 

Worked for me. Thanks again.

I'm hoping that astray might help me get civ 4 outside of the windowed mode.

 

For those of you still having issues getting Civ 3 to work, maybe what worked for me will work for you.

My AAO has, just for your own comparison purposes, 1GB RAM, 160 GB hard drive, runs XP, and has a 6 cell battery.

When Civ 3 first installs, there is no civilization3.ini file. That's the configuration settings file and is automatically generated and edited the first and each time you play the game. You probably have a fresh, never-run (successfully, anyway) Civ 3 install on your AAO. That means no config file. And since the screen resolution stops the game as soon as it starts, what you'll need to do is make one. Assuming you have XP, select: start, all programs, accessories, notepad. Type in these three lines verbatim:

[Civilization III]
KeepRes=1
Video Mode=1024

Note that I used square brackets and put a space between "civilization" and the three capital "i"s in the first line. Also I put a space between "video" and "mode" in the third line.

Open the "file" pull down menu and click "save as." By "save as type" select "all files." In the "file name" window call the file "Civilization3.ini". That's it. When you're done, the file icon should be a notepad with a gear over it and the file type should say "configuration settings." Now check the file's location. If it isn't already in the Civilization 3 program folder (same one that contains the executable file), you'll have to move it there.

That alone got Civ 3 going on my AAO to my complete astonishment and utter delight. It did not, however, address the physical real estate problem that the AAO screen causes. If you start Civ 3 without changing your screen settings, it will run but you'll be missing a sizable chunk of the lower game screen. The XP display settings and the Intel menu settings work equally well for forcing the screen into a 1024x768 display. This provides a pretty screen that requires scrolling up and down in order to see the full picture. The Astray application mentioned previously in this thread is a useful little tool for mapping the entire 1024x768 game screen on the AAO's 1024x600 screen. This compresses things a little bit, but words and symbols are still clear and it doesn't require scrolling. I still don't know which one I like better, but it's nice to have the option.

I want to throw in the disclaimer that I am no professional computer tech. It's likely that some of the details of my fix were not necessary, but more importantly they worked. If you haven't been successful with the other methods (and they were not for me), hopefully this will do the trick for you.

Good luck!

 

I just wanted to thank you for your post it helped a lot in getting Civ 3 working on my Acer.

I wanted to add my experience. If you update Civilization 3 to the latest 1.29f patch it will wipe out your Civilization3.ini file so make sure you make a copy of that file first. You can also just follow Cows Go Moo's post to make a new .ini.