i tried this but i was unable to save changes, it just said 'access denied' or something.

Edit the file with administrator privileges.

what do you mean by that? Im pretty sure i already have administrator privileges, it is a brand new computer and i am the other user that is set up to use it.

If you have User Account Control enabled, you won't be allowed to make any changes to files within 'Program Files' directory. And I guess you didn't change default location during installation.

Either disable UAC completely or copy the file somewhere else, edit it and copy back to game folder.

ok thanks, i'll give that a try

yeah nothing is working. nevermind, thanks anyways

I have the same blank screen/ cursor/ sound problem!

When I alt-escape out of the blank screen cursor game, for a split second before I return to the desktop I see the game!! I mean, I see the start menu, with all the buttons, oh god its glorious, and yet so fleeting! And so frustrating! To know that my computer CAN see the game, but for some blasted reason will not render it unto me!!

So, in my continuing determination to play this game, I bought Space Rangers 2: Reboot from Steam, hoping it would be an updated version and work on my machine (my specs: Toshiba Satellite with ATI mobility Radeon HD 5xand 4x series- works great with every other game). The result? The intro movies played, which didnt happen on SPace Rangers 2! And then, the dreaded blank screen and miserable cursor. $30 and two games later, all I can show for my money and time is a lousy intro movie, which I havent even watched.

FIXED IT!

Here's how: In Steam's SR2 Reboot's cfg file, there is an option for Windowed mode. I changed this to Yes (unfortunately there is no such option in gog's SR2 cfg file, but maybe you can add in that line?) This simple change fixed the problem

I believe that the windowed mode option was added in the Reboot expansion, which is not included in GOG's release. One could try adding it to the GOG release config file, but it probably won't work.

If windowed mode fixed your problem, then your issue was likely with the game's resolution. There are only two resolution options, 800x600 and 1024.768, with 1024x768 as default. These are listed in the cfg file under the line "VideoMode=R2" which can be set to R2 (1024x768) or R1 (800x600). For those users who have laptop screens that have fewer than 768 vertical pixels, changing it to R2 might help the game launch.

For others, it's likely an issue with changing resolutions on your machine. You might be able to get it working with video card setting tweaks, or other display scaling options. There might also be a way to force the game to run windowed, through a registry edit or something. I'm not sure exactly how to accomplish that but I saw something similar for The Witcher (i.e. how to set windowed mode on that game when you can't launch it and get to the options menu).

Similar problem. First, my specs:

New laptop with:
Intel integrated graphics
- and -
nVidia GT555M, driver ver 267.21 (DLing the latest as I type)
Win7 64-bit

Next, what I've tried:
-Installed in D:\Game Files\GOG.com\
-Run as Admin, no effect
-WinXP SP3 and SP2 modes
-Changing to R1 in cfg.txt, no effect
-Manually changing desktop res to both 800x600 and 1024x768, no effect but the laptop will operate correctly on both.
-Forcing both the integrated and nVidia GPUs. The results are similar, which should tell us something about the driver situation.
-Turning off the sound and music options in cfg.txt
-Eliminating the cfg.txt file by renaming it. Found that the game won't launch at all without that file
-Turned off the intro bits from within cfg.txt, so it goes straight to the main menu. No effect.

What I'm going to try next:
-Update video driver for both GT555M and Intel integrated.
-Get DX9

Finally, what the problem looks like in my case:
It's like the game can not handle changes to the graphics. Almost any time it needs to draw something different no matter how minor, it fails to do so; however, the game does sort of operate. For example, suppose I make it to the main menu. When I move the pointer around (it looks like the correct game pointer), it moves just fine but when I happen to pass over an onscreen button, it may or may not highlight that button and it will not highlight any subsequent buttons over which I move the pointer. If I click the button, the software will accept that selection but the screen will not change. If I ALT-TAB out and back in, the screen will be changed to that new screen or option I selected. For example, from the main menu I can select Options, then ALT-TAB out and in and it will then have me on the options page. If I change an option (click the little button), I'll ALT-TAB out and in to see the change. In fact, it will even change from 800 to 1024 modes but the overall problem persists.

As you can imagine, ALT-TABbing my way through the game isn't going to work. ; )

Some notes of things I've noticed:
-Digging back into the installation folder I find a file titled 'exception.txt'. Opening that file, the text is: Searching the net turns up nothing on this error. I'm not 100% positive but I think this file only appeared after I forced the game to use the Intel integrated GPU. I'll rename the file, change modes, and see if it reappears. Update - I only get that text file using the integrated GPU.
-Sometimes the game will try to change screens. What it will show are a couple dozen random horizontal lines. Okay, they're not random - I can tell that it's trying to draw something coherent; the placement of the lines it does draw seems to be random. ALT-TAB shows the next screen. Those lines do not match up to the next screen; in other words, they are of different content than where I end up after ALT-TAB.
-One time I actually had two additional video option buttons within the game's Graphics Options, for a total of four buttons. One was 1280x960 and the other was, IIRC, 1280x720. A bit odd there since it was definitely a part of the game as they showed up as regular buttons within the game menu. I haven't seen those two "extra" buttons since and I don't know what I did to make them appear.

A little update:

- Updated video driver. No effect.
- Installed DX9. No effect.
- Installed DX8. No effect. Why did I do this? Well, when I opened the file ########.txt, near the bottom it reads "Create DirectX 8 .... ok". I figured it's worth a shot.
- In cfg.txt, changed CacheSize from 0 to 2, just to try something. No effect.
- In cfg.txt, changed Debug from No to Yes. It works sort of like a windowed mode but the game itself had the same problems.

At this point, I'm stumped. I forgot to mention that I don't get any error messages beyond the creation of that exception.txt file when using the Intel GPU. Someone mentioned trying VMWare so I'll give that a go. Beyond that, I have no idea what to try next.

Not exactly how I wanted to 'solve' this... but it worked:

Bought a $6 retail copy of Reboot at Half Price Books (lucky find this morning!) and installed it. The first and third intro vids played; the 2nd did not and the menu problem was as I described in the last two posts.

I changed cfg.txt for window=yes. That made for a really ugly windowed version that works. Then I changed the shortcut to Run: Normal window. It runs in a window, but at least it runs. Turning off windowed mode from within the game menu brings the problem back immediately, so apparently it doesn't like to be maximized.

Kind of a non-solution since I had to buy another program, but at least it comes with SR1 at that price. But hey, if you really want to get it going just come over over to HPB in Cedar Hill, Texas, and pick up a copy of Reboot; they have at least 3 more on the shelf. ; D

I was having the same exact problem as you were having, but I couldn't get the game to come up as a window. When I go under the shortcuts properties, I have "Run: Normal Window." I figured this was not what you meant, so I switched it to minimize, since you mentioned the game does not like "maximized."

HOWEVER, if I alt+tab my way into the options menu, and change it to run in a Window, this solved the issue. Playing in a window is less than optimal, but at least it wasn't a wasted purchase.

Thank you very much HereForTheBeer, your ideas got it working for me.

You're quite welcome. Was it Reboot that you were able to get working, or the Dominators package available here on GOG? To get it to run in windowed mode, I had to edit the cfg.txt file found in the folder where the game is installed, and then changed the shortcut. You accomplished the same thing, just using the in-game menu instead. To get the game to fill the screen better, I'm also manually changing the desktop resolution to 1152x864 - on my laptop that makes the windowed game as large as possible without cutting off any part of the window itself.

Oh - enjoy the game! I'm really having a lot of fun with this title.

Edit: D'oh - that was a dumb question of me. Of course it was Reboot, since Dominators does not have a windowed mode.