Pre 9 Alpha: New Game dialog not functioning

The New Game dialog is not functioning for me. When I click on the New Game button in the splash screen the dialog opens very slowly and none of the options (galaxy size, difficulty, race, etc) can be modified from the defaults. The dialog is completely unresponsive. Clicking on any of the options has no effect. At which point if I ESC out of the dialog (because there is no Close button) and then click on New Game again, the dialog opens but fails to fully resolve - it just appears as a shadowly transparency and never fully loads.

This was not an issue in pre alpha 8.

System: Windows 7 professional 64 bit
Ram: 4GB
video card: 2GB

 

Hi Adam - thanks for the response.

To the best of my knowledge I have no anti-virus software running. Windows Defender is not turned on. The only security application I have enabled is Microsoft Security Essentials.

So, in Pre-Alpha 9, the Credits and Settings dialogs work fine; it is just the New Game dialog that is not working for me at the moment. I didn't try Load Game as I haven't any games to load.

As mentioned, I still have the Pre Alpha 8 build on my machine as well and there is no issue with the dialogs in that build. They work as expected.

I would think that if it was due to something outside the application it would affect both builds similarly.

 

Hi,

Sure no problem. Can you tell me what folder structure the file need to reside in under ISG_pre-alpha_9_64bit so that it is visible to the Load dialog. Thanks.

 

Hi,

I loaded up the save this afternoon. The Load dialog finds the save file and allows me to select it. The game then loaded just fine. Sadly I didn't have time to play with it at that point.

Now this evening I can select the save file and click Load but once the Load dialog closes and I am presented with the loading saved game splash screen that's were I stay - the game never loads and ultimately I have to kill the application. it did produce an output og file though in the ISG folder in AppData. I have attached it. Not sure if it contains anything useful.

 

Hi Adam

I have a busy week ahead but just wanted to get you some quick feedback in case it helps with identifying the issue. I launched the game today in 1024 x 768, at low resolution in windowed mode. The New Game dialog still doesn't function. More telling I think is that if I ESC out of the New Game dialog to the main menu and then click on New Game again, the dialog launches but never finishes displaying - there is just a ghostly outline of the dialog and that is where everything halts. And sometimes when escaping back to the main menu - none of the buttons will work. Previously I had launched the game at 1920 X 1080 on normal, which is the default resolution of the external monitor. At the lower resolution the font is too tiny to read so definitely need to play at a higher resolution.

For what it is worth, with the task manager open the game is using up ~ 950 MB of memory when in the main menu and the one time I was able to load your saved game it bumped up to 1.3 GB with the map loaded in turn 1. Just adding that in case it is not in line with what you are expecting.

My system spec are as follows:
Sony Vaio Laptop with a second external monitor
processor: Intel Core i7 Q740 at 1.73 GHz - I believe it is a quad core
ram: 4 GB
graphics: 2 GB Nvidia GEForce 310M
system: Windows 7 Professional 64 bit

I have included tonight's log file in case there is anything different in it - it looks similar to the last one.

 

No problem. Happy to test a "special" build. You can send me the download link using the email address I rused to register for the forums. It will probably be Wednesday or Thursday evening before I have a chunk of time to look at it.

 

Hi. Well I had some time to test the special build today. First I cleared out the game log file from the ISG folder.

I launched the game at 1280 x 1024 in low resolution and verified that the fade effect was on. I clicked New Game. The dialog opened and there was no change in behaviour. Clicking the various game options didn't change the default settings (at least not visibly). At which point I closed the application and got the game log file (see output_log_fade_on).

Next I relaunched the game with the same size and resolution. I opened the Settings dialog and turned the fade effect off (deselect). I clicked New Game and again there was no change in behaviour. For what it is worth, at this point I clicked Start Game - there was no visual indication on the button that I had clicked it. A few seconds later the dialog disappeared and the game started to load; however, the game was never generated. After 5 minutes the loading screen was still displaying "Loading game please wait. Generating game." I closed the application and grabbed the log file (see output_log_fade_off).

Hope this helps.

 

Hi,

Thanks for the link to the NVIDIA driver update. I did install it. It seems to have been a mixed blessing. The drivers have been updated, but it has turned my laptop's 1600 x 900 screen into a 1440 x 900 screen and refuses to recognize any resolution for the laptop higher than that. I now have 80 pixel black bars on either side of the screen - something I will need to follow up with NVIDIA. The external panel is working just fine.

As for the new game build, the New Game dialog is working as expected now. I can cycle through the different options, click Start Game, and the game is generated. I didn't touch the default fader option.

Next up - actually playing the game

Thanks for following up on this.

 

Hi,

I have confirmed that post the updated video driver install the New Game dialog works in the regular pre alpha 9 build and both special builds. Thanks for your patience in helping me resolve this issue.