Update # 12 - Resuming Work & Crash Fixed

Resuming Updates

I’m glad to say that we are back to regularly updating Knights of the Crusades, with some great updates on the way.

Please also allow me to apologize for not updating the game for several months. Unfortunately, we found ourselves facing a publisher deadline, and same time finding a solution to the game’s biggest issue - the loading-screen crashes - literally took months.

There is some good news resulting from this break though. A great deal of new technology and engine improvements were developed at the same time, and we will now begin bringing many of them to Knights of the Crusades.

Update #12

With that said, let’s take a look at today’s update.

The most important change is the fix for the long-standing loading-screen crash.

This problem usually appeared during longer play sessions after repeatedly entering and leaving cities, hamlets, and battles.

Finding the true cause proved extremely difficult.

Over several months, we tested many possible explanations and attempted one solution after another. Eventually, we discovered that video memory was the culprit—but even after identifying the cause, it took another couple of months to fully resolve the issue.

There is one small disclaimer: it is still possible to encounter a video-memory overload crash, but this now requires continuously entering or leaving nine or ten large city battles within a single session. This should almost never happen during normal gameplay.

A special thank-you goes to everyone who submitted crash reports, log files, save files, and detailed descriptions of when the problem occurred. These reports were essential in helping us identify patterns, reproduce the issue, and finally resolve this engine bug.

Although the crash fix is the most important part of today’s release, this is a major update containing dozens of additional fixes, improvements, and optimizations.

We are very happy to be working on Knights of the Crusades again, and many more updates are planned for the coming weeks.

Thank you for continuing to support the game and You can find the complete list in the patch notes below.

Stability Fixes

• Fixed the loading-screen crash.

• Improved overall performance.

• Fixed an issue that could cause some graphics cards to overheat.

• Fixed a rare crash during combat.

• Fixed a rare crash on startup.

Reworked Call to Arms

• Calling lords to attack or defend an area now works much more reliably.

• Fixed several issues that prevented lords from sending armies in response to a Call to Arms.

• When a lord’s army reaches the designated location, it will now patrol the surrounding area and search for enemies.

Reworked Resources UI

• Made major improvements to how resource income and upkeep are displayed in the World Map Resources UI.

• Tax income is now displayed correctly.

• Fixed an issue with how base income was calculated and tracked.

• Fixed tracked values incorrectly increasing when opening a city or army.

• Added tracking for happiness bonuses affecting silver, food, wood, and stone production.

Other UI Improvements

• Fixed the positioning of resource bar tooltips on the world map.

• Buildings in RTS mode now display additional information, including upkeep costs and their effect on population happiness.

• Fixed attack request notifications sometimes overlapping.

• Cities that are lost or transferred are now updated on the minimap immediately.

Other Fixes and Additions

• Fixed an issue where some buildings completed in RTS mode appeared unfinished on the world map.

• Players can now loot silver from fallen units during combat.

• Units trained from upgraded town halls on the world map will now start at a higher level.

• Fixed poor-looking winter textures on Slavic village houses.

• Fixed a major issue that could cause nations to gain dozens of enemies.

• Relations with hostile nations now deteriorate faster than relations with friendly nations improve.

• Upgrading buildings now reduces their monthly upkeep.

• Fixed an issue where opening the New Campaign screen could remove the latest autosave.