Age of Empires 3 Demo

[SAS]

The long awaited Age of Empires 3 demo has been released weighing in at 366MB.

 

[Mazling]

I've downloaded the demo only to have it tell me it can only be run on WinXP. Watch out for that.
I'm lucky that a format is mere days away.

 

[caLLous]

YAY!

AoE > AoM. (shh wij)

 

[caLLous]

Ok... Direct3D initialisation failure when trying to run it... (in xp)

 

[KevinUK]

Mine just resets the PC so be lucky you get a message

 

[caLLous]

So that would be a 0% success rate (with 3 different errors/actions) out of the 3 of us that have tried it so far. :\

Going up to Forceware 78.01 to see if that helps...

 

[caLLous]

http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=1,23561,0,10

I think that'll fix the resetting problem. Apparently the directx problem is something to do with running the game on a widescreen monitor, but the suggestions I've seen haven't worked yet. It tells me to edit the NewProfile.xml but I have a feeling it won't create that file until you've run the game successfully once. Editing DefaultProfile.xml proved fruitless. It tells me to look at the error log for information but for the life of me I can't see anything that looks like a log file in the gamedir...

I WANT TO PLAY.

 

[caLLous]

I fix0red it!!

For anyone with the same problem (a widescreen monitor, basically) you need to edit the NewProfile.xml in C:\Documents and Settings\name\My Documents\My Games\Age of Empires 3 Trial\Users and not the game dir itself...

Change:
<Setting Name="optiongrfxres">1280 x 768</Setting>
to:
<Setting Name="optiongrfxres">1024 x 768</Setting>

and then run the game and change the resolution to 1920x1200 (or whatever) from the options menu.

*play*

 

[Turamber]

Worked okay for me, although the sound skips a bit in places. Can't say I enjoyed the demo as much as I did AoE 2 back in the day. The time period AoE 2 was set-in was fabulous, so many different cultures and societies far removed from ourselves. The new setting doesn't really appeal to me all that much.

 

[KevinUK]

Mine already is set to:

<Setting Name="optiongrfxres">1024 x 768</Setting>

I have dual monitors so I disabled the second one but I still get the problem.

I also hate how software installs things outside of the directory you specify such as:

C:\Documents and Settings\name\My Documents\My Games\Age of Empires 3 Trial

ARG!

 

[KevinUK]

Edit...

http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=1,23561,0,10

That link worked for me

I dont understand why the game is horrible though! The graphics for the terrain and units dont look too good, I like how the tower falls apart as it takes damage though.

The menu takes up too much of the screen I think.

I wont be buying this!

 

[SilverHood]

Good fun, though the difficulty is fucked.

On moderate, I can easily kick the AI's arse. On hard, I get my arse handed to me on silver platter, and a message asking me if I want desert.

 

[Wij]

YAY!

AoE > AoM. (shh wij)

Cally ! So gh3y

Not taken with this yet. Maybe I'll give it another go :/

 

[Mazling]

Penny arcade hits the nail on the head, again.

 

[Turamber]

Anyone figured out how the shipments and customisation options work?

 

[SilverHood]

Anyone figured out how the shipments and customisation options work?

Once your city hits level 7 I think, you can have more than 20 cards, so you have to choose which ones you take.
Only seems to work in Skirmish games, the campaign was a bit naff.

 

[Turamber]

Good fun, though the difficulty is fucked.

On moderate, I can easily kick the AI's arse. On hard, I get my arse handed to me on silver platter, and a message asking me if I want desert.

Now that I've finally figured out how the shipments work I have tried the skirmish mode on hard a couple of times. Absolutely kicked the computers arse ... it tries to rush you a few times, but with judicious use of outposts and consignment/age improvement troops you can fight them off.

For some reason the computer doesn't make proper use of the supply posts and so generates income and raw materials at a slower rate. So I find that I can hit Age 4 or 5 while the machine is still in Age 3. Not much of a 'rusher' myself, much prefer to hit the computer with endless amounts of soldiers and artillery.

Will have to try it on the hardest setting tomorrow night...