for Restriction removal, or placing restriction settings in MapSizeDefs.xml.

What was the point of hardcoding a cap anyway? If people want their game to crawl to a stop, let them.

Seriously?   Talk about whiny self-entitled hate mongering.   

This post sums up exactly what is wrong with the review system that Steam uses.

Yeah, but what about the - probably massive majority - who don't want their game to crawl to a stop? That's the crowd Stardock are playing to - the Easy/Small crowd who like the cheesy pop fluff.

Stardock are damned if they do, damned if they don't.

That said, I think they should rightly say "Your computer can handle This Size Galaxy/This Many Opponents" etc. It's useful information. They should also allow players to over-ride their advice with a pop-up: "Do Not Bitch Online/To Stardock About Your Computer Slowing To A Crawl During This Game. We Will Ignore You If Not Outright Call You Stupid For Not Taking Our Good Advice" before the game begins.

OT - Kind of: Cablenexus makes a fair point regarding Steam Reviews - Stardock have explicitly stated the relationship between the positivity of Steam Reviews and the financial/manpower commitment to Galactic Civilizations III. Steam have - knowingly or not? My money's on "knowingly" BTW - allowed players to redo their review to exploit the powerful position they're in. Like Intrigue? Thumb Up review Monday. Hate Hardcap on map size due to computer grunt? Thumb Down review Tuesday. Rinse and Repeat.

I wonder if a Game Developer could/would take a Rating Company/Aggregator to court for directly costing them their job by showing prominently negative reviews of their former employer's latest game?

'

If you hurt Stardock financially by removing good reviews then you decrease the probability that your complaints are heard because SD won't / can't allocate as much resources to the game.

Apart from that it's very subjective what a player sees as fun crippling and what not. SD cannot satisfy all wishes.

There is no downside to including no caps. All they need is a specification notification/warning.

Those people would naturally play their game on smaller size maps, lower graphical settings, or a combination of both. It is not rocket science. There is no need for the devs to force it on the players. If the players cannot figure it out, then I am sorry to say that the problem is the player, and not the game.

While I empathize with your concerns, a reaction that includes other games seems punitive - like others have noted (and true), it has consequences, on real people, that you can't know.

Indeed, that is often the case.  If the game crashes because they are playing on a map size that makes it prone to do so, they don't often blame their selection or specs, they blame the game.  

Even with a prior warning, people would still complain (and perhaps use a poor review as a weapon) that it was the game and not their specs.  That said, I have (and will continue to) advocated for it as it seems to round all the bases at least.  I will again speak with the producer on such a prompt.

Is GC3 a bad game because it protects people from crashes with map size restrictions?  Of course not - but a collection of poor reviews just because of an issue of debatable significance (or without any context at all) will likely have some people assume it is. That is a shame. 

Again, I am on 'Team warn' and will do what I can to see if it can be implemented.

Thanks for your feedback and support, guys - means a lot.

Regards,
Sean Drohan
Stardock Customer Service Manager

I like the warning idea vs the no choices idea. Thanks for sending it up the chain Sean!

What is the largest consumer of the processor and RAM on a ludicrous or insane map? Is it not influence being calculated for all the thousands of tiles and for all the players?

Why not nerf influence on these massive maps, as that's only part of the game. Severely restrict it to x tiles from it's source. I want even more massive maps than you have made and dont give a hoot about influence. Turn it completely off for all I care.

ships are actually more a problem of cpu (pathfinding),

a big factor for ram is fow, which also means if you play with less than recomemndet factions you need less ram,

thats why its no problem for me to play the biggest maps with only 24gb of ram.

I also think a hardcap isnt the best way, just make a popup when you try to start the game with less then recommendet specs,

that tells you its not a good idea but you can just click do proceed anyway^^

Any news on this issue? I'm still waiting now two weeks to start a new giant game on my old rig. I see the Steam reviews went from 76 % to 66 % mixed score. I deleted my negative review already because what you stated that it can have consequences for real people.

I respect that.

But do you continue to restrict your customers who paid THEIR hard earned money for a game they can't play anymore? Or are you guys remove the hardlock anytime soon?

Thank you!

Tested and confirmed. It works. Now back to chugging on my game.