New vista version problem

[BT14]

Now that I've fixed the problem of the game being stuck in demo with the vista patch, I have a new problem. The level selection stage is all spired and there's no cursor. With all of the fractals on the screen, you can't tell where you are looking at in the level, so I'm still stuck with playing the demo unless a wild shot in the dark happens and I luckily click where the icons are. What's causing this issue?

[frenchfrog]

Could you state your system configuration.

Updating your video drivers would probably be the first thing to try to fix this.

If I remember correctly some people with shitty video cards or integrated video cards have hit a problem like this.

[Jaenis]

I also had a problem at updating.
At level selection screen, you couldn't move the mouse at all and Darwinia didn't accept any keypresses like ESC. So I had to Alt-Tab out and kill the game from task manager in order to exit it.

I solved this just by doing fresh install and then applying the patch.

Reason might be that prepatch in Vista, Darwinia stored some data - like saves, preferences.txt etc - at this folder:
\Users\<USERNAME>\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files\Darwinia\
(that AppData directory is hidden, so you don't see it if you haven't told to explorer to show hidden files)

But after the patch those files are found here:
\Users\<USERNAME>\Saved Games\Darwinia\

That might cause some confusion, because Darwinia will see duplicate files, or something...
So, if fresh install doesn't help, move data away from Darwinia's VirtualStore directory and try again.

[BT14]

my card is an ATI Radeon Xpress 1100 and it seems like they don't issue drivers for the chip anymore. Any other ideas?

[frenchfrog]

hmm, a quick look at ATI website reveal there is Catalyst 7.5 drivers for ATI Radeon Xpress 1100 (you have to look into the Integrated/Motherboard category).

[BT14]

I upgraded the drivers and it's didn't do anything. Here's a look at what I'm up against:



what do I do?

[xander]

I upgraded the drivers and it's didn't do anything. Here's a look at what I'm up against:



what do I do?

As far as I know, there is nothing that can be done about this problem. I noted it back during the beta of the patch, but no solution was forthcoming, and no one seems to know what is going on. However, we seem to have similar video cards, which is probably part of the problem.

xander

[KingAl]

I doubt he'll be able to use that link.

[xander]

I doubt he'll be able to use that link.

Hrm... I hadn't thought about that. At any rate, frenchfrog can use it, and that is all that really matters. ;)

xander

[hibbs]

i'm having the same problem. is it a card issue? or is it a fix-able issue? i really want to finish the game (which i prob lay should have by now... i've owned the game for over a year now...)

[KingAl]

It's a card issue, but it only occurs with the 'Vista patch'. If you're running the Steam version, I believe you can take the 'dat' files from the darwinia directory, move them to a different directory and apply the previous Windows patch to that directory. If you bought directly from IV, just reinstall and apply the above patch rather than 1.5.11.

With regards to your other thread, you can just delete it by clicking the 'delete' button in the top right corner (an 'X').

[hibbs]

so your saying to delete my darwinia data and reinstall? and i'll delete that other post.


:::EDIT:::

so the game is working again. but if IV releases another patch (a big update) will it still have the same problem?


:::EDIT:::

wow i'm the only one here.... well i found some settings that may get you a better picture....

in 3d analyze there is the following settings under perfomance , force SW TnL , then select everything under hardware limits (features) under Pixel and Vertex Shader select force low precision pixel shader

those should remove the "giant triangles." and on a ATI RADEON IGP you should have a perfect picture!!!!

[KingAl]

No surprises there. Though the major difference between the versions is DirectX vs. OpenGL, the only cosmetic difference is the use of pixel shaders etc. And, since this is undoubtedly the cause of the issue, it seems unlikely it'll be 'fixed' in future - since it's essentially an issue of hardware deficiency.

And no, I wasn't suggesting that you delete your data files, I was suggesting you remove the files other than the data files and apply the 1.4.2 patch on top of them (the prescence of these files is all that is required for the patch to run). This will essentially create a new install, but without the changes of 1.5.11.

If you don't have Steam, then you can just use the 1.4.2 patch on a fresh install from the CD.

[hibbs]

so why did the development team switch to DirectX? it would seem inconvenient to mac or linux users.

[KingAl]

A deal with Microsoft of some kind, it seems - it was released as a 'Vista edition' on MSN Games.