I have an older (~2002/3) computer I've got working again running Windows XP (a Dell Inspiron 8500) that is plenty powerful enough for Divine Divinity - but after installing twice (re-downloaded the off-line installer as well) it won't start with an error about "failed to start because the application configuration is incorrect"

It suggests reinstalling, which I did ... I have also installed a bunch of other games from the similar era (Arcanum, Jedi Knight II, Soldier of Fortune II, Medal of Honor Allied Assault) and all of those work great.

The WinXP install is XP2, and the networking subsystem is dead so I can't connect to the internet.

Any other ideas?

From PCgaming wiki:

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Divine_Divinity

Game fails to launch
Use software rendering instead of Direct3D

1. Go to <path-to-game>.
2. Run configtool.exe.
3. Under New rendering system, select Software.
4. Optionally, click Test to ensure the configuration is functional.
5. Click Apply & Close.

I don't have WinXP, so I don't know if this will work or not. Good luck.

If I'm not mistaken, Win XP is no longer supported by GOG and isn't guaranteed to work with offline installers.

Other than that, I have nothing to add to the post above, which gives you a series of steps to attempt to get your game to work.

You might literally be having a problem of installing the GOG version which is updated for Win 7/10 being too "new" for XP. Just a thought, I might be 100% wrong.

Apologies for the delayed response.

The only time I've encountered this error message was due to a problem with Visual C++ runtimes. I'm not sure that Divine Divinity relies on any (the installer didn't apply any such changes on my system) but you may wish to check out Abbodi1406's All-in-One which packs all the latest versions into a 16.8MB installer.

A VirusTotal scan of that file is here for the cautious - I'd suggest the 2 out of 62 scanners that flagged this to be a false positive.

As an alternative, copy and paste the following into a .txt file, change the extension from .txt to .reg and then double-click it to apply changes to your Registry after uninstalling Divine Divinity. This should remove any remaining traces of it on your system, providing a clean slate for a reinstall.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Divine Divinity]

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\GOG.com\GOGDIVINEDIVINITY]

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\GOG.com\GOGPACKDIVINEDIVINITY]

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Divine Divinity_is1] At the very least download a copy of XP Service Pack 3 and apply that. There's very little justification for staying at SP2. I run XP also (SP3) and can confirm that the offline installer (version 1.0.2.13) works fine on my system. Aside from the Galaxy.dll problem, I've not seen any systematic attempts by GOG to break XP-compatibility for games that still run on XP.