EAW and Vista *sigh*

[Sinister]

As if I couldn't be any unhappier with Lucas' productions...

 

I recently got a new computer, which of course came with Microsoft Vista (applause). I installed Empire at War, and it ran fine. I then installed the expansion for EAW: Forces of Corruption. I try to run it and I get an "Exception has occurred" error. I contact Lucasarts and ask "what's the deal?" They tell me that my version of the game, which only came out a little over a year ago isn't compatible with Vista, and I have to buy ANOTHER copy of the two games I ALREADY OWN, called Empire at War: Gold Edition.

 

Unbelievable! I find it hard to believe that Lucasarts cannot write a patch to make the game I already bought compatible with Vista. It's not like EAW was designed for Windows 95! My other XP games work with Vista, such as Battle for Middle Earth II. And again, Empire at War works for it, but the expansion (Forces of Corruption) doesn't??? What kind of crap is that?

 

My loathing of all things Lucas has reached a whole new level. Now I wonder, if Rebellion will even run on Vista.

[DarthTex]

My loathing of all things Lucas has reached a whole new level. Now I wonder, if Rebellion will even run on Vista.

Don't forget to partially blame the evil Micro$ith Corp

[Eagle]

Forget about Vista. Erase it from your harddisk and install WinXP on it. That will keep you out of much more trouble.

[Sinister]

Forget about Vista. Erase it from your harddisk and install WinXP on it. That will keep you out of much more trouble.

 

I'm thinking about doing that. The only problem is, is that I have to hunt down all of the drivers I need for my computer, unless there is some way to extract them from the setup disk HP have me for the computer. I would love to do that, as it would certainly free up a lot of RAM, RAM that Vista needs in order to make itself look pretty.

 

WORK HARDER EVERYONE! GEORGE LUCAS NEEDS YOUR MONEY!

[Evaders99]

Be careful, some of the manufacturers decide not to provide XP drivers, esp where Vista is preinstalled. Surf the manufacturers web site and verify they have XP drivers for whatever model computer you have

[Bill]

Be careful about LucasArts, you say something wrong and they might never make another video game. And you know how they are, if they can make a buck they'll try to make 2.

[Sinister]

Well, here's an update on the situation:

 

Lucasarts and I have been emailing each other for a couple of weeks now trying to resolve this issue. They have suggested that I try a number of things, but none have fixed my problem so far. I am awaiting their latest email...

 

Oh, I tried to install Knights of the Old Republic today. It doesn't work either. It installs, starts up, but when I get to the character creation screen it crashes. I tried some of the suggestions Lucasarts gave me concerning Empire at War, but those didn't work either.

[Slocket]

Empire at War: Gold Edition if you want it to work on Vista. I own both games too.

 

meh, Vista strikes again.

 

As for new PC games from LA, after reading about Force Unleashed, I think they gave up on the PC (even though it takes a PC to design the game). Sad Indeed.

 

I do not want Vista unless they make it truly backward compatible with XP. Another probelm is the manufacture of video drivers -there may only be DX10 only with Vista. Now there's a kick in the pants. So what about all our treasured software game titles from the last 10 years?? Video card dies then you are up a creek without paddle?

 

I hope some companys can see profit in still making compatable hardware. We may never see anymore decent games (at least for not FPS for kiddies) released for PC platform. One reason to start making our own games...but so many good ones I have from the past I stil enjoy. Sad indeed.

[Evaders99]

there may only be DX10

 

Not correct, there is DirectX 9 on Vista and all those games should play just fine. Most games that have DirectX 10 support can have this toggle between DX10 and DX9.

[Sinister]

Well, if you can believe it, Lucasarts still has yet to fix my issue. This is really disappointing.

[Darth_Malice]

Strange because mine installed fine on vista and runs perfectly fine, mind you i had issues with it not installing properly, left it for some time, tried again and it works

[Sinister]

Now that is strange. What version of Vista do you have?

 

Hopefully mine will do the same someday.

[Krytos]

I was going to suggest you go to the Petroglyph forums and ask what's happening - but they appear to be down Great timing.

 

Darth_Malice: Is your copy of EaW the original, or the "gold" edition?

[Darth_Malice]

no mines a original copy, im just using vista home premium with service pack one, i set my exe to run as admin as it works fine, same with forces of corruption

[Krytos]

Hmm, strange. Sinister, have you tried changing files within the EaW folder to work in compatibility mode? Vista has an XP compatibility mode ... if you havn't tried it, it might work? Can't hurt to try at least

[Sinister]

I'm not sure. How do you do that?

[Krytos]

It's pretty much the same as with XP, you select a file or group of files, right click on them and go to properties. There should be a tab labelled "Compatibility", go to that. If there isn't it just means that the file type doesn't need a compatibility mode. There's a drop down list of the different compatibility modes, select XP SP2.

 

This article should be more helpful, including the compatibility wizard.

[Sinister]

That I have tried, but it did not resolve the issue.

 

Lucasarts tech support asked me to send a copy of my Logfile.txt and Except.txt files from the game which are in the C:\Program Files(x86)\LucasArts\Star Wars Empire at War Forces of Corruption directory. The first time I looked for those files they were not present in that folder. I uninstalled and reinstalled the game and this time the Except.txt did appear there, but the Logfile.txt did not.

 

This is rather baffling.

[Krytos]

Okie dokie, questions for thee:

 

What hardware does your computer have?

 

Have you downloaded the latest drivers for your video card?

 

Have you updated the game with FoC 1.1 patch?

 

If not, try the latter two. Hardware wise, check the manufacturers website for common issues or google it.

 

Do you have another computer you can try and install the game on to test that the CD isn't damaged

 

EDIT: Also, post up what that Exception text file says. You might try a Window search for the log file as well. In Vista, you'd need only to use Explorer to navigateto the Empire at war base directory and then use the search box in the top right for Log or whatever. Hopefully you'll find it, chances are you'll need to have run the game once before the log gets created

 

EDIT2: You know what I just remembered - I stopped playing EaW on my desktop because I couldn't play it for too long without the game crashing with said Exception error. I kind of diss-missed it as a fault with my system then, as my desktop has become renowned for crashing any and all games/programs. The OS is XP, though it is a 64bit processor - not sure if that plays a part.

 

EDIT3: Seems like the Exception bug is quiet popular.

 

From the LA forums:

"I was having the exception error too. Mine always showed when i first clicked Start Game or during the EAW logo before the LA or Petro logo animations. I started searching for a possible fix and found this:

 

http://pff.swrebellion.com/index.php?topic=4058.0

 

I tried and it fixed it. I can now play EAW with the 1.05 update with no problems. Hopefully this will fix it for anyone else who has it too.

Problem is, that's a dead link. You can try search or even posting on that site though, assuming they've got a fix/work around.

[Evaders99]

Well the new link should be

http://pff.swrebellion.com/forum/index.php?topic=4058.0

 

But that isn't going to the right topic either... Weird

[Darth_Malice]

when you uninstalled the games did you delete teh folders afterwards? when i did this it installed correctly and worked after setting the exe to run as a administrator (this also worked of the sith lords ), have you installed vista service pack one? this actually makes a huge difference to the system, i remember when mine wouldnt run the window would open for the game, the screen would go white and then it would just fail to launch, exiting the game.

 

Trust me just running something as a admin can solve more problems than you think, its one of the things i hate about vista, far to many things to "protect" the user

[Sinister]

I've uninstalled and reinstalled the game I don't know how many times, and I've done so as an administrator. I have Service pack 1.

 

I've tried looking on that site but I don't see the solution you are talking about.

[Krytos]

Bugger. You might try posting on their forum? Apparently this bloke on LucasForums found it on their forums, so hopefully it's their ... somewhere

[Sinister]

FINALLY...

 

I emailed Lucasarts yesterday and when they got back with me they had a new solution. Go into Msconfig and under the boot menu, adjust the maximum amount of memory. Apparently, PCs with more that 3GB of RAM have trouble running the game.

 

Anyway the game works now. Can you believe it?

 

Oh, and guys, thanks for trying to help me. I appreciate it. May the Force be with you all.

[Krytos]

Woo! Now you can play it finally! And probably not like it