Multiplayer Games Take so Long to Load I Often Drop

Title pretty much explains the gist.

I have been playing MP with mostly friends, and it takes forever to load into the game (up to 10 mins sometimes). I often drop, and we have to restart. Even when I do load in, it takes so long I often get in-game 30 seconds to a minute after my friends--obviously this can create some problems for my early game momentum as my PC races to catch up and my units stand around doing nothing for up to two minutes at times.

Usually I begin to constantly drop after about three to four games in. We recently started playing Wikinger mod with a bunch of new maps, and since then the rates at which I've been dropping and the loading time has increased greatly (posting this in the Wikinger forums as well).

I have a pretty bad PC, which I am sure factors in. I'm playing on a 2010 Alienware, shitty CPU, with a GTX 470 graphics card. I have noticed that the more detailed maps, larger maps, and the increased detail/functionality of Wikinger itself, tend to force me out of the game. I know this probably has something to do with the state of my PC, but I have no way of upgrading it anytime soon. Graphics are also on lowest settings. Any advice for a quickfix to this problem until I can fix/get a new desktop? I don't mind the loading time and the late start I get in-game so much, even though it is a thorn in my side. Looking for reasons I keep dropping//how to fix actually dropping from the game mainly.

Let me note that the game never actually crashes--I always just load in a bit too late and drop. But I can still play around on the map (with AI replacing my friends) leading me to believe maybe the perma-load makes the game think I have lost connection.

Help would be appreciated

Thanks in advance.

high texture and medium/high sound quality is somewhat drain way too much performance

try lower sound quality first it does effect gameplay exp but not the graphic if you worry about that

can you show us your setting ? and your pc information aswell ,i've been playing this game since i've got Athlon X2 270 Ram 4GB VGA 550Ti

back then i've used medium setting low AA low sound quality and maybe low Physic

Snip

Yeah, LimaOscarMike is on the mark. That video card has barely any VRAM for starters. That's going to cause major performance problems with this inefficient game. With only 1.2GB of VRAM available to you, you'll need to play on lowest texture settings, I'm sure. You can find out with either Process Explorer, or Task Manager if you have the latest version of Windows 10.

How much regular RAM your computer has will also be a significant issue. That's easier to upgrade (although pricey at the moment due to a global shortage).

Main points:

• Turn off in-game AA. It uses a lot of VRAM. Nvidia control panel will give you more efficient AA options
  
• Turn sound quality down. The highest setting uses a large amount of RAM.
  
• Lower your texture setting substantially and use Task Manager or something else to observe the result and find the sweet spot. Textures use large amounts of RAM and VRAM, especially in team matches.