Hey guys, Just bought Planetary Annihilation on sale aaand I haven't been able to play a game yet, because the game always exceeds my computer's available RAM (4 GBs), even on the games lowest settings. I start up the first battle in the Galactic War mode (just one planet, moon, and star) and after five minutes or so of beginning to build units, Windows warns me that I'm reaching the limit of my RAM and to close PA.exe. After another minute my whole computer freezes up, and then throws out a memory error after the game (and usually Steam too) crashes. Any fixes? I've checked out the other threads, but even their advice on RAM usage didn't really help. Also, is it normal for the game to create 10+ of those UI.exe processes? Added my dxdiag .txt file too, but just quickly I'm running Win 7 x64, GTX 460, 4 GBs RAM, and AMD 4 core 3.2 GHz. The game runs fine FPS wise until the crash.
No fixes. Though you can play smirmishes with AI on pre-generated planets with memory usage you sure about. Yes.
Just do all you can to minimize RAM from other stuff. Make sure your web browser is closed (they eat a TON of RAM). There are plenty of people with 4 GB who can play the game fine on smaller planets/systems. Try going into the system designer and making a moon at around 400 radius and see how much RAM that takes. Your never going to be able to play on a 1200 radius planet on 4 GB, but you should still be able to play on systems with a few small planets. If it's financially feasible for you, get another 4 GB of RAM to play PA to its fullest.
Financially feasable being. under most circumstances, the ram costing $50. Just check into it, depending on if your motherboard has free room and a limit to ram and what kind of ram.
Yeah it's possible for me to get more RAM, it's just a nuisance when I thought I could run this game relatively hitch free given the minimum specs do say that 4 GBs is enough (devs should really raise those minimum specs honestly, if you're having to optimise your system just to run the game under only specific cases on minimum specs, those are not minimum specs). Even in a tiny system my RAM maxes out. Thanks for all the help guys.
Minimum specs for something means you can run it, that's it. Recommended spec are what you should have for a smooth experience.
Eh, it kinda sorta is minimum specs. I used to have 4g ram, and ran the game. It runs on most maps. Most people don't play over 700 unless and even if it is a 8+ person game. Any less, you couldn't run the game even as a client to a host and even at lowest settings and lowest planet size. And tbh, with 4g ram and a 1g gpu and 2.8ghz cpu, I think you would barely be able to play singleplayer 1v1 AI on a 400 planet. I would doubt any less would run a client and server on same setting which singleplayer would do. Any more would actually probably start doing better than the Uberent servers currently do.
Conventionally, minimum specs are there to tell you you can run the game from start to finish. The fact that I can't get further than 6 minutes in a small, standard game, is pretty troubling. Also, are you guys saying multiplayer is far less strenuous than playing against AI?
I have 4 gigs of RAM (Game uses 86 - 98% of my RAM) with a i3 2.3Ghz Quad core cpu and Intel HD 3000, I can finish multiple games, but sometimes my computer entirely shuts down... (Most likely due to either overheating or intensive pagefiling) Also, I agree with what Trophy said about minimum and recommended. I really need to buy more RAM! But it's 100 dollars for two four gig sticks that can fit in my particular motherboard...
its moments like this when I'm really glad to have 4 RAM slots, makes putting 8 GB in there cheap(er). The thing with minimum specs is they can't test every system with those specs, Uber doesn't know what other stuff is going to be running at the same time. On their end, it probably was able to play GW and AI skirmish just fine on smaller systems.
The game is still under development and will likely use less memory when complete. I know the Linux client currently uses significantly more memory than the Windows version. System size (planet size, number of planets) and the number of units (and thus number of players) is what eats up your memory. Playing versus AI or human makes no difference apart form the number of units they're likely to create. This is primarily a multiplayer game with no limit on the size of solar systems. There is (currently) no amount of memory that can't be maxed out with this game. So with the minimum specs you're only going to be able to play the smallest systems (which are still fun). Currently to enjoy the game I would upgrade to at least the recommended specs, if you can.
