Yet a complication...
May. 28th, 2012 10:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
katrisimsYou must be sick of these computer updates by now, sorry about that.
Turns out things weren't exactly as much in order as I thought. When I checked out the graphics for my game on the new graphics card, they looked quite crisp and nice. Except that, there was something I couldn't quite point a finger on, thought maybe some straight lines were not exactly straight but a tiiiiny bit jagged. Together with the fact that the "smooth edges" option was greyed out, it should have rung a bell. Well, for some reason it didn't and I was just happy that the game was running and so nicely, and kept doing my other preparations.
Then I finally got to the stage where I could put Alphabetia in the game and check that everything was in order. Well, it was, except for one thing that then became apparent: the graphics. The new Alphabetia happens to be a hood with a lot of water and a curved coastline. When I saw that water and that coastline, it was apparent something was wrong. The coastline was incredibly blocky, and the water was just evenly light-blue, not waterlike at all. So it seemed the "smooth edges" option missing was a problem, after all.
I contacted my friend, again (I can't even count how many times I've needed to bug him with this...), and he came to look at it. At first he suspected that it might be because technically my machine now has two graphics cards, of which one is integrated into the motherboard, he found online that had happened to other people, and with a game of this age, it could be that it wasn't taken into account that someone could have two cards. Also, he was sure that my card would definitely, no doubt support anti-aliasing, so it couldn't possibly be that the card was crappy. Well, he did everything he could to prevent the game from using the integrated card, but it didn't help. Then, to be sure, he swapped in my old card, which we knew had worked before - if that wouldn't, either, then we'd know that the game was trying to use the wrong card. But, like nothing else, that worked.
So the conclusion was that my oldish game couldn't understand the fancy new card, it for some odd reason didn't know that the card was perfectly capable of doing anti-aliasing and didn't give me the option to use it. They just can't communicate. So basically, we'll need to replace the graphics card yet. This one was an adm/ati one, so our plan is to try a just about corresponding nvidia one. I looked around, I think the one we're looking at would actually be compatible. I'm crossing my fingers that we can get it, that it works and that I can get some refund for the ati one.
So the downside is, we're not quite there yet, there's been a further complication. But the upside is, my old card is now in, and it works, so I can play again, hooray! It's slower than it was with the newer card, of course, but still faster than it was before the old computer broke. I think I'll wait for the new card before I start shooting pictures again, since my resolutions and stuff can yet change, and I don't want to get pictures inconsistent twice within a chapter. So right now, I'm building a set I realized I'm going to need anyway. At least some progress can happen already.
This will get fixed. I'm determined.
Turns out things weren't exactly as much in order as I thought. When I checked out the graphics for my game on the new graphics card, they looked quite crisp and nice. Except that, there was something I couldn't quite point a finger on, thought maybe some straight lines were not exactly straight but a tiiiiny bit jagged. Together with the fact that the "smooth edges" option was greyed out, it should have rung a bell. Well, for some reason it didn't and I was just happy that the game was running and so nicely, and kept doing my other preparations.
Then I finally got to the stage where I could put Alphabetia in the game and check that everything was in order. Well, it was, except for one thing that then became apparent: the graphics. The new Alphabetia happens to be a hood with a lot of water and a curved coastline. When I saw that water and that coastline, it was apparent something was wrong. The coastline was incredibly blocky, and the water was just evenly light-blue, not waterlike at all. So it seemed the "smooth edges" option missing was a problem, after all.
I contacted my friend, again (I can't even count how many times I've needed to bug him with this...), and he came to look at it. At first he suspected that it might be because technically my machine now has two graphics cards, of which one is integrated into the motherboard, he found online that had happened to other people, and with a game of this age, it could be that it wasn't taken into account that someone could have two cards. Also, he was sure that my card would definitely, no doubt support anti-aliasing, so it couldn't possibly be that the card was crappy. Well, he did everything he could to prevent the game from using the integrated card, but it didn't help. Then, to be sure, he swapped in my old card, which we knew had worked before - if that wouldn't, either, then we'd know that the game was trying to use the wrong card. But, like nothing else, that worked.
So the conclusion was that my oldish game couldn't understand the fancy new card, it for some odd reason didn't know that the card was perfectly capable of doing anti-aliasing and didn't give me the option to use it. They just can't communicate. So basically, we'll need to replace the graphics card yet. This one was an adm/ati one, so our plan is to try a just about corresponding nvidia one. I looked around, I think the one we're looking at would actually be compatible. I'm crossing my fingers that we can get it, that it works and that I can get some refund for the ati one.
So the downside is, we're not quite there yet, there's been a further complication. But the upside is, my old card is now in, and it works, so I can play again, hooray! It's slower than it was with the newer card, of course, but still faster than it was before the old computer broke. I think I'll wait for the new card before I start shooting pictures again, since my resolutions and stuff can yet change, and I don't want to get pictures inconsistent twice within a chapter. So right now, I'm building a set I realized I'm going to need anyway. At least some progress can happen already.
This will get fixed. I'm determined.
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no subject
Date: May. 28th, 2012 07:29 pm (UTC)Me & and my family: "We need a laptop that can be used for gaming."
Store guy: "What kind of game?"
Me: "The Sims 2."
Store guy: *slightly derisive* "Oh, well any of these should be good enough for that."
Me: >:/
Family: "We'll take that one."
~Some time later, having installed everything~ Me: "WTF IS WRONG WITH THIS THING?! My five year old computer had better graphics than this!"
So, yeah. I swapped that laptop for the one I have now, but hopefully there's easier ways to get such things sorted. Good luck! :)
no subject
Date: May. 28th, 2012 07:55 pm (UTC)Yeah, I remembered you had something very similar back then, checked that post when looking for advice, too. That was just arrogant of the guy, I'll have to say. In my case, we didn't really realize how picky the game is about the graphics card. The one we got is supposedly way better than my old one, but according to my friend it's that the game doesn't understand the card in fact *can* do these things.
In my case, it's a nice thing it's a desktop machine we're talking about, so we can just replace the graphics card and not the whole computer.
Thanks! I hope the whole thing finally gets sorted soon. Meanwhile, at least I can work on that set.
no subject
Date: May. 28th, 2012 08:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 29th, 2012 11:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 29th, 2012 04:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 29th, 2012 04:09 pm (UTC)