> What is required in order to play Warlords II via email on a Macintosh? The standard method is to use your favorite flavor of StuffIt (or Compact Pro) to compress the files, and then use email software capable of transmitting files as MIME attachments. This is a relatively painless way of getting the file from your saved game folder to the next player's, with minimum transmission cost. My own personal favorite software for this is DropStuff for the compression, and Eudora for emailing. As a more complicated alternative, you can use a BinHex utility (available on the FTP archive sites) to encode the files as ASCII text and email the ASCII text as if it was a regular text message, but that leaves more work for the person receiving the file. Also, not all mail programs can send/receive long text files, so it may be necessary to segment the BinHex and reconstruct it, which can be tedious.For more information, see Transferring PBEM files in the Game Setup part of the Warlords II PBEM Web Site.
For other play-by-email questions, also see the Warlords II PBEM Web Site
Note that the Demo is based on version 1.0.4, which is much slower than the 1.0.7 release out now.
We're now up to version 1.0.7 (Memory and DOS-format save file bugs fixed).
You can download the binhex from Matt Schikore's Mac Page (sorry, this archive is now dead)
Note: the updater only works if you have version 1.0.3 or later to begin with. If you have versions 1.0.1 or 1.0.2 then you will need to contact SSG. Send (polite) email to Gary Makin, garym@ssg.com.au, and they will take care of you. (Hopefully in the future SSG will make the patches available directly from their Web page.)
When all the players resign at the same time, and on the same turn, Warlords pops up a message: Since there are no other player, no one wins! (or something to that effect). Then, when you click, it says "push any button to exit to DOS"...now...if I'm not mistaken....MAC'S DON'T HAVE DOS!! When I click again, it goes pack to the previous message...then back to the DOS message..then back to the original message..and so on. You have to force quit the game to get out of it. :) - Eric Frierson
Another Mac bug - the game crashes violently if a hero is killed while holding a speed item and standing on a planted standard (version 1.0.x only). - discovered by Jim Panagos while attacking Bob Heeter, and explained by Mike Leung.
Looks like it's time to put up some info on Warlords II Game Versions and
Speeds on various machines:
In article <40br0l$cl6@life.ai.mit.edu> Steven Zwanger,
szwanger@gnu.ai.mit.edu writes:
>I downloaded the Warlords II demo version and have been playing it on
>a PowerMac (a 7100/66). However, it's been *incredibly* slow. I can
>sit there waiting for a full minute between moving two of my units.
>What can I do to speed this game up? Would turning off Virtual Memory
>help?
>
>Also, is the commercial version equally slow?
The Demo version is from an older version of the game
(1.04, I believe), and is therefore not as well optimized
for speed on a PowerPC. A lot of the updates (current
version is 1.0.7) have been focused on improving PPC speed.
I am running 1.0.6 right now (haven't had time to update yet),
and the Native version is *blindingly* fast on my 7100/80 when
I give it enough (>7 MB) RAM. So there is definitely hope. Using
virtual memory alone will kill you though, since the game has
its own memory management system and isn't happy with VM
on. I can wholeheartedly say that if you get the commercial
version, and you update to 1.0.6 or later, and you can turn off
Virtual Memory while giving the game enough RAM, then you
will have a whole lot of fun and possibly start complaining
that the game is *too* fast! (I sometimes have trouble following
the moves of the computer players, but I haven't flipped the switch
that slows them down; I enjoy watching my computer go faster
than I can keep up with. And I can always look during my turn to
see where they end up anyway.)
Meanwhile,
In article <40grus$434@newsbf02.news.aol.com> JKPhoebus, jkphoebus@aol.com
writes:
>I thought I would put this in on the same "slow warlords thread". It's
>not a response, but a question. I have Warlords II (original, which i
>haven't updated yet) which I'm trying to run on an LCIII with 4 megs
>boosted to 8 by RAM doubler. The game is interminably slow. Something
>like 20 minutes from start up until i get to move an army. . . I have
>tried changing the minimum ram allocation to get it to recognize the ram
>doubler memory, but the game seems to only turn music off automatically
>based on available memory. i can't turn it off manually. any
>suggestions? will the updater help? (I would down load it, but i can't
>until i get back to school where theres a faster access line (currently
>i'm at 2400 baud)).
I used to play on a Quadra 700, and while the game wasn't as
fast as it is now on my PowerMac, it was certainly playable.
Just as the game has trouble with Virtual Memory, it also has
speed trouble with RAMDoubler. The game does have internal
options that allow you to turn off the music manually, so
that should help you out. Updating the game to a recent version
should help you out too - one of the updates (I believe 1.0.6)
allows you to turn off the marbled backgrounds on the dialog boxes;
apparently drawing those is a major drain on system resources.
With that and other improvements, when I updated to 1.0.6 on my
old Quadra, the game went from being only marginally playable to
being downright fun. Of course, the other obvious solution
is to get more RAM, but short of that the best you can do is to
disable every system extension (except Quicktime), shrink
your caches, and squeeze the game into whatever you can manage.
You should leave the System with a few extra KB of memory though,
or you'll get crashes.
-------------------------------------------------------
The Bottom Line for Optimizing Warlords II Speed on a Mac:
-------------------------------------------------------
(1) Use the latest update; it helps. At least get 1.0.6.
Buy the game if you have to.
(2) Give the game as much RAM as you can find - but -
(3) Don't use Virtual Memory or RAMDoubler with Warlords II
(4) Run the Native version if you have a PowerMac.