Any word on EP4 CM4?

[SunDancer]

Anyone know time of release yet?

[Easy Mac]

End of the month

[Easy Mac]

from SI games:

Enhancement Pack 4


Wed 25th June 2003 @ 10:30AM

CM NEWS



Just to keep you updated on the progress of EP4.

We are in the final stages of testing and hope to release this by the end of the month
In the majority of cases it will be save game compatible
The size of the download will be around 14mb
The games start date will not be updated

[Honolulu_Blue]

You know. Two days ago I read that EP4 was due out at the end of the month and I said "End of the month? Screw it. I'll start my career now. Can't wait that long!"

End of the month is in like 3 days.

This isn't the first time this has happened. Seriously, I think 2003 is the fastest year of all time.

[SunDancer]

Now,
If you start a career, will you have to restart it, or will it still be playable after patching up with CM4?

[Honolulu_Blue]

It will still be playable. From my understanding, most of what the patch fixes will be fixed. But if you want "full results" it's reccommended that you start over. I think that's how it guys. Marc knows. He does this for a living. He'll clarify.

[Karim]

I really hate that "full results" tagline. It caused me to restart with EP3 but now into a "serious" career, I'd hate to have to restart.

[Marc Vaughan]

You'll be fine continuing an EP#3 game with EP#4 - I'm still playing my EP#3 game with it ...

[MrBug708]

Originally posted by Marc Vaughan
You'll be fine continuing an EP#3 game with EP#4 - I'm still playing my EP#3 game with it ...


Curious Marc, but what team are you, what season is it, and how much ass are you kicking in it?

[Chief Rum]

Originally posted by Marc Vaughan
You'll be fine continuing an EP#3 game with EP#4 - I'm still playing my EP#3 game with it ...

Hey, Marc, if we promise we won't tell the blokes at the SIGames Community Forum, will you tell us exactly when EP4 will come out? We really want to know! :)

Also, it might give us a 2-3 minute window to start our downloads before the wave in the UK hits and shortens baudwidth everywhere. :)

CR

[SunDancer]

I'm with Chief. :)

I am looking at starting a career with the EP3, so I won't have to restart it then?

Also, any suggestions into what leagues?

I will have Europe:
England
Italy
Spain
Netherlands
Germany
Scotland
Portugal
Greece
Russia

N. America:
Mexico
United States

S. America:
Argentina
Brazil

Asia:
Japan
China

Australia
South Africa

I want the best leagues in the world, with a worldwide presence.

By having these leagues and not others, will the talent of the countries slip (Say Greece or Australia will get more talent, with a nation like Sweden slip). Also does international nation performance effect the growth of talent in that national

[Chief Rum]

Can your computer handle all those leagues, Sun Dancer?

The game seems pretty quick to tell you that a small number of leagues only can be played at once on the league set up page, and that's even with pretty high end machines, seemingly.

You might want to balance the leagues you want to run with how fast you want it to go.

For instance, my game can be pretty slow at times (although it's not so bad, since I'm doing a dynasty, and I don't mind grabbing a book and reading or watching TV while it's moving on to the next stop point). I have 28 leagues going on an AMD Athlon XP1500 with 256 DDR RAM. The game recommends I run just eleven (although my understanding is the game tends to undercut AMD processors--it was designed to read Pentiums apparently).

The speed is okay for my uses, but I know that plenty of others would be (and have been) upset at the resulting slow sim times.

It looks like you would have about 35-40 leagues there if you did every one you have there to its fullest extent (including sub-leagues). Things can be helped by going to a smaller database (I went with large), but you have a consequently lesser pool of players apparently, which can really hurt if you're going to be an LLM (I don't know if you are).

How does your computer stack up? What does the game say is the optimum number of leagues to run for you?

This damn game actually has me thinking about forking over some cash for some more RAM. :)

CR

[SunDancer]

Never though bout that Chief...How do u find out about that in the book or whatever?

[Chief Rum]

Sun Dancer, start up a game. You'll run into it. :)

CR

[SunDancer]

Will do Chief...I just downloaded EP3, so it will be a few. I sorta like you, take my time to play, so I might play one or two over.

[SunDancer]

Ok...I got recommendation of 16 leagues...Any suggestions for leagues? I want to go full nation (Premier down to Conference). I want to go with Britian, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Scotland and Germany. Any feedback? I want to get the best teams in the world.

[Chief Rum]

I would stick with Europe then. Refer to your other thread where the best teams were listed. Also consider where you yourself want to play.

CR

[SunDancer]

Thanks...But would that take up enough leagues? Like is a "league" each "level"...Premier ship is a league, division I is a league... I think those have the best teams.

[Chief Rum]

Well, I believe the game actually refers to an entire nation's league set as a "league" and each individual level as a "division", if I recall correctly. But when it tells you you can play 16 leagues, it means 16 divisions.

CR

[SunDancer]

ok...

How much Ram is needed to play like 60 or all of the 91 leagues...is their a ram/per league/division ratio?

[Chief Rum]

Not that easy, Sun Dancer. It seems to very from system to system. I have no idea how to answer that question. If you want more, you need more. Or you can try running it with as many leagues as you like and see if you mind any resulting speed issues.

Chief Rum

[GoldenEagle]

I have 512 MB of RAM and run about 16 leagues. Anything else would be very slow.

[ice4277]

I think a lot of it really depends on your personal preference. Like Chief, I would rather have a bunch of leagues/divisions running with slower processing speeds; I'm ususally either surfing the net or reading a book or magazine while playing, so I don't mind the wait. If you want it fast, though, I would keep it to as few as you think you could live with. One thing I have found is that the difference between leagues in the foreground and background makes a bigger difference than in the past. In my current game, the only leagues I have in the foreground are England and Scotland, because they are the two I figure I would be most likely to manage in. But I have a ton of leagues set in the background, 23 to be exact, some with all divisions and some with only the top division selected. To me, it runs about the same speed as CM 01/02 ran, and I have more leagues selected this time around, so I am happy with it.

[daedalus]

Originally posted by Chief Rum
For instance, my game can be pretty slow at times (although it's not so bad, since I'm doing a dynasty, and I don't mind grabbing a book and reading or watching TV while it's moving on to the next stop point).
Heh. I'm still playing CM3 but I do the same thing while waiting. Well, except the dynasty part. I read 'em.

[Easy Mac]

I'd say you need about a gig of ram in order to run that many leagues.

[SunDancer]

How do you get the windown to minizime, or atleast to not take up the whole screen. What screen settings though the desktop features do you need to select. I have Windows 2000 if that makes a differenece.

[STK]

Running all 91 is slow for me, but not unbearable.

2.66 GHz p4
512 MB of RAM

[Chief Rum]

Sun Dancer, you need to set the desktop screen resolution to 1152x768 or above. Then select the Windowed mode (or however it's called) in the game settings. Then it will appear in a Window.

CR