FIXED! Screwed up fonts making things unreadable

Travathian · December 12, 2001, 18:23

For those of you with problems with a lot of the in game text being unreadable due to the fact its in the wrong spot, runs off the page, etc etc.

First off, deleting your fonts until you get under 256, or whatever inforgrames/firaxis says won't fix the problem. It has nothing to do with the number of fonts. It has everything to do with another piece of software and Civ3 installing conflicting fonts.

Goto your fonts folder. C:\windows\fonts or C:\winnt\fonts

Look for fonts LucidaSans****. There may be quite a few. Delete them all. No need to delete all of the Lucida, just the ones with Sans in their name.

Hopefully the game should look much better after this.

This is only a workaround, not a fix. Because you deleted those fonts, some other software MAY look funny. Maybe with this info Firaxis can patch this sucker.

I believe this is an issue with the font used in Civ3 and likely the naming/ID of it, and how it didn't get caught in QA is beyond me.

ps I tested this on 4 different systems, and would appreciate other people findings.

Kolyana · December 12, 2001, 22:42

I haven't had a problem with my fonts - except for the funky population number post-patch - but i truly appreciate your diligent hardwork and troubleshooting.

I'm actually slightly disgusted that Firaxis have been coming out with lame excuses and pseudo-solutions, whilst fans actually get to the nub of things.

Still, can't help but wonder why the frig we have to delete fonts to accomodate CivIII.

Travathian · December 14, 2001, 12:28

Well if you did have the problem it makes diplomacy and the Civlopedia very difficult to use.

Hasn't anyone else had this problem?

Ilkuul · December 14, 2001, 20:07

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

Ever since I got the game I've been battling this problem -- with me it meant deleting a few more fonts every time I wanted to play! I was down to about 220 (from over 700!). Incredibly frustrating -- there goes another font down the drain -- wonder what that will mess up??

Now in a few words you've fixed the problem and given me a clean, readable diplomacy screen every time I play! (I've reinstalled all 700 fonts, except the Lucida Sans's, and it works fine every time.)

Did I say it before...?

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

Travathian · December 17, 2001, 14:17

Well you're welcome, glad to help.

LeckerKase · December 17, 2001, 22:13

I had the problem that my text would go off the bottom of the screen during diplomacy and trade. I've never been able to get it to work before, so I had very high hopes for your solution. There's just one problem. I have no main menu now

. There are no entries on the main menu (where you would choose to start a new game, or load, etc.), just the background. Any ideas?

EDIT:
I just realized you might want to know which fonts I had and deleted.
LucidaSansDemiBold
LucidaSansDemiOblique
LucidaSansOblique
LucidaSansRegular

I'm sure there's someone out there with this problem, and hopefully someone who's figured it out.

Travathian · December 18, 2001, 04:21

Reinstall. Then it should only put the Civ3 fonts in there. If that doesn't work, try replacing each one of those fonts one by one, testing the game between each. If that still doesn't work, keep harassing technical support and refer them to this post. Good luck.

Trust me, its a much better game when you can actually read all of the text! Don't give up!

OJK82 · December 18, 2001, 17:38

Travathian, my brother and I truly love you. You are indeed fit to rule a Civilization to Stand the Test of Time.

Who'd have thought it would be something so simple?

We'd send you a Christmas Card, but we don't have your address, and I wouldn't recommned posting your address on the message board....

Travathian · December 24, 2001, 18:19

Save your money on the cards, just send me cash thru paypal, lol.

I'm curious to know, for those who had this work, if you ever identified the software that installed the other fonts?

For me it was some A+ certification testing software.

ct6671 · January 7, 2002, 20:59

Well done! I hope you have sent this fix to Infogrames themselves, as they need to fix this prob quickly. It has been a hassle with everyone I know of.

What a pain that they release a game knowing it has bugs (did you get a look at the huge list of things the 1.16f patch fixes? Don't tell me they weren't writing that as the game was being packaged and shipped!).

A great game, but very disappointing in it bugs. I will not be so eager to get the next one!

Anyway, you have made my MillenniuM! Thanks!

Travathian · January 9, 2002, 20:48

You all could always write to Firaxis and ask to make me a beta tester!

I'm glad this has helped people, I know it made a huge difference for me playing the game properly. And since the patch didn't fix it, I damn near gave up on the game! Spread the word!

ct6671 · January 9, 2002, 21:05

I sent a link to your solution to Firaxis, strongly suggesting they take a look and and fix the problem in another patch before all other players of the game go mad like we nearly did!
So, it may be a good time to register your interest as a beta tester!

ct6671 · January 9, 2002, 21:13

Thought you all would like to know that I recevied a reply from Firaxis about two minutes after I sent a link to this excellent bug fix.

Here 'tis. Again, well done Travathian!!
----------------------------------------------------------

Awesome. I will.

Jeff
----- Original Message -----
From: "Craig Pickering"
To:
Sent: Wednesday, January 09, 2002 7:52 PM
Subject: Bug Report: CIVIII

> BUG REPORT for CIVIII follows:
> -------------------------------------------------------
> Many people have has a problem with the writing in Civ3, especially in
diplomacy screens where some is not visible at all (it disappears down the
bottom of the page instead of appearing in the appropriate box), plus
over-writing in many Civilopedia entries.
> One genius has found a fix, which has prevented many fans (myself
included) from giving up on the game entirely (yes, it was that bad!).
> Please go to the link below for the solution, and for the overwhelming
reaction to it.
> I suggest you include it in your next patch, or countless others will give
up like I nearly did.
>
> http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...652#post691652
>
> Regards,
> Craig

Travathian · January 26, 2002, 14:56

I guess we'll see if they include it in this next patch. Be nice to not have to delete fonts I may actually need.

Purple · February 2, 2002, 19:28

I don't know whether this is related, but I had a problem with the font in the Load/Save Game dialog. It was too large, and consequently, the year of the save was not displayed for the Babylon civ--it ran off the right edge.

I solved this by changing "MainFontSize=16" to "ainFontSize=15" in the civilization3.ini file.

Oddly, I haven't experienced the other problem, despite a ton of Lucida Sans fonts in my Fonts folder.

The Andy-Man · February 3, 2002, 11:51

do we realy have to delete them, i just got this PC and i dont really wanna screw it up......

Purple · February 3, 2002, 16:23

Quote:

Originally posted by The Andy-Man
do we realy have to delete them, i just got this PC and i dont really wanna screw it up......

You can temporarily move them to another folder. Or you can rename them, in which case they will still be available under the new name, but will not interfere with Civ3's use.

In either case do it one font at a time until you achieve the desired results.

The Andy-Man · February 3, 2002, 16:43

how did they miss this problem anywho, they got the shittiest selection of fonts on their PC's?

marc420 · February 9, 2002, 07:24

Any word on a patch for this game?

They did one patch 2 months ago. And that patch apparently screwed up something in the middle of the game so that on my machine the game crashes in every game at some point in the industrial age. This happens so often I've finally removed the patch and am now playing with the original CD version .... which of course has serious issues of its own which is why they patched it in the first place. Arrrgh.

I notice the Civ3 website hasn't been updated since December. The Infogames FAQ page is friggen joke. I picked this topic to bumb back to the top of the list with my "Where the heck is the patch to the patch question" because lots of people have had this problem. But apparently to Infogames there are no Frequently Asked Questions because they aren't updated their website info like this fix to the fonts. And I know they know about this problem, because I emailed this solution to them after I a) had this problem, b) got no help from InfoGames, and c) found this solution that worked out on the forums. In my opinion, Infogames is a bunch of useless #!@%@!%$^.

Please, Firaxis, at least patch the last patch so that I can use the solutions that you put into that. Or put out some word that someone over there is alive and well and is working on this and that there is a patch coming sometime. No date needed, I know how touchy those can be. But word that there is another patch coming and a list of things that are definitely fixed in the next patch (Because I hope someone is working on some bugs and has some already fixed) would be wonderul.

Special Ed · April 11, 2002, 11:04

I have been working with technical support from the firaxis web site on this problem for over a month. Every few days he emails me a new suggestion, but they were all to no avail. I am SOOOOOO VERY VERY HAPPY that your solution fixed the problem.
I suppose the detonator driver I installed added somefonts, because it wasn't until after I had installed it that the problems started to occur.....

Well none the less, we have a solution so that is good enough for me!!!!

mantranet · May 17, 2002, 09:59

I also had loaded a testing program for the Network + exam. After that I had the font problems, uninstalled the Net+ testing software, all my problems went away!

Gelondil · January 9, 2003, 16:43

Can we get a mod to sticky this please?

alva · January 10, 2003, 11:24

What for ?

coyotetw · January 11, 2003, 14:31

Hi all

I also have a problem with the FONT. But this problem only show up when I want to play PTW. Everytime I run PTW it said something like this

FONT ERROR
ERROR LOADING FONT (ERROR CODE 13)

Does anyone know what that mean? Does it mean that I have to do all the fiddlings with fonts that was discussed before? Thanks for any advice.

Gelondil · January 13, 2003, 15:55

Quote:

What for ?

What for to sticky it? It took me 20 minutes (or 6 months depending on how you look at it) to find this post, and this problem has been bugging me forever.

If you have a better way for people to find this solution easily please do it - there may be many others out there who are still having troubles. In the end I guess I dont really care because my problem is taken care of.

Also, as far as I could see, this specific problem wasn't listed in the "official bug list" - though perhaps I missed it.

Marauder34 · January 15, 2003, 19:22

Ok this is going to be a little light in the information side since I am not sure why this worked.

I have been having a problem with the fonts in Civilization III. The font has always been slightly bolded, and a little too high (almost one line higher than it should be).

I removed all the Lucidia Sans and lsans fonts from the directory, but that did not work.

I even moved the font that came with Civilization into the font directory, but that did not work either.

I ended up doing a search for lsans, and founs a folder named Oplimit in my C drive (c:\Oplimit). In this folder was a file called lsans.fot. At first I ignored it, but later in desparation moved it to my desktop just in case it was interfering. I ran the game and it still did not work, so I exited. Now the funny thing. The lsans.fot was back. Thinking I had clicked copy and not move I deleted the file, and tried again. The game still had the messed up font, and I exited once more. The file was still there. Turns out every time I ran the game it made the lsans.fot file in the Oplimit folder. I tried to put the file in the font folder, but was told by my computer that it was not a valid font file. I then stuck the lsans.fot file in the civ III directory and tried again. IT WORKED!!!

I also own PTW, and have been getting the font error 13 and 28. Now that I have fixed this problem I am going to reinstall PTW and see if that problem has been fixed.

I hope some other computer guru can explain what I did in better terms, but I do not even know why this worked.

Marauder34 · January 15, 2003, 19:52

I tried installing PTW, but it still gives me the error code 28 font error. I am going to try and play with some stuff, but at least I can play the game (without the multiplayer expansion).

Marauder34 · January 15, 2003, 20:03

Just another update here. I tried putting the lsans.fot file in the PTW directory, and it removes the files everytime I get the Font error Error loading font (error code 28)!!! message.

coyotetw · January 16, 2003, 01:22

Hi Marauder34

I read your reply and did a search for LSANS.FOT. I found out that I have this file in my C drive, civ 3 and PTW folders. As far as I know these files are the same one (I have four of them each is 2KB). So I guess there isn't any point for me to move this file to PTW folder. I guess I am stuck with error 13 for now. I have had PTW for a week haven't had a chance to play. I have no idea what is taking infogames so long to reply my e-mail.

Marauder34 · January 16, 2003, 02:03

Hey Coyotetw, I tried putting the file in my PTW folder, but it did not work. I did get PTW to work without the new patch. I removed the 1.14 patch (the PTW patch) and also removed PTW. When I reinstalled PTW, I restarted my computer IMMEDIATELY after everything was done installing. When my computer booted up, I was able to play PTW. I tried installing the patch after this, but it did not work. One thing to note is that I opened the game and then exited before loading the patch. When the patch was installing, it gave some notification for some read only files it needed to edit. I gave permission to edit the files as needed, and then I got the error 13 again. When I removed the patch, the errors remained. When I also removed PTW, however, the error went away. At least it is working, even if it is not the latest version. I will play with it some more tomorrow. I'll post my results.

Key: Restart your computer right after installation...do not run the game or anything. That has worked so far (without a patch that is)