I bought WCIV on Tuesday and have spend a good chunk of the intervening time trying to get it to run. I'm running XP and I have tried every proposed fix for every problem with the game on this forum. I've made sure all my software is up to date, I've deactivated my firewall and AV programs, I've uninstalled and reinstalled CCCP, I've installed all the recommended files, I've tried compatibility mode, everything. I'm beginning to wonder if it's something wrong with my computer, but all my other games run fine and AV ca't find anything. I don't expect any revelations, given how little information I have, but any suggestions would be appreciated.

I'm having a similar prob the moment i try and skip the intro the game just locks up.

Similar problem: the intro runs fine but then it just goes black while the sound is still on. Graphics card/ driver issue ? Is there any way to edit graphics settings without going through the menues? Any help?

intel 945 chip here

For most of the people that have had the game crash on launch, the solutions so far have been to disable their firewall and or Antivirus software the first time they run the game... Some have had to go so far as to even uninstall their firewall software and switch to a different firewall program to allow the game to run

That was it - i created an exception for WC4 in the firewall and the graphics are now there no problem at all. Thanks for the Tip!

Having the same problem (crash on start) on Windows XP SP3. After hitting enter a couple of times I get an error message 'missing movie' for c:\vob\sc_0010a.vob. This is not where the game is installed, and actually copying the 'missing movie' to that location also does not work.

Tried all the audio and video codec installs mentioned here and elsewhere and disabling any firewalls and anti-virus software, but no luck so far...

If you ignore the missing movie message, does it give you the dialogue choice? And then does skipping the subsequent "missing movies" send you into spaceflight? If the gameflow portions are working then it's definitlely a codec issue (audio and or video).

I would suggest trying a different video pack. Uninstall CCCP or whichever ones you tries and unzipping http://www.si-gamer.net/gulikoza/bin/mpeg2dec.zip into your wc4 directory. Then run register.bat (as administrator)... you may have to run register.bat more than once.

Also note *ANYONE* that has overwriten mpeg2.dll or dxmci.dll with Gulikoza's versions will break their game... Do not do this. If you have done this, reinstall the game before performing any of the codec steps.

Thanks for your reply. I had indeed probably overwritten mpeg2.dll, but unfortunately following these steps (clean install with just mpeg2dec.zip) did not fix my problem. By the way, without any codec packs WinXP now has no way to play back .vob files (unless mpeg2dec should handle that?), is that no problem for the game?

I do get the dialog choices (over a black screen) and ultimately the space flight part, but sound only. The game 'works', because Alt-x, then y does quit the game, but there are no visuals. The next time I start the game I do get the menu screen.

Yes mpeg2dec is an Mpeg2 decoder. But note, mpeg2dec *just* a video decoder and you need to use it along with ac3filter to get the movie audio. You don't necessarily need to remove other codec packs to use it. But you do need to unzip the file I linked it into your WC4 directory and then run the included register.bat file while logged in to windows as administrator.

However you don't *have* to use it. It's just a cleaner way to get mpeg2 playback since it doesn't install a bunch of other stuff that you may or may not want. If cccp didn't work, give k-lite a try. Those packs will include and ac3 decoder as well.

If none of the codec packs are seeming to work, try disabling your firewall software while you run the game for the first time.

Just read an article about problems with WC4 on WCnews.com
Maybe it'll help.
Check it out!:

[url=]www.wcnews.com/news/4576[/url]

I too had the black screen on launch with the DXMCI error and "missing movie" messages (Win XP SP3, dx 9 gpu), but following the instructions from wcnews signaled by Knetterkak (thanks !) solved the problem :

www.wcnews.com/news/4576

As suggested, I installed AC3filter and it worked immediately. For info, I installed version 2.5b Lite.
Previously, reinstalling mpeg2dec and re-registering did nothing.