Posted November 30, 2013
Hello GOG-ers!
Recently I decided to replay IWD1 (last playthrough was in 2006). After successful installation I configured it and got myself into menu, but after selecting single player / new game, full game or expansion only, it always choked itself...i.e. screen was greyed out, music stopped and there was "hidden" Done button in middle of the screen, possibly with error message above it. Clicking it returned me one step back with no other effect. Different settings, or tweaks with GPU didn't help at all, so I thought that my CDs are not good anymore (using 3Cd Czech localized version and Win XP for the reference) and headed over here to possibly get me a digital copy. I checked forums all over the place and I see that this same issue was reported couple of times over the years, without any working solution!
It took me some time to figure out how IWD works. Basically it uses multiplayer mode even for singleplayer game, at least the DirectPlay aspect of it to create a party in new game, derived from BG1 MP. Problem is, it uses the most obsolete version of DirectPlay dating back to DirectX5~7 and it tends to get corrupted easily. This solution should work even for other Infinity Engine games, which might suffer with exactly this same problem.
So lets start:
1. Run DxDiag to determine if DirectPlay is really culprit here. Start > Run > dxdiag
After diagnostics finishes, head into Networking tab and look for error reports. Usually DirectPlay8 or newer should be OK, but the old DirectPlay at the bottom tends to report Errors.
2. If it is OK, you should check Network/Internet settings in your Control Panel, especially services and protocols. Make sure you do have IPX and TCP/IP protocols enabled and configured properly. Also check whether firewall isn't blocking way too strictly (iirc DirectPlay uses ports in the 2000~2400 range, but that info is ages old).
3. If DxDiag shows error with DirectPlay, you have to repair it. Since you cannot uninstall DirectX completely yourself and Macrosoft doesn't give a damn to publish repair utility, you have to either: Manually edit registry through Regedit to force DX version down to 8.1 in case of Win XP, or using convenient utility like Dxerad to rollback DirectX to the version your OS came packed with. Once its done, restart your machine and check DxDiag again. It should show DirectX 8.1 installed and hopefully old DirectPlay will be without error too. In that case you should be able to run IWD now, but you might want to play newer games as well, so lets continue.
4. Download fresh DirectX installer from Macrosoft itself (webinstaller version first (circa 270kb in case of DX9c), then complete pack later (circa 96Mb in case of DX9c) just to be safe and run them in that order to update your DX back). After another restart, run DxDiag and hopefully both DirectPlay and DX version are OK and up to date respectively.
5. Now go on and enjoy some IWD!
Note: Be very careful if you decide to go with regedit and also pay attention from where you download executable/dll files. When in doubt, use Jotti online scanner beforehand for example. If there are requests for links or more detailed instructions at some point, I will do my best to provide both. Have fun!
P.S. It worked for me, hopefully it will work for you if this problem plagues your system. I for one am glad to be able to enjoy it again on my laptop. Might even get myself the English version from GoG-store, eventually.
Recently I decided to replay IWD1 (last playthrough was in 2006). After successful installation I configured it and got myself into menu, but after selecting single player / new game, full game or expansion only, it always choked itself...i.e. screen was greyed out, music stopped and there was "hidden" Done button in middle of the screen, possibly with error message above it. Clicking it returned me one step back with no other effect. Different settings, or tweaks with GPU didn't help at all, so I thought that my CDs are not good anymore (using 3Cd Czech localized version and Win XP for the reference) and headed over here to possibly get me a digital copy. I checked forums all over the place and I see that this same issue was reported couple of times over the years, without any working solution!
It took me some time to figure out how IWD works. Basically it uses multiplayer mode even for singleplayer game, at least the DirectPlay aspect of it to create a party in new game, derived from BG1 MP. Problem is, it uses the most obsolete version of DirectPlay dating back to DirectX5~7 and it tends to get corrupted easily. This solution should work even for other Infinity Engine games, which might suffer with exactly this same problem.
So lets start:
1. Run DxDiag to determine if DirectPlay is really culprit here. Start > Run > dxdiag
After diagnostics finishes, head into Networking tab and look for error reports. Usually DirectPlay8 or newer should be OK, but the old DirectPlay at the bottom tends to report Errors.
2. If it is OK, you should check Network/Internet settings in your Control Panel, especially services and protocols. Make sure you do have IPX and TCP/IP protocols enabled and configured properly. Also check whether firewall isn't blocking way too strictly (iirc DirectPlay uses ports in the 2000~2400 range, but that info is ages old).
3. If DxDiag shows error with DirectPlay, you have to repair it. Since you cannot uninstall DirectX completely yourself and Macrosoft doesn't give a damn to publish repair utility, you have to either: Manually edit registry through Regedit to force DX version down to 8.1 in case of Win XP, or using convenient utility like Dxerad to rollback DirectX to the version your OS came packed with. Once its done, restart your machine and check DxDiag again. It should show DirectX 8.1 installed and hopefully old DirectPlay will be without error too. In that case you should be able to run IWD now, but you might want to play newer games as well, so lets continue.
4. Download fresh DirectX installer from Macrosoft itself (webinstaller version first (circa 270kb in case of DX9c), then complete pack later (circa 96Mb in case of DX9c) just to be safe and run them in that order to update your DX back). After another restart, run DxDiag and hopefully both DirectPlay and DX version are OK and up to date respectively.
5. Now go on and enjoy some IWD!
Note: Be very careful if you decide to go with regedit and also pay attention from where you download executable/dll files. When in doubt, use Jotti online scanner beforehand for example. If there are requests for links or more detailed instructions at some point, I will do my best to provide both. Have fun!
P.S. It worked for me, hopefully it will work for you if this problem plagues your system. I for one am glad to be able to enjoy it again on my laptop. Might even get myself the English version from GoG-store, eventually.
Post edited November 30, 2013 by Spectrum_Legacy
No posts in this topic were marked as the solution yet. If you can help, add your reply
