8 replies to this topic

[Power Moron 5000]

System Details: Windows 7 -  8GB Ram -  Intel Core i7-2600K CPU @ 3.40GHz 3.70GHZ 

Type Of Installation: EAW Gold Boxed

Mods: None.

 

 

 

So i've noticed a rather show-stopping bug in the first campaign (Galaxy Far Away) for the latest version out.  It appears that saving is causing crashes to the desktop.  In fact, I can say that on my end, this is the sole apparent cause of crashes.  Furthermore, from talking to a friend we discovered that it appears to be the root cause of all of his crashes as well.  He just wasn't aware of it since he relies on the auto save system and hadn't paid much attention to what the cause was.

 

This is most evident when manually saving during a period of high activity on the galaxy map or on tactical battle maps on the ground that are overrun with units.  Doing so during a period where the game is moving slowly seems to almost ensure a crash.

 

More annoyingly, this bug appears to happen with auto saves too.  Since there is no way to disable auto saving in game that i've found, this means that you're basically rolling the dice to see when the game will crash on you.  Even more annoyingly, rarely it wipes the auto save.

 

Unfortunately despite how much fun this mod is, it has made my ability to play this mod just about impossible.  I've replayed the last few sieges of different planets maybe a dozen times each before I lucked out and managed to get a working save after them.

 

 

I'm not sure if this bug occurs in other campaigns, but it appears to be the case.  I'm trying a number of short term fixes, including trying to find a way to manually disable auto saving and messing with the 64-bit compatibility patch to see if it's an available resources issue but I haven't had much luck so far.  

 

I'll post here if I can find a fix, but I was wondering if anyone else had any input on the issue?

Edited by Power Moron 5000, 02 November 2013 - 02:21 PM.

[evilbobthebob]

We're very aware of the issue with saving and trying to work out a fix. The game really doesn't like the number of units in our mod, especially on large galactic conquest maps.

 

To stop the game autosaving, go to your Users/<Username>/AppData/Roaming/Petroglyph/Empire at War - Forces of Corruption/Save/ folder and set the slot0.sav file to READ ONLY. This prevents the game from writing an autosave to the file. Warning: while this will decrease battle load times and reduce crashes, it means any other crashes will likely wipe your game unless you save first.

 

In the meantime, I would suggest playing the smaller campaigns since in general they perform better and are less likely to be afflicted with this particular issue.

[Sûlherokhh]

...

To stop the game autosaving, go to your Users/<Username>/AppData/Roaming/Petroglyph/Empire at War - Forces of Corruption/Save/ folder and set the slot0.sav file to READ ONLY. This prevents the game from writing an autosave to the file.

...

 

 

Nice idea. i should have found out myself. Thank you!
 

[Aizen Teppa]

No and no.

 

1st No. Sadly it's the problem with game engine. It seems incapable of dealing with expanded AI coding and number of units. It happened to me 100s of times. Unfortunately AI in 1.2 is too fat for EaW engine (well over 30MB IIRC which is I think max for stable operation) to take. It will be trimmed down (together with # of units for 1.3)

 

2nd No. There is one thing you can do to help. Take scenario files, open in editor and remove all unnecessary rubbish units. It will improve game responsiveness by solid degree - at least in the beginning. If you having problem with AI fighter spam then do the same with fighters. Raise PopCap to whatever you like (personally using 5). Granted it will hamper early expansion for both sides, but you can sell not needed fighters for some credits and free Popcap for capital buildup. And AI will lose it's capacity to spam thousands of fighters which Totally kills the performance.

 

In general default PR in current state is kind of smash and grab ASAP - unless modded heavily and even then crash is just waiting to happen. If you reach mark of 100 weeks game will work as long as you play, but it will hang 99% after reload. 

 

 

Word of advice with regard to saving in OP post. Never under any circumstances attempt to save a game when game gets choppy (AI most likely moving units around). It will fail. Uhm... well PM5000 (interesting nickname lol) don't waste your time with 64bit compatibility patch. Game exe is incapable of addressing more than 2GB of memory anyway. Tried few tricks, game will crash long before reaching that mark, at 1.3GB game is bound to crap-out instantly. To be honest it's miracle that it works on some other systems than XP anyway which is system of choice for stable operation. Heard that Macrocost?!

[Ghostrider]

We have solved a lot of the problems of saving and playing the mod. If you look at the latest 2 news threads you'll see what I mean. 

 

It's less about the engine and more about campaign management. The game engine has to process the data in the XML's and the campaign files. As we have learned more about how the engine works, we have managed the data setup for the game in terms of XMLs and how the data is compiled. 

 

This has had significant dividends in game performance.