Stardock Central

Join Date 03/2001

The Political Machine Beta 4A released

Stardock has released Beta 4A of The Political Machine to its beta testers. The Political Machine is a strategy game in which players take on the role of campaign manager in the upcoming US Presidential campaign. Users can become beta testers by subscribing to Drengin.net (http://www.drengin.net). Beta 4A provides a host of bug fixes and new content as the game heads towards its "gold" date.

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Hi,

More bug reports for you.

--Aaron

- Version 4A says it's beta version 5 on the main screen of the game

- On the introductory window when you begin a new game, why are you capitalizing "Advertising", "Carried Out", "Funds", "Raised", etc? I understand you like to capitalize game concepts, but some of those words would better be lowercase. Would make for a more readable paragraph. No one Likes To read sentences With Weird capitalization.

- What is the Engalan Value?

- On the "10 week" notice, there is a comma at the start of the 3rd line. Should be at end of 2nd.

- Webmasters (on the hire operatives screen) have two different effects listed. One at 50%, one at 75%.

- In reality, the webmaster has a 100% effect on newspapers and 75% for both newspapers and radios.

- Create ads - explanation of effects is messed up. For example, "...by 3 (Plus 4xhange to position". Or "...in state by 1 (Plus: 1". It ends there, no close parantehese.

- The halfway notice made it sound like I was losing. But I was winning at the time.

- What is the effect of a running mate? Game doesn't make it clear. Perhaps put something on the small screen when you click on the running mate.

- There are still occasional pauses in the game.

- What does a political operative do? He's the guy you get with a level 3 HQ. Put the effect on the small screen when you click on him. (You once said it's the same as a political consultant. If so, I suggest just having it create a political consultant. It's rendundant otherwise. Perhaps use the icon for something else in the game. Or have give him an effect other than what a political consultant gets).

- The end election was waaayyyyyyy too fast. Perhaps allow fast/slow election night as an option to the options menu.

- My opponent (Arnold S.) managed to raise and spent 249 political points (I raised 120), and $29 million (I raised $10 million). I spent most of the game taking out ads and buying/spending political capital. This was on tough level. Either it's horribly unbalanced in favor of the computer, or there's a bug in there somewhere giving him a lot of extra stuff. It is not appropriate if the computer is getting 10x the stamina that the regular player is getting.

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By the way, I'm pleased to see that most of the bugs I reported last time around have been fixed. Y'all are doing a great job.

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Just played another game. Again, the computer waaayyy outspent me and raised way more political capital than I. If I created a webmaster it lasted for perhaps two turns before my opponent wiped it out with a fixer. Eventually I stopepd bothering. It had half a dozen or so fixers in the game. Quite brutal, and it made operatives a bit less useful. Annoying, since without webmasters I couldn't hoped to match the computer in terms of money. Not a very enjoyable game playing against a computer player that had 3x the money and political capital that I did. And this was only on "tough" level.

Did find a few more bugs though.

- The Fixer text doesn't fit on his "hire operatives" screen.

- The consultant text features two different variations about what % chance each week it causes.

- In the webmaster text, "Media Professionals" should be lowercase.

- On the smear merchant text, "Political Quips" should be lowercase.

- On smear merchant text, the description ends with a command, not a period. Or perhaps the additional words don't fit in the space given.

- On consultant text, it says "candidates" with a s'. This should be 's. Aposotrophe before the s.

- On the Fixer text, you list single quotes around "The Fixer". They shouldn't be there, as you don't list single quotes around any other operative name on their descriptions. Be consistant one way or the other.

- The 10-week notice said the other candidate was in the lead. I was way ahead of the computer.

- Taking out an "I support" ad still says that I am blasting my opponent. Suggest a more proactive headline for "I support" or "I oppose" ads.

- On the news page about the HQ upgrade, you have the following mispellings: "dispite", "voulenteer".

- On the news page about Condi Rice making an HQ upgrade, it says "part of his week". Condi Rice is, I do believe, a woman.

--Aaron

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Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

+2412

Thanks Aaron. You know, if we had 100 of you on our team, we could conquer and enslave this planet. Whohahaha!

Please send us a tissue sample.

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I wish I had the time Aaron has; sadly, this has been a brutal several weeks for me.

However, I noticed at least one significant bug while playing in Campaign mode last time around, and I can't imagine that it doesn't exist in the other modes either. (This applies only to Beta 4; I haven't had a chance to play Beta 4a yet)

- When buying political capital, if you have only 2 free time left, there is a bug in the game that allows you to continue purchasing political capital ad infinitum. The button doesn't grey out, and thus you can just click on it forever. Perhaps this is why Aaron's Schwartzenegger is getting so much policap? Note: I did not see this in every case, so it's that worst form of bugs: the intermittant one.

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Uh-oh...got a CTD again with this build.

Stardock SmartException Logging Information
-------------------------------------------

OS Version : Windows XP
Video Card : Intel(R) 82845G/GL/GE/PE/GV Graphics Controller
Application Exception code: C0000094 INT_DIVIDE_BY_ZERO
Crash Addr: 0040370A 01:0000270A C:\Program Files\Stardock\Drengin.net\PolMachine\PolMachine.exe

Processor Registers (x86):
EAX:000006CB
EBX:0A55CAE0
ECX:86CB5EDE
EDX:00000000
ESI:00000000
EDI:0A061258
CS:EIP:001B:0040370A
SS:ESP:0023:0012FA94 EBP:0012FACC
DS:0023 ES:0023 FS:003B GS:0000
Flags:00010246

Current Application Call Stack:

Addr Frame Logical addr Module Name
---------------------------------------------
0040370A 0012FACC 0001:0000270A C:\Program Files\Stardock\Drengin.net\PolMachine\PolMachine.exe
0043A477 0012FBE0 0001:00039477 C:\Program Files\Stardock\Drengin.net\PolMachine\PolMachine.exe
00482966 0012FC10 0001:00081966 C:\Program Files\Stardock\Drengin.net\PolMachine\PolMachine.exe
0051E58E 0012FC3C 0001:0011D58E C:\Program Files\Stardock\Drengin.net\PolMachine\PolMachine.exe
77D43A50 0012FC68 0001:00002A50 C:\WINNT\system32\USER32.dll
77D43B1F 0012FCD0 0001:00002B1F C:\WINNT\system32\USER32.dll
77D45B2C 0012FD00 0001:00004B2C C:\WINNT\system32\USER32.dll
77D45F73 0012FD20 0001:00004F73 C:\WINNT\system32\USER32.dll

Debug information for each stardock app follows ....

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Thanks, Frogboy.

I'll play again when you have version 4B out. As far as I'm concerned, the balancing on this version is off and it's not very fun to play. I enjoy a challenging game, but that should be done by improving the computer's AI, not by allowing the computer to cheat (or receive bonuses) so greatly that it isn't a fair fight.

--Aaron

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Well, the game is really getting close with 4A, from what I've seen so far. However, the CDTs are back with a vengance for me. How do I get the smart exception tool to post a crash report?

Also, the intro movie does something wierd for me. It is a split screen with the bottom on top, and the top on bottom. Minor to me, I just turn off the intro anyway.

As before, PIII 933, 64M GForce 2, W2K

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Well, I tried one more. I managed to get to about week 24 before CDT. Had something odd happen before that. My first interview came about week 20, on joeuser.com. They asked me a question with no text in the question, but it had 3 answers: America should re-evaluate their policy, America should do something else that I can't remember, but didn't sound that good, and America should turn the middle east into glass. Well, I foolishly chose the first one. I then got a stream of about 4 questions which basically only had choices which said America is very bad and should be destroyed. Grrr... I guess the game wants me to be a war monger. The War on Terror became the most important issue for 25% of the country and went 100% to my Democratic opponent! Oof! What did it ask me?

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Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

+2412

Worked a lot on the AI today. Actually the AI wasn't spending THAt much political capital, it was a bug in how it was being reported.

But it's amazing at how some tweaks in strategy make such a huge difference in how the game plays.

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Comments/Bugs:

- In news, Fundraiser has the comment "SCOTT!!!"

- For the polls on the electoral map after election day, they should reflect the after-election-day result, not pre-election day polls, I think.

- No debates?

- In the Endorsements page, there's a blank endorsement in the top left corner - is that the buisness endorsment my opponent gets? - Also, sometimes, after getting an endorsement, the number of political capital will be -1?

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"Well, I tried one more. I managed to get to about week 24 before CDT. Had something odd happen before that. My first interview came about week 20, on joeuser.com. They asked me a question with no text in the question, but it had 3 answers: America should re-evaluate their policy, America should do something else that I can't remember, but didn't sound that good, and America should turn the middle east into glass. Well, I foolishly chose the first one. I then got a stream of about 4 questions which basically only had choices which said America is very bad and should be destroyed. Grrr... I guess the game wants me to be a war monger. The War on Terror became the most important issue for 25% of the country and went 100% to my Democratic opponent! Oof! What did it ask me?
"

I think that question was what if Al Qaeda sets off a nuke in an American City, how would you respond. The middle choice was something along the lines of "I can't really say what, but I would certainly respond to it"

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Also, getting crashes to the desktop sometimes when I try to go to the Win Endorsement page:

debug.err:

Debug Message: ******* Starting Game Shell *******
Debug Message: Going Fullscreen
Debug Message: Preparing to change display settings.
Debug Message: Now Fullscreen
Debug Message: Shell initialization complete
Debug Message: ***** Initializing Game *****
Debug Message: Timer Frequency is 0 1234dc
Debug Message: LoadAllModelsInDirectory: No files matching mask *.mdl.
Debug Message: LoadAllModelsInDirectory: No files matching mask Gfx\*.mdl.
Debug Message: LoadAllModelsInDirectory: No files matching mask Setup\*.mdl.
Debug Message: Added fonts: font2 font1 Arial13B Arial16B2 Arial10
Debug Message: Added fonts: Arial12 Arial12B Arial14 Arial14B Arial16
Debug Message: Added fonts: Arial16B Arial18 Arial18B
Debug Message: Initializing sound card.
Debug Message: Issues Loaded
Debug Message: Issues Tweaked
Debug Message: Loading 8 questions from Data\HardHitterQuestions.questions.
Debug Message: Loading 12 questions from Data\JoeUserQuestions.questions.
Debug Message: Loading 9 questions from Data\KingQuestions.questions.
Debug Message: Loading 22 questions from Data\NightTimeQuestions.questions.
Debug Message: Loading 11 questions from Data\OMaleyQuestions.questions.
Debug Message: Loading 4 questions from Data\SawyerQuestions.questions.
Debug Message: Question Files Loaded
Debug Message: Special Interest Loaded
Debug Message: Create setup screens.
Debug Message: setting size 0 x 0
Debug Message: MemMan: Unable to find pointer in GetBlockInfo. Memory system: EditFields
ASSERT ERROR in file \Projects\Pear\Source\memman.cpp at line 581.
Debug Message: Initialize Tilemaps
Debug Message: Set mouse.
Debug Message: Unhide opening menu.
Debug Message: Set update timer.
Debug Message: MemMan: Unable to find pointer in GetBlockInfo. Memory system: EditFields
ASSERT ERROR in file \Projects\Pear\Source\memman.cpp at line 581.
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
Debug Message: ******* GameStarted *******
ASSERT ERROR in file .\Source\Animation.cpp at line 32.
Debug Message: Trying to add animation that already exists. Disaster avoided
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
Debug Message: Your points: 236631.718750
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
*DEBUG ERROR: *** No edit field definitions for group passed to EditFieldsUpdate ***
ASSERT ERROR in file Game.cpp at line 2327.

and polmachine.err.cra:

Stardock SmartException Logging Information
-------------------------------------------

OS Version : Windows 98
Video Card : ALL-IN-WONDER RADEON
Application Exception code: C0000005 ACCESS_VIOLATION
Crash Addr: 0047D5A6 01:0007C5A6 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE

Processor Registers (x86):
EAX:00000001
EBX:0000000A
ECX:00000000
EDX:01B75453
ESI:01B7CB1C
EDI:01417F00
CS:EIP:0177:0047D5A6
SS:ESP:017F:00B3F9C4 EBP:00B3F9C4
DS:017F ES:017F FS:559F GS:0000
Flags:00010246

Current Application Call Stack:

Addr Frame Logical addr Module Name
---------------------------------------------
0047D5A6 00B3F9C4 0001:0007C5A6 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
004ED2A5 00B3FA34 0001:000EC2A5 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
00447C7C 00B3FA48 0001:00046C7C D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
0044872E 00B3FA58 0001:0004772E D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
004F157F 00B3FA78 0001:000F057F D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
0046DE30 00B3FA98 0001:0006CE30 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
0046DF48 00B3FAB0 0001:0006CF48 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
004640FD 00B3FAC8 0001:000630FD D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
00480449 00B3FAE8 0001:0007F449 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
00482966 00B3FB18 0001:00081966 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
0051E178 00B3FB54 0001:0011D178 D:\PROGRAM FILES\STARDOCK\DRENGIN.NET\POLMACHINE\POLMACHINE.EXE
BAABEB08 00B3FB80 0001:0001DB08 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\DDRAW.DLL
BFF7363B 00B3FBA0 0001:0000263B C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\KERNEL32.DLL
BFF94407 00B3FBB4 0002:0001B407 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\KERNEL32.DLL

Debug information for each stardock app follows ....

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I'm getting a freeze without a smartexception report whenever my opponent takes an interview.

Cheers

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I think that question was what if Al Qaeda sets off a nuke in an American City, how would you respond. The middle choice was something along the lines of "I can't really say what, but I would certainly respond to it"

No wonder they turned on me! That missing text bug can really bite you!

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I'm using Win 98 with a Geforce 2 MX 400.

Twice when I was playing the campaign mode as Gephardt vs Rice, the game would crash to desktop with no message. This happened when I clicked the "win endorsement" button.

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I just played what I could of the new build, until it froze up in the middle of exiting the operatives screen. Sorry, no SE because I don't think it triggered it, had to C-A-D out. Wrote down what I found for a change, and I apologize if I repeat anything.

-Opening movie still bad, and I am beginning to suspect my video card. It tends to do stupid things to good games.
-Version at bottom of the opening screen reads 0.0.0.101 RC 0
-When I went to purchase Political Capital, I noticed that it says the value is only 7 now, I assume this is what it has been changed to. But whenever I went to get one, I had to have 8 Political Capital on me, or I was told I didn't have enough. It would only deduct 7, but that little problem lost me a endorsement or two, so significiant problem.
-Conflicting numbers on the Webmaster, the general description reads a 50% deduction, but the short description reads 75%, and in the game when clicking on the Webmaster reads 75%.
-Can't read full general descriptions for Fixer, Smear Merchant, the short description below is fine.
-Conflicting numbers on the Consultant, reads 5% in general description, but 4% in bottom description.
-Whenever I went on an interview, and went back to check the news later, the news desciption of the interview had no name like "Interview" at the top, and no candiate name. Full description was fine when I clicked on it.
-Opponent seems to go to the news interviews, they dissappear at least, but the news never says they took the interview. Playing on Normal. Not taking them, or not reporting them?
-I would like a warning before I have to pick the VP, so I know what states are in the balance, and which states would benefit most from the VP being from there, every time it catches me by surprise and I have to think what states I don't have yet and guess.
-The Vice President seems totally worthless to me except as a bit of money and a state to support you without campaigning. Mine can't build HQs, can't give speeches, raise $, get interviews, and uses my main candiate stamina. Anytime I try to perform an action, it effects the state that my Pres candiate is in. He just eats stamina and cash. He should have his own stamina, and be able to perform actions, but the money from him and the Presidential candiate should be from the same source.

That's all for what I found. Great job on fixing earlier bugs, and the game works pretty good. Looks like another quality Stardock game!

Hardware:
Sony Vaio
Windows XP
x86 Intel 2.6 GHz
512 MB RAM
Mobility Radeon 64 MB 9000

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I am -still- having problems with the opening move. Framerate remains terrible, and the pink-corruption lingers.
System specs: Athlon XP 2Ghz, Win2k Professional, NVidia GeForce 4 4200

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Played another game, issues:

a) The 'victory' sound is corrupted for me. It (under Win2k) sounds much the same as all the game's sound did back in Beta 1.

[Edit: Removed known news ticker scroll issue].

c) Windows, such as reporting the opposition gaining an endorsement, would often not appear until after I opened and closed another window, such as candidate info.

d) What is the Engalan Value? e) I could not open any of the windows from the top bar (such as "News") or "Assets" twice in a row. The second time I tried to open it, the click would be nonfunctional. f) The computer player -still- jumps on 90% or so of the '?'s.

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I was playing a campaign and around week 6 William Taft went to California and stayed there for the rest of the game. He didn't do a thing...just sat there. As a result, I wiped him out on the electoral votes. A clean sweep. I played the next "victim", Gerald Ford, and everything worked fine. Not sure what happened to Taft. The game has Taft as a Californian...or at least, that's where he started the game...wasn't he an Ohioan?

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Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

+2412

We put up a new build on Friday that should address that.

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Well, the latest version doesn't even begin for me. When I try to run it, I get the message "failed to initialize display" and that's it. It won't run. I'm on a Pentium M 1.3 GHz w/ 512k memory using Windows XP. Actually, it's kind of funny, b/c the only version that has worked from start to finish was the first beta.

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That's 512 MB! Living in the past, I guess...

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ElChupacabra,

Try this....
1) Find PolMachine.ini. It should be in the same folder as Polmachine.exe
2) Set the "BehaviorFlags" to 132 (ie. BehaviorFlags=132)
3) If that didn't work, try 36

Please let us know if it worked.

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Hi,

I just played a game with the latest version on Stardock. I started making a list of errors until I realized they were the same errors I pointed out in my last message. I'll submit another list once you address the 30+ typographical / game errors I pointed out last time. It's a fun game (and better balanced than in the last version), but it's not worth my time to point out the same typos over and over and over and over...

--Aaron

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