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[City Builder]

Hi Catfriend.

Just to cliarify, Simcity 4 works fine with Windows 7.  I run Windows 7 64bit and it's been rock solid since I added the following to my shortcut to start simcity 4:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Maxis\SimCity 4\Apps\SimCity 4.exe" -w  -CustomResolution:enabled -intro:off  -r1920x1200x32 -CPUCount:1

It's rock solid for the past several weeks since adding the cpucount:1 to my shortcut to start the game.

[Catfriend]

Hi Citybuilder, thanks very much indeed for that information.  I have made a note of it and will try and get my Simcity 4 up and running again.  I've also just discovered the Pharaoh/Cleo section, so I will devour the posts there in the hope of finding evidence that Pharaoh will run.  I've recently retired and divide my time between looking after cats, husband, and the usual household chores, but best of all is when I can settle down at my computer for a long gaming session 

[City Builder]

Hmmm I've not tried Pharaoh yet under Windows 7 that I can remember anyway, but I used to run it under vista if I'm not mistaken and people in general say that if a program runs under vista it will run under 7 as well.  I've run across very few exceptions to what the people have said, most of which seem to have issues with the aero desktop and sometimes turning it off helps those programs that don't like it, and sometimes it just doesn't work at all.

I've tried the virtual XP thing for one of my programs that appeared not to want to run under 7, but the virtual XP was too sluggish for that application which isn't graphically intense at all (it's just an application to build websites) so I doubt I'd try running any games under it.  Then again I don't suppose that MS created it to run games through, but rather more for business's to run their business applications that won't run under 7 more than anything else.

[crowebird]

Hey CB.. is the CPU Count anything specific, or just better for the game in general since it was probably not developed for multi cores?

[City Builder]

Yes, it's general for any multicores because SimCity 4 has a tendency to become either unstable with multicores, and or it just gets really jerky at best.  Since limiting it to one core, it has been rock solid, and the jerkiness of it is really minimal compared to what it once was.

[Catfriend]

Just a follow-up to my post about seeing whether Pharaoh would work under Win 7 Home Premium 32 bit.  Well, first of all I installed Pharaoh followed immediately by Cleo and after a lot of messing with the compatability settings I finally got the game to run, but only in the lowest resolution which looked awful.  Any attempt to alter this just resulted in a crash.  Having read somewhere that often Pharaoh will work on its own in Vista/Win 7, I uninstalled, and reinstalled just Pharaoh.  I finally managed to get this to work in the highest resolution the game allows using Win 98 compatability mode.  I was sorry that Cleo messes it up, though, as I loved the Cleo expansion.  Oh well.  Having gone to all that trouble I'm not sure now whether I want to play it or not, and am torn between trying my old copy of Sim City 4 (with City Builder's tip as I have an AM2 6000+ processor), or buying Tropico Reloaded as I've never played any of the Tropico games and am rather tempted.  Or maybe I should go straight to Tropico 3? Or maybe I should just stop wasting time and go and do something useful for a change

[CoconutKid]

... Having gone to all that trouble I'm not sure now whether I want to play it or not, and am torn between trying my old copy of Sim City 4 (with City Builder's tip as I have an AM2 6000+ processor), or buying Tropico Reloaded as I've never played any of the Tropico games and am rather tempted.  Or maybe I should go straight to Tropico 3? ...

If I may, I would suggest T-Reloaded first before T3. It's less expensive for both the 'cold war' and 'pirate' (not three) games, and gives you a preliminary look to see if there's anything you like. Besides, I think it's more fun.

[Catfriend]

Thanks for the advice, CoconutKid - I've just ordered Tropico Reloaded from Amazon.  They're out of stock, but hopefully it won't be too long.  Also, just to go back to Pharaoh for a moment -I always used to play in Win2000 compatability mode when I had XP, but this time around I couldn't get any sound with it, and although the sound is there in Win 98 mode the music wasn't quite right.  Anyway, I downloaded the Pharaoh patch and it fixes the sound in Win 2000 mode and now the music is fine.  If only I could find something to make the Cleo expansion work at the right resolution I would be a very happy bunny, but I will keep trying.  I can see that all the gardening and house decorating I had planned for this spring is going to be somewhat delayed 

[City Builder]

Some of these older games (Like Emperor Rise of the Middle Kingdom) kind of make me wish that I still had an old 15 or 17 inch monitor sitting around so that I could play them at their native resolutions and not have them all squished or pixelated on the larger displays that many of us use today.

I tried playing Emperor for a while, a while back on my 24" monitor and it just got to the point where it was annoying at such a low resolution.

Hope you enjoy Tropico Reloaded.  If you enjoy it, maybe keep an eye on Steam, Impulse or Gamersgate for when it goes on sale early this summer.  I say that because they've got an expansion due out this summer and usually the original game goes on sale when the expansion comes out or a good deal is struck with both original game and it's expansion.  In my opinion, T3 is worth picking up.  I think at this point in my ocmputers technology, the oldest I'll be playing is Simcity 4, which amazing how it sounds, still looks great at the 2nd or 3rd zoom level, especially with all the new HD plugins that people are creating.

One of the things that always bugged me about SimCity 4 was how cars would appear, move about 1/2 inch (as measured on the screen) and then disappear again, that sometimes made me want to pull my hair out, especially once I got some HD vehicle packs to go into my game, then I found a new mod plugin that makes the cars hang around longer and now I can actually watch vehicles start at home and drive all the way to work sometimes.

Anyway, hope you enjoy Tropico Reloaded, which I don't recall if your a person that buys games digitally or not, but I believe that both Steam and Impulse have the game for digital purchase and download.  Well, at least Steam does have it for sure for only $9.99, I didn't check the other two selelrs.

[Catfriend]

Thanks for that info City Builder.  My screen is only 19" widescreen, so Pharaoh with a resolution of 1024 x 768 doesn't look too bad.  I was wrong about the music, though.  I tried using Win 2000 compatability mode and, as I said, the sound was fine at first, but then went a bit weird and stuttery, so I reverted to Win 98 mode which did the same, so I think there must be something about either my mobo sound driver or, more likely, Direct X, which the game doesn't like.  Oddly enough, sound effects without the music seem to be ok.

I heard from Amazon UK that Tropico Reloaded won't be in stock until about 24th March, but that is fine, and will give me something to look forward to and if I like it I will look out for Tropico 3 at a cheaper price later on.  I don't buy games as downloads because my broadband connection isn't very fast and I think it would take rather too long to download one of today's games. 

Sometimes I wish I had never been seduced into buying Windows 7 as it really does nothing to enhance my computing experience.  XP was rock solid and did everything I wanted it to, but Windows 7 has been nothing but hassle from Day 1 what with blue screens and black screens and older stuff not working.  I'll persevere with it now I have it, but I wish I had stayed with what worked, but you live and learn.