Whenever I start up the game, the framerate dips down to a ridiculously low level; it takes about 10 seconds for the game to advance a single frame. I can access the menu, but it responds just as slowly. I've tried unchecking most of the detail-related options in the loader, to no avail. Are there any patches that could solve this problem, or is there some other solution?

Please don't tell us too much about your operating system and the hardware that you are using ;-)

Ah, of course. I didn't think it'd matter too much since my system should be more than capable of playing it, but if you insist.

Operating System: Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp_sp3_gdr.120821-1629)
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E8400 @ 3.00GHz (2 CPUs)
Memory: 3072MB RAM
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
Display Card: NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT
Sound Device: C-Media PCI Audio

Hi,

your hardware should do that well. With other games there are no similiar problems? Maybe your Antivirus let it slow down? And a least: you are running the gog-version of the game?

No, don't have any problem at all with other games. No, turning off my anti-virus doesn't seem to help either. And yes, I am running the GOG version, of course.

Puh, that is strange. Never heard of a problem like this. The only thing (it's a long time gone since i used XP) i could imagine:

uninstall and reinstall the game, if possible, by rightklick on the install.exe chosing "as admin".

Alternative you could check out i.e. with process monitor, if there is some program using much cpu time:
[url=http://technet.microsoft.com/de-de/sysinternals/bb896645(en-us).aspx]http://technet.microsoft.com/de-de/sysinternals/bb896645(en-us).aspx[/url]

Multi-core could be a possibility too. You could try disabling the second core of your CPU for the game's process so that it runs only on the primary core.

Start up the game, bring up the Windows Task Manager using Ctrl-Alt-Del, find the game's process, right-click it and choose the Set Affinity option, then disable the second core. This only disables it for that session though, and if the process ends and restarts (you restart the game) you'll have to do it all again. However, if it does work you can create a batch file to launch the game with one CPU core only.

No guarantee this will work but it's worth a try.

Nope, the game already runs on just one core, it seems. Switching it to both doesn't work either.

Updating video drivers worked, thanks :) But now I have a different problem... the music plays ridiculously fast. Yep. Misery loves company, especially with older PC games like this. I'll read around the forums, I saw other people had trouble with that too.

EDIT: And fixed. Used the same hardware acceleration trick I had to use to get Retro City Rampage's sound working. I need a better sound card, methinks...

Nice to hear, enjoy the game ;-)