Howdy, Got a bit of an odd problem here.
I was playing Wizardry 8 perfectly fine, got in, uploaded my characters from 7 to 8 just fine, and saved the game, quit and went to bed. Next day, picked it up, the game would start, but as soon i went to load into the game, it crashed. Then it wouldn't even boot up to the title screen. Execute game > Crash. I'm currently running windows 8.1 and like i said, it's run fine before, but even after re-installing and changing around the ways to start it up via compatability mode, nothing. Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

sounds like an antivirus issue and 8.1 could be in the middle of updates (if you allow microsoft a free hand)

does the opening vid play or does the game crash before that?
if the vid doesn't play try making a different start i.e, sided with the bugs in w7 = martans fort ... sided with the rinos = the mountian and starting from there will reset the vid settings

another tip with w8 = don't take forever to load your party... make the start and save as soon as the first talk in finished then you can take your time making party adjustments

I tried a different idea and going from there: My brother in law had a copy on steam and i downloaded it and tested to see if it would work. And it did. Honestly better than going through Wizadry 7 again, i gave up 3/4 of the way through when the game bugged out and became unwinnable. Thanks for the input though, i'll keep the last bit in mind!