broken sword 3 crashing / black screen - Geforce problem?

[fov]

Sigh. First my CD cracked, and now I got a replacement disk and it's crashing... I think I'm destined not to finish this game. :frown:

Okay, I'm at the castle in Prague. George already got in and I'm controlling Nico. The game crashes to the desktop right after she climbs through the window.

I downloaded the saves from this site (http://www.nicouzouf.com/en/?id=brokenswordthesleepingdragon). Tried loading from the save at the point where my game is crashing... and it crashes to the desktop. Then I tried loading the next save (which is supposedly in Petra's bedroom), and the screen turned black and just hung there. Ctrl-alt-del gave me a cursor but the screen stayed black. I had to reboot manually.

I'm going to try updating my video drivers, but I did that recently for something else and it caused Indigo Prophecy (which I'm still replaying) not to work anymore. :( Any other ideas for what could be causing the problem? I am on WinXP, 1.7 Ghz processor, 512 MB RAM, 64 MB Nvidia GeForce 2 video card. I have not had any crashing up until this point.

[Lucien21]

Have you upgraded to SP2 as Broken Sword 3 doesn't like it.

[fov]

No. I never even upgraded to SP1.

EDIT: Updating my video drivers didn't work. It actually caused a lot of weirdness. BS3 wouldn't even launch (it opened a small window and hung that way) and I tried Indigo Prophecy just for kicks and got a message that the game couldn't run because my video card isn't DirectX9c compliant (which it obviously is since the game ran fine with my old drivers). So I rolled the drivers back. Not sure what else to try, unless there's a patch or something I don't know about.

[badmojo]

I'm trying to find the fix for it.. It happened to me too and it turned out to be a single graphics setting in windows ( like turning Vsync off or something).

They never patched it to my knowledge.. but there was an easy fix. Just for grins, try switching Vsync to OFF in your advanced display settings for your video card.

[fov]

Is that Vertical sync? Tried turning it off, didn't work. :(

Good to know you found a workaround for the same problem, though. I'll keep trying.

[Len Green]

I'm no techie ... so don't pay much attention to what I say on this.

However, It couldn't be that horrendous (immoral IMHO) Starforce "Copy Protection" causing troubles could it ??:r :frusty:

[Nicouse]

fov -> I've checked the saves I provide on my website by downloading them as any user would do. The ones you tried to use works fine on my PC (ati radeon 9800 with the latest 5.10 Catalyst for information).
I ran the game under XP SP2.

Have you checked or unchecked the antialiasing or other common messy parameters (like 16 or 32 bit textures, anisotropic filtering, etc..) in your video card properties ?
Have you tried to change your resolution to lower levels or higher ?
Or even the speed of your screen refresh: you should try at 60Hz to launch the game.
Have you tried a re-installation ? Maybe some files are corrupted.
BTW, are you nvidia or ati powered ?

I doubt it's a copy protection issue or else it would have failed earlier in the game.

[fov]

Thanks, I'll try those things. Up until now I've never really had to muck around with my video card. (It's an Nvidia Geforce2, by the way.)

I agree it's probably not a copy protection issue. However, until recently I was playing the THX (European) version of the game. My CD got a crack in it and I wasn't able to keep playing. Someone kindly sent me the TAC (American) version, and I uninstalled the THX version, installed the TAC version, and continued from my last save. The crash didn't happen right away so I don't know for sure that it has anything to do with the TAC version, but it's always possible that if I'd been playing the TAC version all along, a crash would have happened sooner than this.

[Nicouse]

I understand why people talk about Starforce protection about BS3. I've never encountered that kind of protection on my european copy of BS3.
I made the savegames with the THQ version, perhaps that's why they crash on your PC but I doubt that too given the problem is here no matter what savegames you use.

I had once a weird crash with Syberia (the 1st one) who crashed in the train station of Barrockstadt when I tried to reach the birds' nest. Everytime I climbed the ladder, the game crashed with no other alternative that manual reboot. I managed to find that checking the compatibility setting to Windows 98 in the properties of syberia.exe allowed me to go through that ladder thing. Why did the game crash at that point (which is not at the beginning at all) ? A complete mystery.
So try everything possible, you'll manage to find the right setting. It's quite a pain in the ass to do but sometimes you succeed.

[fov]

Argghhhh. :frusty:

I never resolved this problem and never finished BS3. A few days ago I installed a new(ish) video card to try to get a few more years out of my old computer. Thought that would surely resolve the problem I was having, but no, it's crashing in the exact same place.

The old video card was a Geforce2. This one's a Geforce 6200. Does anyone know of Geforce issues with this game, and how to fix the problem? I'm not finding anything with a search.

Sigh. I really am destined not to finish this game... :sad:

EDIT: With my refresh rate at 100hz (which it normally is), the game hangs on a black screen and I can't even ctrl-alt-del or alt-F4 out of it... I need to reboot the computer manually. With the refresh rate at 60hz the game crashes with a Windows error message (the application has experienced an unexpected problem, blah blah). I have fiddled around with several different resolutions and settings but nothing's working. I'm sad. :sad:

[marsan]

Just as a heads up. I found this in the Revolution technical support knowledge base

"The PC version crashes unexpectedly?

If you do not have directx 9 try installing it. "

"The game will not start? Here are some things to try.

XP
Reduce audio hardware acceleration. To do this clickon on Start -> Run -> type dxdiag -> Sound -> Move the 'Hardware Sound Acceleration Level' slider down to 'Basic acceleration'. This is resolving the majority of XP startup problems.

- Try running the safe version of the game, it is found in the game folder.

- If you are using any refresh rate fixing programs like nvRefreshTool then disable these before running the game

Win98/ME
- Try running the game in a different resolution. 800 * 600 is a good one to try.
- Set the refresh rate to 60Hz. Open the control panel, Click on display, settings, advanced, moniter, and set it to 60HZ. "

Personally, I haven't had any problems with finish this game before, but I think I had an ati card last time I played it through. Who is the manufacture of your new geforce card? usually the drivers from the card manufacture works better than the drivers from nvidia.com

Anyway, I got a GeForce 6800 now, so I'll probably try to installing BS 3 later to see if I discover anything that can help you out.

Are you still running WinXP without SPs?

[Nicouse]

Poor fov, BS3 is playing hard on you :D

My guess is you don't miss a great game though.

[fov]

Thanks marsan, I tried a few of those things but not all of them. At one point I was using nvRefreshTool but I think I uninstalled that a while ago. Anyway, I'll look for it.

The new card is not manufactured by Nvidia... I forget who it is, but I am using the drivers that came with the card. I guess I could update them but I don't think this is necessarily a driver issue since it's happened to me with two completely different cards and drivers now. More likely it's got something to do with my computer (which is why I was thinking the refresh rate might be the culprit).

I recently (like two weeks ago) upgraded to SP2.

I guess I could always try to get my hands on the THX version of the game (again). I never had any trouble until I uninstalled that one and started playing the TAC release instead.

[Melanie68]

Emily, I have a jewel case copy of the game at home. I'm not sure what version it is, but let me check when I go home tonight. If it's the THX version, I'll bring it by this Saturday so you can borrow it. :)

[marsan]

Alright. I have now tried installing the game. At first it would hang when I tried to start it up. I went to DirectX homepage, and upgraded the DirectX to 9.0c. After that it started like a charm.

Fov: Yep. Sounds like it's something other than drivers, and since you're using the drivers from the CD I don't think that's the problem. It's probably something like the refresh rate or the directx version, or some conflicting program.

That's it for now. Toodles!

----------------------------------

I'm not allowed to play Broken Sword 3 anymore. It makes me so nostalgic, and makes me re-play Broken Sword 1 and 2 and laugh so much that I have to play them again. In the end, it really makes me wish Broken Sword 5 goes back to it's roots.

I love Broken Sword :)

[fov]

I'm using DirectX 9.0c, I tried running it in safe video mode and turning down audio acceleration, I tried running it at 800x600 and changing my refresh rate to 60. No luck. nvRefreshTool may have been installed at one time, but it isn't anymore.

I give up. :sad:

[marsan]

Ugh. Around the area you mentioned the sound goes completly banacas, but no crash. So just one last thing, because I'm just so incredibly curious about what the solution can be for this problem :D What kind of soundcard are you using? Are you using the same soundcard as last time you had troubles?

[Jolaes]

Emily, you Literally Broken that Sword... ;(

I can recall having audio driver issues which could be eliminated by an official patch (version 1.1)

I am absolutely positive that Geforces can run the game flawlessly; it is not about the Detonator/ForceWare drivers.

I'll dive into the case and if I can come up with sg I'll let you all know. Maybe with nHancer (black-belt compatibility tweaker) it can be taught to behave. :devil:

[fov]

Are you using the same soundcard as last time you had troubles?

Yep, it's not a sound card though, it's SoundMAX integrated sound (comes standard on a lot of Dells).

I don't see the 1.1 patch on the TAC website so I assume their version is already patched.

Thanks for offering to help, both of you. This is so frustrating. :(

[Melanie68]

I found this thread on the Dreamcatcher forums. Someone with a GEforce 6600 card was having problems (not exactly like yours though) and they used an older driver (63.77) and it seemed to help. It's worth a try at least. :)

http://www.dreamcatchergames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27379

[Nicouse]

I never heard of any patch about BS3 :crazy: :shifty:

[Jolaes]

European publishers and hackers are ever more ready to respond to the gamers' plight...:devil:

[after edit]: Let's look around.

[Nicouse]

I think you're mistaken Jolaes ;)
You've linked the 1.1 patch for Broken Sword 4.

[Jolaes]

ooops you're right. Still, there IS a patch for BS3... must have been unofficial, that's why it is so difficult to find. I removed the wrong link.