Supreme Commander Forged Alliance Sorian Ai
and they are almost identical matched in type?Here your argument starts to break down. The starcraft races were very different in execution and gameplay from each other, whereas the factions in SupCom mainly differ in details (unit strengths, speeds, costs, special units).If anything, the breakdown of the 3 factions is more akin to Dune 2, where we had the Harkonnens with their heavy weapons (Aeon), the Atreides with their special units (UEF) and the stealthy Ordos (Cybrans).However, anyone who's played RTS for a while knows that the spiritual predecessor of SupCom is Total Annihilation, which is one of Chris Taylor's early games. So if anything, the only person he's ripping off is himself.
However, anyone who's played RTS for a while knows that the spiritual predecessor of SupCom is Total Annihilation, which is one of Chris Taylor's early games. So if anything, the only person he's ripping off is himselfTotal annihilation was the. I remember the first time i downloaded the patch with all of the new units, took about 4 hours on dial up for the. Blah blah blah, starcraft, blah blah blah.Haha. Forum noobs getting off topic.So you're saying the performance in FA is better than SC:Original?
And they haven't patched SC:Original with those fixes!?!?! WTF!SupCom got a performance tweak at some point a few months after release. I'm not sure what the current performance level is, I hadn't played in several months. I need to play more games with many players on huge maps to get a real good sense of the performance though vs.
The original game.Voldenuit: I'm glad someone took danny e. To task for his absurd rant. SupCom got a performance tweak at some point a few months after release. I'm not sure what the current performance level is, I hadn't played in several months. I need to play more games with many players on huge maps to get a real good sense of the performance though vs.
The original game.If it doesn't crash due to memory limitations, performance is really excellent for dual-core. When I play, it's usually tfp and I vs. 2 or 3 Supreme AI's or Sorian AI's on Seton's Clutch, Fields of Isis, or a custom map called King of the Castle. I never go permanently below +1 on the sim scale, only occasionally going down to 0. And RAM usage is never over the top, either, usually around 900MB or so. The thing is, it's only now at that point after countless patches; they should have gotten it to this point before they ever shipped it. If it doesn't crash due to memory limitations, performance is really excellent for dual-core.
When I play, it's usually tfp and I vs. 2 or 3 Supreme AI's or Sorian AI's on Seton's Clutch, Fields of Isis, or a custom map called King of the Castle. I never go permanently below +1 on the sim scale, only occasionally going down to 0.
And RAM usage is never over the top, either, usually around 900MB or so. The thing is, it's only now at that point after countless patches; they should have gotten it to this point before they ever shipped it.Yeah my P4e at 3.5Ghz drops down to -3 or -4 when derFunk is at +1 or 0. Better then it was in the past. I finally got around to purchasing FA a few days ago. I've played up to the last mission of the Aeon campaign on Hard, gonna try to finish it off tonight.I also finally got my internet connectivity issues sorted out, so I can play online MP games again now! So is there anyone who still plays on occasion? I haven't played an MP of SupCom in probably 8 months, but I'd like to get back into playing some real people on occasion.
Feel free to friend me on GPGnet, same user ID as I use here on TR.If anyone wants to have a few games this weekend sometime, drop me a PM or post up here and we'll arrange it. I got FA for Christmas, but I haven't played any single-player yet; I've only played online multi.though I'm glad I didn't pay real money for it - it's like they added a new skin for the other races (yes I know there are minor balance differences) and the AI seems to eat EVEN MORE CPU time. Tfp and I tried playing on a custom map (Kings of the Castle, pretty awesome map) against a couple of AI's (even one super-powered AI with a 1k unit limit) and even my 3GHz E2140 was going slower than real-time. When I finally lost, my sim time was over 200%.Still, I wish they'd fix this game - it's loads of fun.I also wish they'd release a map editor that doesn't suck; I just want to lay down some AI markers, some mass, play with elevations, choose my texture set/skin, and be done with it. The water maps have the biggest problems with the AI, so I thought I'd try to eliminate the AI.unfortunately, I can't use the crappy included editor.
I got FA for Christmas, but I haven't played any single-player yet; I've only played online multi.though I'm glad I didn't pay real money for it - it's like they added a new skin for the other races (yes I know there are minor balance differences) and the AI seems to eat EVEN MORE CPU time. Tfp and I tried playing on a custom map (Kings of the Castle, pretty awesome map) against a couple of AI's (even one super-powered AI with a 1k unit limit) and even my 3GHz E2140 was going slower than real-time. When I finally lost, my sim time was over 200%.Still, I wish they'd fix this game - it's loads of fun.I also wish they'd release a map editor that doesn't suck; I just want to lay down some AI markers, some mass, play with elevations, choose my texture set/skin, and be done with it. The water maps have the biggest problems with the AI, so I thought I'd try to eliminate the AI.unfortunately, I can't use the crappy included editor.There's your problem, you played a multiple AI game with a huge unit cap. Try playing a 1v1 with another real person on a normal ranked rotation map.
That would show you quite the difference. Even I have some problems with big AI games or campaign games with 2000+ units on screen, and I've got Q6600 and 4gb of ram. Even one super-powered AI with a 1k unit limitMy sim time was worse against a single 1k-unit opponent than it was against 2 500-unit opponents on that map. I thought it could only be better because it's just one 'brain' working, but apparently not.I'm not a big pvp kind of thing, I enjoy the skirmish stuff. I enjoy things like starcraft games of 2 of us playing zerg vs. 6 randomly-selected computer opponents, because there's still tremendous challenge in it - for instance, 'can I survive a triple zealot rush long enough to get to Lurkers/Guardians/Devourers?' This game has potential to finally replace starcraft, but there's no way that my system should be seeing sim times like it is - a 3GHz Allendale system (though with less cache) should have no problem keeping up.
I think they got too carried away trying to simulate.everything. and didn't spend enough time thinking about 'will this engine that can support monster-sized games actually be playable with those sizes?' Besides, if you want to play the single-player game, you.need. to have an AI that's not that kind of drag.
Even one super-powered AI with a 1k unit limitMy sim time was worse against a single 1k-unit opponent than it was against 2 500-unit opponents on that map. I thought it could only be better because it's just one 'brain' working, but apparently not.I'm not a big pvp kind of thing, I enjoy the skirmish stuff.
I enjoy things like starcraft games of 2 of us playing zerg vs. 6 randomly-selected computer opponents, because there's still tremendous challenge in it - for instance, 'can I survive a triple zealot rush long enough to get to Lurkers/Guardians/Devourers?' This game has potential to finally replace starcraft, but there's no way that my system should be seeing sim times like it is - a 3GHz Allendale system (though with less cache) should have no problem keeping up. I think they got too carried away trying to simulate.everything.
and didn't spend enough time thinking about 'will this engine that can support monster-sized games actually be playable with those sizes?' Besides, if you want to play the single-player game, you.need. to have an AI that's not that kind of drag.I agree, it's kindof pointless to have a game that's unplayable except for only pc enthusiasts or high priced systems from manufacturers. Not to mention most of these enthusiasts are playing other games that run much better and provide a more enjoyable experience.
Well it doesn't even play well verses the AI on very high end PCs. It seems that the game spawns a 3 threads for every expansion an AI makes, and the AI starts with 3 for the main base. So every expansion sort of works independently and manages itself. The problem of course is on a good size map it is enough to grind a overclocked quad core to a less then real time speed. It's worse with water maps because those locations there count as expansion as well.
Even though they are spawning multiple threads I don't think those are being spread out evenly over all the CPUs and are overloading CPU0.AI Moders are trying to pull that usage down to a more reasonable level by limiting the number of possible expansions per AI. From the test they have run it seems to have helped.I also read that GPG is working on a patch so that will be nice. I hoped that the Modders aren't the only ones trying to fix the game.
Well, all along GPG told people that this game would be one which is scaled towards future hardware improvements.The game runs fine for me, so long as I don't try to do things I know it has problems with, like playing multiple AIs on very large maps. I just played the last mission in the Aeon Campaign last night on Hard, and the only time I got slow-downs were if I zoomed in to the point I could see each unit, on portion of the map that had a lot of units duking it out. I believe that is a video card issue.Other than that, with 3 AIs plus me, for a total of probably 4000 units (I don't think AIs in campaign games have unit caps), and I had no problem.
Granted, my system is a bit beefier than most. I think many people over-exagerate the slow-down issues. Especially those who don't have FA, since the AI in FA is supposed to be much more efficient and cause far less slowing down.Either way, I think the game is over-criticized on the issue of slow-downs. And the problem is, people compare it to other RTS games, but name another RTS where you can have thousands of units in play at any given time, and maps the size of which are available in this game.shrug. I guess from the comments though, there's nobody left here playing, so it looks like random matches for me. I still like it, if only for the UI.FA definitely felt a lot faster than the original on my system at least, especially during large skirmishes.
But I'm more of a single player guy though, and I have to say FA failed quite miserably in that department. The same missions, for all three factions. That's really weak.:/I haven't played any non-Aeon campaigns yet. Are they really the exact same missions with the exact same goals, maps, etc? It wouldn't really surprise me, since there were a lot of things involved with FA for the game other than the single player. If that's the case though, I doubt I'll bother playing the other factions campaigns.I still think it's a worthwhile purchase though, for the added units, better AI, new maps, new UI, additional race, etc etc. I'm looking forward to some multiplayer tomorrow (haven't played a multi in FA yet).
Yes, there's a single campaign that you play through with the faction of your choice. It does kinda suck, but the campaign (what I've played of it) is still fun.The real problem lies in the AI: tfp sent me a couple links to GPG's forums where the AI mod makers have been discussing just why FA is so slow compared to the original. Alot of it has to do with the AI's handling of expansion bases:The Reader's Digest version is that it's the build manager. Duncane is modifying (or has modified) his AI mod so that the AI can only expand twice.
The AI can still build mexes everywhere, but it'll only have two extra air/land bases beyond the first base. Water maps are worse about this, because they.also. include naval base expansion positions.This doesn't help at all if you're playing the campaign; it's just flat-out going to run slower than the original SupCom. It's an improvement because the AI is smarter; it's just even more of a drain than the original. Well, all along GPG told people that this game would be one which is scaled towards future hardware improvements.If they aren't going to make a 64 binary it is really hard to believe the scaled towards future hardware crap.Yea, since we all know that 64-bit would improve performance, and Windows 7 is dropping 32-bit support in 2009.Oh, right, it isn't.64-bit may be the wave of the future, but don't expect it to become hugely prevalent yet for another 5 years, at least. I fail to see how a lack of 64-bit support means this game wasn't designed to scale with future hardware.
Yea, since we all know that 64-bit would improve performance, and Windows 7 is dropping 32-bit support in 2009.Oh, right, it isn't.64-bit may be the wave of the future, but don't expect it to become hugely prevalent yet for another 5 years, at least. I fail to see how a lack of 64-bit support means this game wasn't designed to scale with future hardware.The point isn't performance its is the fact you can reach the upper memory limits for 32bit with the game. It gets there the game crashes hard? Don't remember hearing about that?How the hell am I going to run a 8 player game with 1K units on a huge map when the damn thing can't handle enough memory to begin with. Really. epic.I would have hoped for an informed comment but hell I shouldn't expect that on the web. It's weird; in the Mac world, they upgrade the OS every 1.5 to 2.5 years, write apps that only work on the new OS, and everyone's (more or less) happy.
Sorian Ai 2.1.2
In the Windows world, they write apps that could possibly do more than the old OS can handle because everyone demands it. I think if a few killer games came out as 64-bit only, it'd force moronic gamers that strap hugely fantastic systems to 2001-era 32-bit OS's (yes, I'm taking a shot at XP) to finally wake up and smell the 64-bit coffee.The point, Inkedsphynx, is that the application can run itself into a 32-bit memory wall.
It can try to use more than 2GB of RAM if you play a game that is selectable using in-game options. They need a 64-bit binary one for the added register support and two for the extended memory address support. Yea, since we all know that 64-bit would improve performance, and Windows 7 is dropping 32-bit support in 2009.Oh, right, it isn't.64-bit may be the wave of the future, but don't expect it to become hugely prevalent yet for another 5 years, at least. I fail to see how a lack of 64-bit support means this game wasn't designed to scale with future hardware.The point isn't performance its is the fact you can reach the upper memory limits for 32bit with the game. It gets there the game crashes hard? Don't remember hearing about that?How the hell am I going to run a 8 player game with 1K units on a huge map when the damn thing can't handle enough memory to begin with.
Supreme Commander Forged Alliance Sorian Ai Mod
Really. epic.I would have hoped for an informed comment but hell I shouldn't expect that on the web.Except the fact that I have no problem accessing all 4gb of memory I have to go along with my 64-bit OS in FA.But hell, I guess I wouldn't expect someone on the web to know wtf they're talking about.Anandtech wrote. And getting back to Supreme Commander for a moment, our problems have not fallen on deaf ears over at developer Gas Powered Games. They let us know that the next version of Supreme Commander, Forged Alliance, will feature several engine improvements related to the issues we've covered. They are switching memory allocators to an in-house solution which is lighter and uses less memory, and are also attempting to put in a notification system for alerting users if the game has run out of address space to work with. Finally the game will be shipping as large address aware and will be tested as such. Hopefully we'll see other developers taking similar steps over the next year.Thanks for playing.