For all those having bad lag, the UI glitching behind the background, or just flat out refusing to start. I found a tool called DDrawCompat that seems to help with a lot of issues Creatures 2 tends to have.

https://github.com/narzoul/DDrawCompat/releases

(use version 0.1.3 or 0.2.0)

just copy the ddraw.dll into your creatures install directory.

IMPORTANT: Make sure all the compatibility settings and modes are disabled (including 16bit colors) for launcher.exe and creatures2.exe. When the game asks to change to 16bit color just say yes.


Things to note about the different versions:

All versions: The game crashes if you resize the window. Just maximize the window and relaunch if it crashes.

0.1.3: Haven't had one s16 loading error on this version. Menus seem to be a little glitchy though they don't get stuck behind the background. Creature view doesn't seem to update unless you move the window.

0.2.0: Doesn't have the UI glitches 0.1.3 has but it's harder to launch. Takes about 3 tries before the game will launch without the s16 error.

All the other versions either are either no different, crash in odd ways, or just flat out never get past the s16 errors.


Anyway, though I'd share my experience and hope it helps someone else out!

0.1.3 Worked for me.

This is on Windows 10 v.2004, 64 bit. I tried version 0.2.0 and had no luck.

Thank you.

I also just created a patch for Creatures 2 that should fix performance and other issues with the game. You can check out the patch here:

https://github.com/elishacloud/dxwrapper/wiki/Creatures-2%3A-The-Albian-Years

BTW: As much as I love DDrawCompat, I could never get it to work on my computer with this game.

Wow Awesome! That one works even better! Thank you! I did toy around with the dxwrapper but never could find the right combination of settings to get it running reliably!

It does seem to throw an exception when launched but it doesn't appear to effect the game from launching.

in my case (with my machine I guess) setting compatibility to 16bit color causes it to show the dung.s16 error. So I had to leave it unchecked and just hit yes when it asks to change to 16bit.

Edit: Heads up, the game still seems to hate the window being resized. While it's not flat out crashing like it does with DDrawCompat. After resizing the main window then opening on of the kits, it will crash.

This issue does not happen to me. Each kit is a separate process (exe). For example, the breeders kit runs "BreedersKit.exe". Verify the compatibility settings for each of these processes. For me I have all of them set to 16bit compatibility.