Smoke depiction in the Demo

[Whizkid]

Greetings to all.Well,I guess the Demo was a really smart move by the Developers,as I for one cranked out my $50 for the full version with nary a whimper on Thursday,figuring that I couldnt stand to keep playing the same Scenarios for ever.I really noticed how they modeled the Officers AI correctly,as they seem to go around in circles quite a lot!Seriously though,what a great Sim(I like that title more than Game)but I do have a question. In the Demo,the Smoke is shown by white polygons with black corners,as it used to be in 1980's Sims.Looks as amateurish as Hell,and worse when youre close.Please tell me its not like that in the full version,as Im going to be very disappointed.As a newbie here,Im sure a lot of this has been answered before but please bear with me.

[David Aitken]

Sounds like a graphics card problem - make sure you've got the latest drivers for your card/chip. If you're on a Mac, I could give you more specific advice, but I assume you're on a PC, so you'd have to ask someone else.

David

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There's a splinter in your eye, and it reads REACT

[Formerly Babra]

Also, be sure to toggle the hotkeys to hi-res smoke. You may have it set to "fast and compatible"

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Sounds like 100% weapons-grade bolonium to me.

[Hamstersss]

There are three levels of smoke you can have, just shift-K, IIRC, until you find what you like.

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You wouldn't know the dust of Thermopylae if it came up to you, handed you a business card reading "Dust of Thermopylae, 480 B.C.E.", then kicked you in the shins.

-Hakko Ichiu

[Spear]

I'm in the same boat with you, WhizKid. I was so blown away by the demo that I ordered the full game a week ago. I'm still waiting, patiently, as I know that all the favorable reviews are surely boosting sales beyond BTS's expectations. Hard to keep up with all these new orders, you know. Still, I'm always a bit disappointed to come home from work each day, only to find no shipment from BTS.

Anyway, I'm only up to my 3rd CM game, which is also my first attempt at the Valley of Trouble scenario. Last night, I just dropped my first smoke barrage on the pillbox with the 75. I thought, "wow, that's cool!" Although my frame rate drops a bit when panning past the smoke, I think it looks pretty good. Yeah, the smoke looks a little chunky when you're close up, but when viewed from the American positions, it looks fine to me.

Actually, one consistent theme that I've seen in the many CM reviews that I've read, is that the graphics are not quite as flashy as in many other of today's games. I play a lot of FPS games and flight simulators with some of the latest graphics, and I own a fairly decent system (TNT graphics card). Although I would concede that CM's graphics may not be quite up to state-of-the-art standards, they still look pretty good to me(at least so it seems from the many cool screenshots that I've seen on CMHQ - great work, guys). Also, with the constant stream of new mods and patches, the graphics will only keep getting better.

But the bottom line is, CM is such a great game with an innovative system and interface, that any minor blemishes in the graphics department can easily be overlooked, IMHO. CM RULES!! FIRE FOR EFFECT!! :

[This message has been edited by Spear (edited 08-25-2000).]