Serious Sam Test on G400 ?!?! I can't play !!!

[franklar]

I've just downloaded Serious Sam Test from Matrox FTP and it's impossible to play.

I was expecting it should be too much slooooow...
It's not so, but after a few minutes of playing I experience a gradual but inexorable corruption of textures !

I tried it on Win 98 and Win 2000 both with the latest drivers installed, latest bios and DX 8.0

as you can see:



Sometimes finally PC crashes

If I try to set a lower quality level, corruption become evident enough just some minutes after, but crashes now are more frequent...

Is there some guy who knows why Matrox distributes on its own site a Game demo that's totally useless for Matrox Gamers ?

Or maybe there's something ( patch, partigular game settings...? ) that's able to run better this game ?
It seems a very coooooool game, I want to try it !!! ( without spending a lot of money in a GeForce... )




[This message has been edited by franklar (edited 30 April 2001).]

[DuRaNgO]

The game runs just fine g400's, the problem you're having sounds heat related

Try leaving the side off of your case and make sure the fan is turning on your g400
jim

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P3-700e @ 1G+! Check it here!
Abit BE6-2
TwinMos 256mb pc-133
a Matrox video card......
Maxtor 40gb 7,200 ATA100
SB Live!
Toshiba 12x DVD
Teac 12x10x32 burner
Winblows 98se & DX8
Roadrunner cable
and 19"'s of crispy 32bit color!

[Kruzin]

Matrox users aren't the only people having trouble with the game doing this. Folks with all sorts of video cards are having the same problems. Seems to be a buggy game engine. But hey...it's only a pulic "test" beta, not even a full blown demo...I'm sure the programmers will polish it up.

A couple of things to try that seem to have helped other ppl:
-set "Wait Vertical Retraces" to "yes"
-disable "Fast Rendering" from the Advanced Graphics Menu
-if neither of those help, reset all default video settings

[This message has been edited by Kruzin (edited 30 April 2001).]

[franklar]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by DuRaNgO:
The game runs just fine g400's, the problem you're having sounds heat related

Try leaving the side off of your case and make sure the fan is turning on your g400
jim
</font>

can you see the image ? I don't see anything...

Anyway, I'm sure that this problem is not heat related. Consider that my card has been able to run stable with an incredible overclock ( core 212 - memory 188 ) and actually I have no problems with any 3d application ( benchs, games ) at those frequencies. Obviously my G400 is usually running at lower frequencies ( 162-182 ) with any problem

However the type of texture corruption is very similar to the corruption caused by an insane SDRAm overclock ( my limit is 188, I can see so garbled images only if I overclock them up to 200 Mhz !!! )


There should be some problem about game configuration or incompatibility with last card's drivers...

Pay attention: I'm talking about the demo version ( Test ), not the complete version !

Thanks

[franklar]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Kruzin:
Matrox users aren't the only people having trouble with the game doing this. Folks with all sorts of video cards are having the same problems. Seems to be a buggy game engine. But hey...it's only a pulic "test" beta, not even a full blown demo...I'm sure the programmers will polish it up.</font>

Yeah, you're right, but I wasted 2 hours and 30 minutes in downloading 48 MB with my old dirty 56k....
I'll definitely agree with you when I'll have a cable connession

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">A couple of things to try that seem to have helped other ppl:
-set "Wait Vertical Retraces" to "yes"
-disable "Fast Rendering" from the Advanced Graphics Menu
-if neither of those help, reset all default video settings</font>

I'll try...

Thanks

[Kruzin]

Sorry...hadn't looked in the game myself...I was reading those suggestions off an e-mail...I just d/l'd and tried the game myself. The advanced video options don't seem to be available in this test, so my suggestions arent going to help.
And the game doesn't work for me either...locked up my machine within 2 min every time in 6 tries.

[franklar]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">The advanced video options don't seem to be available in this test, so my suggestions arent going to help.</font>

but there's a configuration file in SCRIPTS folder. I'll try modifying settings there

[DuRaNgO]

If I remember correctly, I was running 6.50 not 6.51 when I played the demo to the end with no crashes

I now have the full game and no probs with 6.51 as of yet
jim

[franklar]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by DuRaNgO:
If I remember correctly, I was running 6.50 not 6.51 when I played the demo to the end with no crashes

I now have the full game and no probs with 6.51 as of yet
jim</font>

I tried to play in Win98 SE and Win 2000 too

same problems...

However my card runs fine with all other games, I'm confused

[Kruzin]

I am hearing from all directions that it's the game engine in this public test causing the problems.

One guy I know with a Geforce card having the same lockups contacted Croteam (game maker), and their responce was to try to set the PCs virtual memory to 1 gig.

Doubt I'll bother to try that...

[Liquid Snake]

I remember trying it a while back. Forgot the drivers, but I think it was Win2K 5.21. I did have lockups after several minutes sometimes. Other times, it ran for 30 minutes without incident. I do recall texture corruption at times. Actually, I think the fact that I didn't have lockups at times, was because I had upgraded the drivers. This was several months back, so I have trouble remembering. I'll get the test tomorrow and try it on my machine.

[Grego]

I have just got the full game, and what can I say it looks GREAT. Havent tried the demo which is apparently causing so much grief. It is a really cool engine. Think Ill try and up the resolution.

Now Ive had the chance to play a little more - this game is SO much fun, Im sure that Sam is a relative of Bruce Campbell, his comments = rofl! The g400 is doing a great job at 1024x768, it is extremely fast and good looking. Back to killing weird aliens

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System:
Asus A7V rev. 1.01p bios 1007
AMD Thunderbird 800@824 fsb 103
SBLive retail with liveware 3.0
Matrox g400 MAX pd 6.51
LG Flatron 795FT 17" monitor
IBM 13.5 GB 7200 hdd
Pioneer 103-s dvdrom
WinME
directx 8.0a
128mb pc133

[This message has been edited by Grego (edited 02 May 2001).]

[franklar]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Grego:
IThe g400 is doing a great job at 1024x768, it is extremely fast and good looking. Back to killing weird aliens

</font>

I agree !
In the first minute it looks pretty fast at 1024x768 16bpp and high quality, but after a few time....bleahhhh !

Is it possible to find somewhere a different ( and less buggy ) version of the Test ?

[Grego]

Yep you were right, I have to play 800x600 with all visual options at max. I have never seen a game with so much action / enemies at one time. Aside from occasional glitches when rendering the weapons when firing I havent encountered any problems.

[IgnatiusTam]

Guys, the original poster d/led Sam from Matrox's web site, I don't know which version he came into, but there was a Public Test 2 (*must* with patch 2a) which will work perfectly under my G400Max and, hehe, G200 :-D under W2k Pro.

http://www.croteam.com/download_files

The released version ironed out some more bugs and runs more smoothly under the above config. Guaranteed.