STW WE Crashes to desktop

[Unemployed Druid]

I had been playing (and REALLY REALLY enjoying ) STW WE Campaign mode for nearly a week until, on clicking End Turn the game crashed to the desktop at Summer 1559. I've tried loading from an earlier save point and reducing my activity (e.g. pulling armies out of invasions) in the season that leads to the crash, but it makes no difference: the game still crashes. I've registered on the official TW forum and having read through a lot of threads there, tried a lot of the suggestions posted to help other people experiencing crashes and it STILL crashes. From what I've read and tried I've come to the conclusion (PLEASE somebody, prove me wrong&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif that this game and MTW is fundamentally flawed. I am totally gutted about this.
But life goes on and I hope to find another game to fill the empty chasm. Does anyone know of a game that offers the strategic and battle aspects of TW but without the problems?

[Jacque Schtrapp]

Welcome UnemployedDruid http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

Unfortunately, no game is perfect and the TW series does have its share of flaws. Here at the Org you will find many of us choose to overlook these quirks. There just might be a solution to your problem though. If I remember correctly there is a ctd bug that has to do with simultaneous targeting of one general/heir/daimyo with either two ninja or two geisha (can't remember which http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif ) I'm sure one of our STW fanatics can clear this up and I'd be surprised if in 24 hours you don't have an answer and are on your way to raise your battle standards once more. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[Gregoshi]

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif Hello Druid and welcome.

Question for you: do you have the 1.02 patch installed? See this thread, it may be describing your problem - and the solution is the patch: Crash to Desktop STW (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=2;t=1652;hl=stw+and+crash)

Note that there are few posts talking about CTD with MTW, but most posts are about STW.

If you can give us more information about your system, we (by we I mean not me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif ) might be able to solve the problem.

[Unemployed Druid]

Thanks for the replies
I did have a Ninja assigned to assasinate an Envoy. There were also 2 battles, the death of a Daimyo, the promotion of one of my Generals and a visiting Envoy at my Throne room (Throne room is enabled, so I see the video of it). So quite busy. Originally I personally dealt with the battles but when trying to get the game going after the crash I let the AI deal with them (and embarrasingly the AI did better than me&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif. I have just tried unassigning the Ninja, I did this by moving him to another Province where I was given the option to unassign his assasination mission. But the crash still happened unfortunately. Oddly although all the other event happened as listed above (at end of turn for the season immediately BEFORE the crash), the assasination attempt DIDN'T appear with the usual video sequence, but the Ninja had moved to the Province that the Envoy had occupied and I think the Envoy has dissapeared (he may have moved without me noticing).
I installed the patch v1_02b (as included with the Sold Out version of the game) but I installed it AFTER the crash. Maybe this has messed things up? On patches, the Total War site refers to 1.02b for STW WE, and also a patch called 1.12 (I think it's 1.12) for STW, so is this second patch 1.12 appropriate for STW WE?

My system comprises: ECS K7VMM+ M'Board
Athlon XP 2000 CPU
256MB DDR RAM
60GB 7200RPM Seagate HDD
52x35x52 CDRW
Asus V9180 SE GeForce4 MX 440 8X Graphics card (M'board is 4X AGP), Mai driver nv4_disp.dll, version 6.14.0001.4345
On-board VIA AG'97 Audio (WAVE), Version 5.12.0001.3820 sound
56K INT V.90 Modem
Floppy drive etc.

I really don't think there is any problem with my system spec for this game or MTW.

I really hope this crash problem can be sorted out: I'm getting serious withdrawal symptoms

[Unemployed Druid]

Forgot to say that my OS is XP Prof with Service Pack 1.
DirectX 9
Downloaded Media Player 9 following raeding this as a solution elsewhere.
My crash comes when I click End Turn, not at the other places mentioned by some others.

No STW WE this weekend by the looks of things. In my opinion the flipping people who are making money out of these games should get off their fat arses and sort it out
I bought this game in good faith and I didn't expect all this hassle. Feeling grumpy.

[Unemployed Druid]

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif Well unfortunately the optimism of Jacque was misplaced: not only is a solution unfound in 24 hours but even so after a whole week. A whole week with no STW WE I could cry

I attempted to uninstall the game. Went via Start\STW WE\uninstall and via Control Panel\ Add Remove etc, but neither would allow me to uninstall - due to something or other being corrupted. So I deleted it in Explorer and deleted the Start menu entry and desktop shortcut. I have reinstalled it of course and I've also installed the v1.02b patch BEFORE playing this time (I previously installed the patch AFTER the crash, which probably wasn't much help). Trouble is the looming posibility of further crashes WILL reduce my enjoyment.

I still need help here please.

[frogbeastegg]

I can only offer a couple of basic suggestions but you never know, they may help.

Firstly you said you DX9, have you upgraded it to DX9.0b? I had a lot of problems with Shogun and DX9.0 but they disappeared after I upgraded to DX9.ob.

Secondly since you have XP have you tried using the compatibility modes? I needed to run Shogun.exe with windows 98 for stable gameplay.

Thirdly have you had any sound problems at all? At one point (couple of years ago) I had glitchy sound and the game kept crashing on the campaign map. I turned off sound acceleration in windows and both the sound problems and the crashes disappeared.

I'm going to point this thread out to Kraellin; he's the resident expert. Hang in there Shogun can be a technical nightmare but it is a fabulous game.

[Unemployed Druid]

Hello Frogbeastegg and thanks for your reply. Not known many people with that name....

I have upgraded to DX9.0b and I have downloaded and installed up to date graphics and sound driver. All these done this week on the advice of EA support before they abandoned me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif ,see other thread.

I have had absolutely no problems with sound or graphics but I did try turning off sound acceleration. As with all the other suggestions this didn't solve it. I havn't yet tried a compatibility mode change so I must try that.

Thanks for the help http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

[Kraellin]

Quote[/b] ]I attempted to uninstall the game. Went via Start\STW WE\uninstall and via Control Panel\ Add Remove etc, but neither would allow me to uninstall - due to something or other being corrupted.

umm, if you can get that message to come up again and tell me exactly what it says, the one about 'something corrupted', that might help. you shld be able to un-install the game by using either add/remove programs or the uninstaller that comes with the game. but if you're getting a message about a corrupt file, then i'd say let's start there, but i'll need to know what that message said.

also, if you do manage to get the game uninstalled, install it again without the 1.02 patch and see if the game will run. no need to complicate things further before we fix what's wrong.

if you do get the game working again, without the patch, then, and only then, install the patch again and see if it works. if it then crashes, then you've most likely got a corrupt patch file and you'll need to erase the one you have and get another.

K.

[Count Alfred von Schlieffen]

Quote[/b] (Unemployed Druid @ Nov. 28 2003,05:11)]Hello Frogbeastegg and thanks for your reply. Not known many people with that name....

I have upgraded to DX9.0b and I have downloaded and installed up to date graphics and sound driver. All these done this week on the advice of EA support before they abandoned me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif ,see other thread.

I have had absolutely no problems with sound or graphics but I did try turning off sound acceleration. As with all the other suggestions this didn't solve it. I havn't yet tried a compatibility mode change so I must try that.

Thanks for the help http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif
Frogbeasteggs username undoubtetly comes from that other marvelous game that the computer industry has brought forth: the Thief series.

Sorry to hear from all those game troubles. I wish I could help, but I am not much of a computer expert myself. I can but pray to whatever kami or boddhisatva or saint there is that specializes in solving computergame crashes. With the big Japanese gaming industry, there's bound to be one.

Ganbatte onegaishimasu ne http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/pat.gif

[Unemployed Druid]

Hello all. Firstly apologies for not getting back to those of you offering help - I've been very busy studying http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-book2.gif for my Cisco CCNA2 exam (passed with 88.5%) and now onto CCNA3, so I've been too busy.

Did get well into a campaign before Christmas and got to a very tense stand-off situation, which I was very much enjoying until a dastardly Legendary Geisha proceeded to systematically kill off all my heirs before eventually killing my Daimyo. This completely ruined a really absorbing game (well it ended the game). This, following previous crash problems, has put me off the game so much that I havn't played it this year. But the bug (not computer type bug) bit deeply and I return. Does anyone know if it is possible to delete LG's from the game - as far as I'm concerned they are far too powerful and spoil the game. I have seen a post in the Sword Dojo advising to raid and destroy Geisha Houses, which I think has to be done BEFORE the creation of a LG so would mean allocating a lot of resources to seeking out possible GH's (because unless you have your own LG once an opponent has one you're stuffed). I'd prefer not to have to allocate what I consider to be far too much time, attention and resources to a problem which I believe is completely unrealistic in the game. Does MTW have a similarly unrealistic and game-ending entity such as the LGs? Is there a way to delete LGs from STW WE?

As ever, any help, suggestions, comments and/or observations will be much appreciated.

Belated Happy New Year to you all.

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

[Gregoshi]

Welcome back UD. Glad to see you made it past your CTD problem.

I vaguely recall there being a way to mod-out the geshia, but I'm not 100% sure. Aside from that, your best bet is to make sure you get the LG first. Then, so as not to disrupt the game, only use them as body guards. I think a LG vs LG (almost?) always end in both dying.

MTW only has assassins which are the equivalent of ninjas. You need not worry about unstoppable female Terminators in MTW.