Getting irritated with all the crashes

[Private Cyr]

Aside from my frustration about crashes I like the game. I have submitted the logs, dumps, and dxdiags to the support team as they have requested. Funny how this is happening on a fresh install. These crashes are the game without a doubt. I've seen some people blame other stuff, but I'm getting the same results with a fresh install.

:sulk:
AA just crashes to the desktop...or a bluescreen with no text and reboots....or hangs in the middle of the game. Temps are fine, no overclocking, checked my memory using a Microsoft memory tester and everything pans out. ALL drivers and BIOS's are up to date. My 9800 Pro is set to application preference on everything. Just pissed and puzzled that a game that has been out for a bit now has not had a patch for these stability problems. The AI they can get to, but as for the stability it is really ticking me off to no end. I love the game...but this is getting old. Reminds me of when CivIII came out. It took forever to get a patch that fixed all the AI and stability problems.

Well if anyone has any suggestions I'll take them under consideration.

Stay low and keep the powder dry!!!!!

[Skipster]

I'm pretty computer illiterate, but I see this sort of thing with every new game, starting a couple of years ago.

There are so many different computer configs out there these days, somebody is guaranteed to have problems with any new game.

The lucky ones have no problems, the unlucky (like yourself) usually have to tweak something to get it to work.


Usually what happens is somebody figures out how to fix it and spreads the news.

Unfortunately, before that, a number of people will tell you your system is crap, which is probably untrue.

The reality is, as computers get more complex, the only way to guarantee the game to work right off the hop is to use the exact same setup as the game devs. Any deviation from that will give you differing rates of success.

The games are designed to work with most configurations, but some hardware combinations seem to affect some games in a negative manner.

Just trying to say that you'll probably get better results fixing it yourself than waiting for a patch.

One possibility that has worked for others with other games, is rolling back your drivers a version or two. Also, I have heard many people having issues with different games and XP Service Pack 2.

[Ammon]

Originally posted by Skipster
I'm pretty computer illiterate, but I see this sort of thing with every new game, starting a couple of years ago.

Skipster you are not that computer illiterate, you seem to realize more than most techs and game designers.

The fact is alot of these games are rushed out the door with minimal testing. I am a programmer not for games but for an insurance company. We deal with all kinds of different technologies from JCL and COBOL mainframe programs to the front end JAVA XHTML. Things almost never go right the first time around. But solid coding will save you many problems. Believe me the programmers and testers know there are problems with the game when it goes to market. The bottom line is they ask the questions "Does more of it work than not?" and "Do we have the time and budget to fix everything?" Thats why games come out so ****ty. You can usually look at a company's other games to get an idea about the stability. Valve, ID software, and Blizzard put out some of the most solid games today. Look at Half-Life 2 they spent over 5 years making it and it shows the bugs they do have are easily fixed. I think testing should at least have the following configs tested fully

Directx -latest version
Video Card - ATI radeon technology, and the Geforce cards
how hard is it to test on a few of the top home PC's
Dell
HP/Compaq
Gateway
Alienware

that would cover the majority of people buying the game

And if they seriously took the input from magazines like PCgamer and EGM we would have some awesome games out there.

[zaz]

They already have a set order they will work things. The first of these is to fix the crashes and hardware specific problems with the game engine. This game engine is used for multiple products released by TimeGate so it will be fixed on two fronts.

After fixing as much stability as possible they will add content. This may sounds illogical, since you would think beefing up AI would take precident. But the AI coders are likely the same guys who were fixing the stability. Level and content designers are not usualy involved with AI and Stability issues.

Hopefully we see a major contribution on all three with the first patch.

Now for your fourth area you can just give up as I doubt the WWII mode will see significant changes. My only hope for an improved WWII mode is in fan modifications and a future expansion pack for A&A RTS.

[Ammon]

Seems they have a better handle on this than I thought if what you say is correct. I would prefer they worked on the stability issues first. Give the community a stable game and some decent mod tools and they will turn it into a good game.

[zaz]

What I posted is pretty industry standard and has been for a long time. They know the o rder for update priority before the game is released. If the game doesn't work, you have a harder time selling it. If new content doesn't come out, you have a harder time selling more weeks and months after release. It's certainly all about the sales, and there is nothing wrong with that.

[CPTBrown]

These crash problems must be real hit or miss. I'm playing on a Gateway Laptop with a 2.2 mghz celeron processor and no graphics card and have not had any problems. Some slow downs, obviously, but the game is stable on my antique!

CPT B

[tellgar]

I haven't had a single crash in the retail version. I had some in the beta but that got fixed before the beta ended.

Here is my system specs, maybe it will help you narrow down the problems with crashes.

I have XPpro with service pack 2 and all the other windows updates, on a 1.9 ghz athlon machine, with the sound card on the motherboard, a Nvidia 5700 (I think, can't remember at the moment for sure), and 512 ram. I have all the drivers up to date, and all the motherboard's (Asus) firmware and drivers up to date.

[Private Cyr]

I have quit playing this game until a patch comes out. As for when I play it again I don't know...but for right now I feel I have waisted my money. I hope Atari doesn't screw up a Neverwinter Nights sequel like they did this game. A&A had great potential, but I'm very disappointed in the availability of a patch to at least get some of the stability issues resolved with ATI cards considering they have ATI as a sponsor on the box. It's either the Nforce drivers or ATI I don't know, because everytime it crashes it appears to be a device driver. Who the hell knows.

[CPTBrown]

I voted for the stability problems earlier. Although I'm not having any problems on my computer, the fact that many other people are is bad for the game. If fan base slides and the game goes into the bargain bin, the future looks bleak for an expansion.

[Skipster]

Originally posted by CPTBrown
These crash problems must be real hit or miss. I'm playing on a Gateway Laptop with a 2.2 mghz celeron processor and no graphics card and have not had any problems. Some slow downs, obviously, but the game is stable on my antique!

CPT B

I hear ya. Before when I had Win98 on an Athlon 1700 w/SDram, I never had any problems on any game I could run.

Since going to XPpro (to get more than 512 RAM), I have had problems with a couple of games that I had previously.

I went through 3 copies of BF42, (my original, a brand-new anthology, and a used one) and two HD wipes, before I could get it to work, and even to get that I had to use discs from 2 different copies.

[manuel859]

Fix stability problems, its very annoying

[jbowser]

Is it possible that you have a bad memory chip? I have to say, I've run the game on my laptop and my desktop with no problems. My laptop has a tiny integrated, shared memory peice of junk nVidia card, and my desktop has the "real" version, 64mb. I've seen games bring out memory issues, and much in the way you're describing with the blue screens, it hanging up, and just acting poorly.

Try to pull out a couple of memory chips. If you have 4, pull out 2 and try it, if you have 2, pull out 1 and try it. If you have one, then use your discretion on whether you want to buy a new memory chip. If the game crashes after swapping out some memory, try the other memory. If it still crashes, at least you've eliminated one hardware issue.

[MrFahrenheit]

Grrr!

ALL my Atari games screw up...this happened with ToEE and Terminator...I go to the game, works fine for a bit, and then screen goes black, followed by a blue screen informing me that "Windows has shut down to prevent damage to your computer" and a physical memory dump.

The only other game I've ever had this problem with has been Rise of Nations, but with RoN, it is a totally random occurence, and usually I'll go several hours, even days, of gaming (on and off, I'm not 24/7 obviously) before it happens.

So with the random, infrequent RoN excluded, this only happens with Atari games.

I do not want to admit it, but for this readon I am loathe to buy NwN 2, whenever it may come out.