Download size is about 12mb (4mb for older version which has no music). If for you current version fails but some older version runs, please report that me by mail or skype (or reply on
my blog), all chances are I can fix it really quickly.
Note: the free beta has only 11 arenas (full has 33) , does not support saving of images and custom arenas from editor, and (most importantly for me) it does not directly help me pay my bills. If you like the game a lot, or want to use editor as artistic tool, and have some spare money, you may want to
buy the full version.
File redistribution: If you want to redistribute demo binaries online, you need to get my permission first.
Please note that international copyright law forbids unauthorized redistribution of copyrighted works in general. In the request, please be specific how you want to re-distribute. Hotlinks to these files are only permitted from pages wich contains well visible link to this page. The game is updated quite often with new bugfixes and features; I do not want people to download ancient versions which have issues that I have already fixed.
Review guidelines: In a review, please provide links to official pages. If you're writing review in diffrerent language, and really need to hotlink the files, you can hotlink them, but near the hotlink(s) you must have a link to this official downloads page, explaining that there might be a newer version available through this page. You may freely use any screenshots from this game you see on my site, and quote the content, in context of review - but you may not imitate or spoof this site. If you feel you need to store a copy of the binaries on your site, please contact me to discuss it.
System requirements:
Recent drivers. If anything is wrong, first try updating the graphics card driver.
Video memory: currently, 256 MB seem to be the minimum (let me know if it runs on 128), 512 MB recommended for big screen resolutions. I'll try to lower requirements to 128 MB if I can.
Known to work on following video cards: NVidia GeForce 9800, 9500, 8800, 7600, 5600(?), 280, 295, and other similarly recent NVidia cards, ATI Radeon HD 4650 (512 MB), 4850, 4870, 3800 (with latest drivers as of may 2009. Old drivers fail), and other similarly recent ATI cards. If it fails on such card, first update the drivers, if it still fails, send a bug report (as described in readme), if a card is indeed good and has the required features, there is a very good chance that I can fix it in same day.
Known not to work on following video cards: most onbroard graphics (in particular GMA), and old cards (in particular Radeon 1300, 1600). These cards lack required features.
Known issues:
FPS stutter on dualcore with nvidia or ati cards. In your video driver options, look for "threaded optimizations" or similar option and try disabling it. It was broken in older drivers, and may still be broken now.
Also, you can try choosing Arbitrary framerate (in display settings in Polynomial), or set CPU affinity for polynomial to 1 core.
On OS X, if video card has 256MB of video memory, full screen may seem to 'hang up' with keyboard locked. Use alt+command+esc to kill it, then delete the config.txt from the Resources folder in the bundle (or just delete whole bundle and re-unpack). I'm a little surprised that operating system where you can not even steal focus would not let user easily kill hanged up application, but meh. The hang up seem to be caused by massive slowdown when running out of video RAM, and does not happen on good graphics cards. It seems that OS X uses some video memory for it's compositing manager.
Segfault/crash under Gentoo and some other Linux distributions:
create ~/.alsoftrc with following content:
drivers = alsa
[alsa]
mmap = off
Proper fix is in progress. Fixed this now, above workaround shouldn't be needed.
OS X (rare issue): crashes once in a while, the 'console' crash log says "crashed in thread 3" and has apple audio in stacktrace for thread 3. It is a bug in Apple's OpenAL or apple audio drivers. Report it to Apple with full crash log. You could also try run the game with 'open Polynomial_osx.app --nosound' from terminal as temporary remedy.
FAQ
q: Does it work on 64-bit processor or 64-bit operating system?
a: Yes. 64-bit Windows is fully backward compatible with nearly all 32-bit applications. I have positive run reports from people using 64-bit processors and operating systems.
q: It crashed on Vista/Windows 7/amd64/quadcore
a: There is no known incompatibility with either systems or CPUs (though Windows 7 is a beta so your mileage may vary). Most likely, your graphics card or drivers are the problem. Please try updating the drivers, then if it still fails to run, report the bug to me.
q: If I buy full version now, will I get free updates and multiplayer account when multiplayer is implemented?
a: Yes, absolutely!
q: Can I review it?
a: Yes, you don't need any special permission to review it and link to my pages. However, if you wish to host a copy of the archive, or hotlink to archive or installer file on my server, you need to ask for my permission. I am updating the game quite often, with new bugfixes and features.
