I know that RT3 doesn't really run on Win 7+ out of the box, but I also know that there are fixes available for it. Given that GOG lists Win 7+ compatibility for this game, is the fix automatically packaged in with the GOG version? Thanks!

Not only is it probably packaged, there's a good chance GOG may have applied their own patches and fixes.

Works fine on win 7 64 bit. Installed it, no tinkering at all. And it's fun.

My game is crashing as soon as it reaches the main menu screen.

Tried a few different compatibility options and safe mode parameters, to no avail.

I'm on Win7 Home Premium 64-bits.

I checked my settings, and they have not been altered. I've played this quite a bit and it's only crashed on me once. I've played it with a nvda 760 card and a 970, the 760 struggled with game. Do you know what graphics card you have?

I'm using a Geforce 560 GT.

You might want to ask around, but seems that's an old card (in tech years?) and the stats I found for it indicate it may not have the power to support the game. my 760 struggled and it out performed the 560.

For any problems running this game on modern systems, try out a tool called DxWnd. It translates older directX versions in a way modern devices can understand (directdraw, direct3d, directX) There are also framerate limiter, CPU limiter, mouse fixes, make it run windowed, etc etc

For those still finding a tough time making this run in Windows 10, I came up with a solution (that works for me anyway) after trying to go through GOG support (they were responsive and helpful, but didn't quite diagnose the problem and solve it), I zeroed in on the 'Vista Fix' that has been mentioned here and elsewhere (Hawk and Badger for instance). Long story short (as I had to figure this out twice) the problem was as follows: RRT3 would launch fine the first time from the installer and then the dreaded directX error would ALWAYS prevent another load. The problem appears to be that the game unchecks the lighting whatever box when you exit and saves the engine.cfg that way. This causes the error next time. I'm nowhere close to an expert in programming/coding/etc, but I hope this helps someone who, like me, didn't want to install 2 or 3 other programs to download a patch, open it, install it, and then hope it runs the game. For reference, I use Windows 10, Intel processor i5, nVidia GeForce 730 card (nothing fancy by any means, but it works).

1. Do NOT install RRT3 through Galaxy, no matter what I did, it would never launch through there. Instead, download the 'backup game' installer from your account and run the installer.

2. Right click on the short-cut for RRT3 and choose 'Properties'. Click on the 'Compatibility' tab and choose an appropriate previous version of Windows from the drop-down tab. For me Windows XP SP3 was fine. Press OK.

3. I think the GOG version already comes with the 'Vista Fix' in place, but I'm not sure, so you may need the next step or not. Open the folder where you installed RRT3. Open 'Data' then 'Configuration'. Right click on the 'engine.cfg' file and choose properties. Check the box for 'Read Only' then press OK. From here you might be alright.

4. If not, get the 'Vista Fix' patch from Hawk and Badger. Right click on the download and extract all. Open the file until you find the 'engine.cfg.' Copy this file and use it to replace its counterpart in the RRT3 Configuration file. Now right click the file and check the 'Read Only' box and press OK.

At this point everytime I launch RRT3 from the shortcut, Windows asks if it's ok that it makes changes, so say yes to launch the game and away it should go. The game plays fine from here. The drawback (which maybe someone who understands this stuff better than me can help with?) is that it always loads in 800 x 600 resolution. You can change it to something else, but it can't save the setting so you have to change it every time manually (although I'm generally content at the 800 x 600). The important part is that it runs fine and saves games fine. I hope this is helpful, and if anyone has a better 'simple' solution (i.e. not needing complicated patches and programs just to open them), I'm all for it. Happy Railroading.

Thanks Gamingrn, I am trying to implement your proposal but I don't know how to get to the "Backup Game Installer" so I can download it and uninstall from there.

The only option I see is to install via galaxy... Please help?

OK so I have tried everything now.

I've installed dgVoodoo2, DxWnd, installed the game via the backup installer, uninstalled and reinstalled, copied the Vista fix file called engine.cfg into the Data/Configuration folder, changed the compatibility settings of the RT3 launcher shortcut, deleted the original d8tx.dll file and replaced it with the dgVoodoo2 file called D3D8.dll file and renamed it to d8tx.dll, and I still get that horrific DirectX 8.1 error when I try to launch the game.

I am running Windows 10 64bit, NVidia Geforce RTX, DirectX version 12.

What am I missing? I am new to GOG, so I wonder if a GOG developer can maybe assist?

I really love this game and absolutely have to play it!

I'm afraid I don't have any familiarity with the dgVooDoo2 or DxWnd programs. I think I tried to use one and it was a file type I didn't recognize and I wasn't interested in finding some other program or means to run it so I never installed anything of the type. From what you've written, my question is did you set the engine.cfg to 'read only'? As far as I encountered, the problem seemed based off of the game undoing a critical setting that was correctly set in the vista fix and that made it unlaunchable after without reapplying the fix. It's possible that there is just something odd about my computer that I just got lucky. All I can say is to set the short-cut with a viable compatibility, make sure the engine.cfg is read-only, and then launch the game from the shortcut (nothing I did ever got it to launch using Galaxy). Sorry if this is unhelpful, I know when I tried a support ticket with GOG, they tried to help and I stumbled across this self-fix by chance (they got me the compatibility mode and I got the read-only portion). There may be some other issue at work they can help with.

You likely don't have DirectX 9.0c (which contains 8.1) installed on your system at all. It's separate from DX10/11/12 and doesn't come fully shipped with Windows, so you need to follow this procedure: https://www.gamefront.com/support/knowledgebase/installing-directx-9-0c

Have a old version of RT3 and could not run it on my new win 10 laptop [it runs at my old win 10 desktop]. Then I bought here the version for win 10. I still have the same error message "no hardware acceralted drivers/devices for directx 8.1 found". Direct play is activated and direct X 9 installed (it should cover 8), but obviously not.