i have the same problem.. the support sent me a message i dont really understand.. its really sad..

Yes, it is sad, given I love the game. I wish there was some older Windows versions emulator like DosBox, but the best I could achieve right now would be to install an older windows version in a virtual machine, not quite the same thing.

While I found no solution for this game on Win 10, I found that downgrading to older Windows (Win 7) is likely to work, as well as using Wine. In my case, I did a dual-boot setup on my machine for work purposes, so I installed Ubuntu 16.10 x86_64 with Kernel 4.11, and Wine managed to run fine Pharaoh + Cleopatra GOG installer and game. So I recommend anyone who can't use an older Win, but can use a GNU/Linux distro, to consider trying Wine for this game. It just may work.

The game works pretty well on my computer and I'm on Windows 10. Try using the widescreen patch (which has been known to fix a lot of the peripheral bugs, despite just "increasing" the resolution), and making sure you have the necessary codecs installed.

I also had the game crashing on win7 but with the help of GoG support i think the issues are fixed since i haven't had a crash, or game getting stuck with sound looping, reading game encyclopedia crash etc. Should work for win10.

Here is what i did:

game exe compatibility tab:

os compatibility win98

disable visual themes

disable desktop composition

disable high DPI settings

and administrator access


This is really the most important one since i thing this is the thing that is causing all the crashes

change Screen colors setting to HighColor (16bit) Screen Resolution\Advanced settings\Monitor



replace the game ini's with these from GoG support

https://www.dropbox.com/s/imtlv1djftg4og6/Pharaoh.inf?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/79vobhu9pgqdbfd/Pharaohmap.inf?dl=0

change to fullscreen after starting game



and ingame (not sure if it has any effect) disable autosave and turn off the messages that pop up on the screen

(as they may have crashed the game for some)


also resolution resize in the form of "PharaohResize" tool made by crudelios at WSG Forums

Regular freezes/crashes of the game are associated with a bug in the playback of sounds.

Especially strong when "Compatibility WindowsXP(sp2/sp3)"
Use "Compatibility Windows95/98"

The user reports that after updating mss32.dll and MP3DEC.ASI the problem was solved.
caesar3 . heavengames . com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=9,7677,,20
old files
CRC32:0CF075E4 mss32.dll (Version:5.0r)
CRC32:1533C2F2 MP3DEC.ASI

A proven pair to replace mss32.dll+Mp3dec.asi (from Zeus+Poseidon v2.1)
CRC32:9BD81E9D mss32.dll (Version:6.0m)
CRC32:FA4BC870 Mp3dec.asi
wdfiles . ru/e11658

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DirectX 9.0с Runtime Pack (June 2010)
www.microsoft.com/en-au/download/details.aspx?id=8109

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When you have more than 2 speakers (2.1 or 5.1 or 7.1 sound)
Also, modern sound cards can work in surround sound emulation mode.
Older games don't know what surround sound is.
Download "Version 0.12", unpack and move to the game folder.
www.indirectsound.com/downloads.html
(or "Version 0.14" with EAX=off by default)
This dsound.dll replaces the native one from DirectX, like a wrapper, reconciles the old with the new.