Hi all :). I have a big MTW problem

[Sonny]

Ello everyone. I just got Medieval and Viking Invasion yesterday, but for some reason on my computer it simply refuses to run. (BTW I tried posting this in the apothecary section but I wasn't allowed http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif)

My Specs
Motherboard: Nforce MSI motherboard
Cpu type: AMD Athlon XP 2100+
video card: Radeon 9500 Pro
sound card: Creative Audigy 2
Ram: 512mb
monitor: NEC MultiSync FE950+

software on my machine:

operating system: Windows 98 SE
directx version: 8.1
vid card driver version: Catalyst 3.8
sound card driver version: 5.12.01.0383
which Total War game: Medieval Total War
anti-virus software: Norton Antivirus
firewall/proxy (software type): Zonealarm

The Problem
OK my problem: I can install Medieval fine, but when I actually execute the .exe file to run the game, the small Medieval intro graphic square appears, then disappears after about half a second. The game doesn't continue to run after this (the Program doesn't even get to the stage where it appears in the taskbar).


Things I have already tried to do:
(Failed means the game was still unable to run when this was tried)
Install the game on another PC - SUCCESS (no problems)
Try every game and patch combination on non-working PC (i.e MTW, MTW patch, VI, VI patch) - FAILED
Uninstall Directx and try Directx version on game CD - FAILED
Uninstall Graphics drivers and try older version - FAILED
Complete Uninstall-Reinstall (6 times) - FAILED
Reinstall DVD ROM - FAILED

By the way, the strange thing about this problem is that I also have Shogun:Total War and the Medieval:Total War demo on my PC now, and they both work perfectly with no issues.
I am really stuck with what to try now. Does any of my Hardware/Software conflict with the game to your knowledge?
Thanks in advance for any help you can offer me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif. Great site btw.

Sonny

[Snowhobbit]

I dunno what to do... maybe some moderator could move this to the Apothecary...
Edit: And welcome to the org http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

[Shahed]

Greetings and Welcome to the org http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/pat.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

Hmm I had the same problem sometimes, but it was usually fixed if I simply rebooted my PC.Copied your message to the Apothecary, here. (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=2;t=12191;r=1;&#top)

[brent_james]

Mine used to do that intermittently. Sometimes it just wouldn't load, and I would try again, and it would.
Also, I had that problem and I couldnt get into the game, until I realized I had a wrong patch version of one of the txt files (unit or building txt files). When I put the proper file in there, it booted.

[Orda Khan]

Those specs should be quite adequate. I have experienced many silly, niggling faults and I get this one too from time to time but a reboot does the trick, as Sinan says. I find a reboot necessary before I go on MP otherwise my first game will crash

....Orda

[Shahed]

You got some more replies here. (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=2;t=12191;)

[Sonny]

Thanks for your replies everyone http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif. Unfortunately I still can't start the game though http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif . I'll tell you what I tried to do this evening:

Complete uninstall of game, graphics drivers, Windows Media Player and DirectX. Disabled hardware acceleration on the Audigy card and disabled it in the system panel. All items on the taskbar were disabled at startup so that only Explorer is running.
I then put on the basic graphic drivers that came with the card (I think version 3). I installed MTW, put on the version of directx that came on the CD and reinstalled Media Player (latest version).
I tried to run the game then, but it didn't work so I upgraded my Graphics drivers to version 3.4. No success - so patched to 3.8. Still no luck, so I tried installing DirectX 9.0b. I then enabled the Audigy Card and put hardware acceleration back on. That didn't work either http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif.

I made sure to restart the computer after every change I made, and also a few times after all changes had been done just to be sure.

I'm really stumped http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif . This problem just doesn't make sense I have the Medieval Demo and Shogun Total War both working perfectly on the same system, which suggests to me it is unlikely to be a Graphics/Sound card issue. The game works on other computers so the CDs aren't faulty. I have tried running the game with a No-CD patch which made no difference, so it isn't a problem with the DVD-ROM.
It seems to me that it must be an hidden piece of software/file that comes with the game or was on the HD already, which prevents this PC from running it.

Anyway, thanks all for taking the time to read about my problem and especially for your useful replies http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif.

P.S. Jacque Schtrapp - Could you give a slightly more detailed explanation about how you skip the intro? I tried it the way you wrote it but it didn't affect the game at all.
Also, does anyone know how I could check if my .txt files are the right version?

[Kraellin]

ok, i'm not running any ati cards at the moment, but arent the 3.4 and 3.8 also catalyst drivers? in which case, this would still apply:


Quote[/b] ]ATI® users - If you experience any problems running Catalyst™ version drivers, please revert to your previous driver set. (from the index.htm that comes with the game)

which is exactly what i posted in the apothecary. now, to me, that means GET RID OF THE CATALYST DRIVERS AND TRY SOMETHING ELSE

K.

[Sonny]

Thankyou for your continued assistance all http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif.

I just tried downloading all the Windows updates that seemed relevant from the site, but I still have no luck with the game http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif.
The only thing for it is a complete reinstall of Windows, which I'll be trying tommorow evening. If any of you have a brainwave before then please let me know.

[Kraellin]

sonny,

going back to your first post, you said
Quote[/b] ]the small Medieval intro graphic square appears, . did you see the graphic there or just a white or black square?

if it was just a white or black square, then this is why i'm stressing other drivers so much here. if you actually got the proper graphic or intro movie, well, it might still be drivers but might also be something else.

also, i'm curious. how did you uninstall directx? and have you run dxdiag?

also, disabling the hardware sound acceleration in the control panel wont do it, you have to do it in dxdiag for it to be effective. one of those oddball windows things.

turn off anti-aliasing and anistropic filtering. and is that vid card agp or pci?

try getting just mtw working first. dont worry about patches or vi for now.

K.

[Sonny]

Sorry Kraellin just realised I haven't answered your posts -

The drivers I have tried for the graphics card were the default drivers that came with the card (version 3 I think), version 3.4 (downloaded a while ago) and the latest version 3.8. The install of each version made no effect on the problem I am facing.
I uninstalled directx using a program called DirectX Eradicator 1.09. As far as I could see directx was completely removed when I tried it.
Currently, all Directx Diagnostic panels show 'Enabled' buttons for sound and graphics.

The graphics card is AGP 128mb Radeon 9500 Pro. I have tried turning many graphics options of including what you mentioned but to no effect :/.

Being more specific about the intro square - It has aDark blue and black coloured background with what looks like silhouettes of spears, and the Medieval Total War logo in the foreground. After 1/2 a second of seeing this, every single time it has disappeared and the program ceases to load.



I hope that's made things a bit clearer http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif.

[Sjakihata]

Uninstall the catalyst drivers completly, insert you windows cd and update you vid drivers from the CD eg. standard windows drivers. Now see if this works.

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif - You could also try to contact CA / AV support.

[Kraellin]

ok. thanks.

the thing is, the drivers that came with your card, the 3.4's and the 3.8's are ALL catalyst drivers, if i have this right and the index.html that comes with the game says if you're having troubles with cat drivers, get something earlier than the cat drivers.

what Sjakihata suggests may also work. depends on what microsoft packed in there, but that will surely get you earlier than the catalyst drivers.

you might also try updating windows media player. sometimes the codecs on older versions dont work, or one slips in there and messes things up. also make sure that win media player is the default player on your machine. the thing that comes after that intro splash screen is the intro movie and it sounds like your machine isnt making the transition from the splash to the movie and that could be wmp or vid drivers.

also, set your refresh rate for the monitor to 'optimal' if you have this setting available. that will let windows and the game determine the refresh rate.

make sure too that you are running the game in a resolution that doesnt exceed your desktop resolution. best to try the standard 800 x 600 when trouble shooting this stuff.

win98 doesnt make the transitions from screen to screen and media to media quite as well as say an xp machine and you're dealing with a lot of different generation stuff here all in the same machine. you've got the older mtw game, later vid card and mobo, later vid drivers, but an earlier operating system and a mid-range directx. matching up all this stuff can be a trick. and from what i've seen, you usually have to go back to earlier drivers. getting the latest drivers doesnt always take into account what was going on 3 years ago, or 5. so, finding the right drivers isnt always just a matter of getting the latest ones. i use some VERY old drivers on my win98 machine and they work very nicely. i NEVER update them.

frankly, with all the various options and possible configurations, it's surprising that more folks dont have problems. so, generally, the industry does pretty well, but sometimes you just have to go back a bit to find what was working then and use that.

K.

[Sonny]

OK I've finally got it working... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

All it required was a complete uninstall/reinstall of Windows to do it http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif. It was a bit of overkill but in the end I didn't care, I just wanted to get the damn game running http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif.
I think it must have been some bad registry entry somewhere in windows or something like that, because I am using all the same driver versions as before and my vid/sound card work fine.
If any of you have a similar problem to this one, it looks like reinstalling windows is the only surefire solution :/.

P.S. Thankyou everyone who took the time to help with this problem, the input was much valued http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif. Its nice to know there are still game communities around like this one that will stop to help out the n00bs http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif. Great site

Now back to the important business - I'm off to invade France See you soon http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif.