Empire Total War: Should it be this way?

Chicken #16

Chicken #16

Chicken #16

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Hi,

Got Empire Total War for Christmas and got it installed (off the discs!)

Only problem other than the random crashes is how slow it all seems even on lowest of the low settings.

My PC is XP on a Core2Duo 6300 running at around 2.13 ghz, 2GB ram with an ATI 3870

The game takes ages to load, then when playing, many of the voiceover bits struggle to play smoothly and everything feels really sluggish.

GFX drivers are up to date and Steam appears to patch everything automatically (but I'm not overly sure).

I would accept needing to upgrade but don't want to if it is going to cost the earth (or if it won't solve the problem) - a 5770 ati for £120 would be my limit
 
I think the ram may be limiting performance. Also a little trick, if you're scrolling around the map and it's sluggish, try deselecting the unit by clicking in the open sea or somewhere, this alleviates the stuttering slightly.
 
ok so an extra gb 6400 stuff might help but then I'd need a newer operating system for more....would 3gb be enough do you think? and what difference does it make being unmatched or paired etc.

Cheers for the tip about scrolling - that is another of the irritating bits.

This is my first Total War game as I love the history around the era but I'm put off at the moment because I have to save pretty much every turn. I was caught out by some bug that meant the save game I did have would always result in a crash.

Does anyone have this game running on a similar PC with no problems on the lowest settings?
 
Be sure to download all of the patches. Many of them addressed performance issues that plagued the game on initial release. Be thankful that you didn't ever play the demo... My .... God...
 
The game is just jacked up i'm afraid. I could play full 20 on 20 stacks in North America maxed out solid 60+ FPS, but a 10 on 10 in India reduced my FPS to a slide show even on medium settings.

Specs: Q9550 @ 2.8, 8GB RAM, GTX280.
 
Swi1ch said:
The game is just jacked up i'm afraid. I could play full 20 on 20 stacks in North America maxed out solid 60+ FPS, but a 10 on 10 in India reduced my FPS to a slide show even on medium settings.

Specs: Q9550 @ 2.8, 8GB RAM, GTX280.
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+1 it's a badly coded , rushed game.
I am so gutted with this game I am a TW fanatic and this game just failed :(.
 
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ah....sounds like it's a little bit more serious than some simple patching....what's the guess we get left with how it is now bar some minor patching and they focus on the new one coming out?
 
Chicken #16 said:
ah....sounds like it's a little bit more serious than some simple patching....what's the guess we get left with how it is now bar some minor patching and they focus on the new one coming out?
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You are correct The Creative Assembly's standards started slipping when sega bought them:mad:.
 
Chiiives said:
You are correct The Creative Assembly's standards started slipping when sega bought them:mad:.
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Absolutely! :(

I bought every TW title and expansion up until M2TW: Kingdoms but have no intention of buying another title as the series have really gone down the pan.
Eye candy at the expense of gameplay depth was a major issue for me, as was the increasingly poor record on patching at the same time as they were frantically working on the next title. It seemed their thinking was "why patch it properly when we can offer a remedy as part of the next title", hence they were expecting me to shell out for a new title when the last one didn't work properly. Add secuROM to the mix and thanks, but no thanks.

Cheers Sega, for ruining my favourite series.
 
The game is borked in all honesty.

I love TW games but the problems are just not worth it.

At launch 30% roughly of people on TW forums reported it playing fine (AS DID I!!), the rest complaining of awful load times (at all stages, app load, save game load, battle load etc), 'click' and 'turn' response and the game just generally running very sluggish.

It didn't make sense either cause people with monster rigs were having difficulties like the rest with normal kit with the same on the otherside (monster/average rig) for those whom it would play well, then when steam patch no 1 came through I all of a sudden got 'sluggish'.

Its been like that ever since. Sometimes it takes so long to load i give up (i mean ages, go make dinner ages), steam are tosspots for support. verified, defragged, redownloaded. no difference. formatted installed off DVD (limited edition) with automatic patch through steam and sluggish.

**** CA, **** steam, **** sega.

(Thats on a e6400 @ 3.7Ghz, 4gb + 8800 512 gts)
 
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Swi1ch said:
The game is just jacked up i'm afraid. I could play full 20 on 20 stacks in North America maxed out solid 60+ FPS, but a 10 on 10 in India reduced my FPS to a slide show even on medium settings.

Specs: Q9550 @ 2.8, 8GB RAM, GTX280.
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I have no problems with it, only difference between my system and your systems is the GTX280 and I have two HD4890, but my CPU is overclocked, this might make the difference
 
I played this game to death earlier this year - I had vista 64bit back then and a 4870. I had absolutely no problems whatsoever (after the first graphics orientated patch).

I decided to go back to playing it yesterday (I am reading Bernard Cornwalls Redcoat!) the only changes to my machine are that i have upgraded to Windows 7 and now have a 5850. The graphics performance is stuttery when I have full stacks (reminded me of first version), I am hearing a digital noise when looking at the campaign map that sounds like its coming from my graphics card (even with the settings turned right down) and I have played 6 online games - 3 were OK and I received 2 memory allocation errors and one return to ETW main menu during battles (very annoying).
 
I played it extensively on an E6400, 2gig RAM and an 8800GT. While it was slow at times, it never seemed as bad as your thread is implying. So no, I think you should be getting better performance.
 
starskysdad said:
I decided to go back to playing it yesterday (I am reading Bernard Cornwalls Redcoat!). The graphics performance is stuttery when I have full stacks (reminded me of first version), I am hearing a digital noise when looking at the campaign map that sounds like its coming from my graphics card (even with the settings turned right down).
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Yes - I can hear some odd noise from my PC only when playing this. I thought it was my hard drive.

Book I read that made me buy the game was Dewey Lambdin's The French Admiral which is all about the battle of the Chesapeake and then Lord Cornwallis' siege of Yorktown with quite a bit of swashbuckling thrown in for good measure (Alan Lewrie is much more fun than the Aubrey/Maturin books) but also loved playing Colonization (I still think the old one is more fun than the new one).

Anyone played using XP and had no problems?
 
Chiiives said:
lol. you will soon find problems with it. whether it be the buggy fortress battle's AI , The suicidal battle AI and shocking pathfinding issues.
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This & some.

Unless your getting this for a tenner, keep your money as you will be dissapointed eventually even if it does run as it should for you.
 
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