KQIVGA Crash on opening

Message

LazerFX · #1 Post by **LazerFX** » Tue Jun 20, 2006 10:10 pm

Hi all,

Love the idea of remaking these games. I played them when I was very young, and never completed them (First one I completed was KQ5, actually), and so it was with great anticipation that I downloaded and installed KQIVGA.

I hope you can help - I've not been able to get it to work. When I start the program, it crashes out. When I first started it, I couldn't see anything - black screen, 'ding' sound, windows elements resized to fit 320x200 (Not nice to see). Then, after fiddling in the directory, I found the configuration file, and had a fiddle. I set it into a window, and got the error message:

---------------------------
Illegal exception
---------------------------
An exception 0xC0000005 occured in ACWIN.EXE at EIP = 0x02A673D8 ; program pointer is +1004, ACI version 2.56.631, gtags (2275,8)

AGS cannot continue, this exception was fatal. Please note down the numbers above, remember what you were doing at the time and notify CJ on the Tech forum.

(Room 0 script line 62)

Most versions of Windows allow you to press Ctrl+C now to copy this entire message to the clipboard for easy reporting.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

So - Is there a CJ on this forum who needs to know this?

My system: Windows XP Home
Targa Traveller 824+ MT32
AMD Turion MT32 1.8Ghz 64
1GB PC-3200 RAM
ATI Radeon x700 Mobility 128MB
1280x800 screen
Samsung 80GB hard disk
(The rest is standard spec on Targa's website - if you need to know more)

I'm running SP2, fully patched.
I've got the latest DirectX 9.0c update, as of last week.

The KQ install is the full Game, then Music, then Voice-pack. It's stored on an external drive (Tried running it locally, but that didn't help), which is a 250GB Maxtor DiamondMax 9 in an IcyBox SATA->USB2 converter cage.

I've tried running the game in different resolutions (Despite the warnings it says if you don't pick 320x200), tried forcing alternate letterbox resolutions, tried it fullscreen and windowed, turned off the digital music pack and digital sound, even tried changing the langauge. I also turned on and off Anti-aliased sprites, and upped the Sprite Cache size, to no avail.

Please help - I'm really looking forward to playing this game.

pass · #2 Post by **pass** » Thu Jun 22, 2006 8:51 pm

Maybe the file you downloaded was damaged? If you didn't download the game from the agdi website, try to do so now, and re-install:
game: http://www.agdinteractive.com/countdl.p ... oad&game=1
music: http://www.agdinteractive.com/countdl.p ... oad&game=3
speech: http://www.agdinteractive.com/countdl.p ... oad&game=2

LazerFX · #3 Post by **LazerFX** » Thu Jun 22, 2006 8:59 pm

I knew there was something I'd forgotten to mention - I've downloaded the game twice, from the AGD website...

Thanks for the thought, but I think I've covered all the daft n00b mistakes

#4 Post by **Anonymous Game Creator 2** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 2:09 am

Judging by the error you posted, the game is crashing when it tries to play the initialization movie. There are a few things you can try:

1) First try running the game in 640x400 mode. You can change that by running the winsetup.exe program and saving the new settings then running the game.

2) If that doesn't work, try holding down ESC while the game it going through the opening screens. Keep it held down till the title screen appears. With any luck, this may bypass the init movie file and prevent the crash.

3) If all else fails, delete the file 1.vf1 from your game directory (or, perhaps back it up and then delete it, instead) and then try to run the game. You will probably receive an error about a missing video file, but just click it away, and you should be able to continue as normal.

Let me know if that works. If there's another release of KQ1VGA, I'll get rid of that initialization video, since it doesn't really serve any practical purpose anymore.

LazerFX · #5 Post by **LazerFX** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 11:35 am

Oooh, thanks for the help.

OK, running it in 640x400 mode didn't help...

Next, I tried holding down ESC - that got me to the main menu, and the game seems playable for there - woohoo!

Just as a test, I tried renaming the 1.vf1 file to 1.vf1.bak - it got me past the disclaimer message (I did get a '1.vf1 file is missing' error message), but then as soon as the intro started to play, it crashed again (I get a couple of seconds of music with this, but then boom, crash) - the error message is:

---------------------------
Illegal exception
---------------------------
An exception 0xC0000005 occured in ACWIN.EXE at EIP = 0x02F49018 ; program pointer is +6, ACI version 2.56.631, gtags (1541,640)

AGS cannot continue, this exception was fatal. Please note down the numbers above, remember what you were doing at the time and notify CJ on the Tech forum.

(Room 87 script line 46)

Most versions of Windows allow you to press Ctrl+C now to copy this entire message to the clipboard for easy reporting.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

Now, I'm not sure, but it seems that playing any movie is causing problems? I don't know - it's played the introduction OK when I went to play that from the main menu, and it started the game OK... I just wonder if it's movies that's causing the problem. Should I have a codec or something downloaded to play these?

Thanks very much for the help - I'm going to enjoy playing this, the introduction was excellent

#6 Post by **Anonymous Game Creator 2** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 2:09 pm

Seems like your system is hanging whenever the game tries to play a video file. You should check to see if Windows Media player is capable of playing a standard MPEG-1 format video on your system. AGS (the engine we used) simply 'hijacks' Windows Media Player to play its movies, so if MPEG-1 format movies also result in an error message when attempting to play them in Windows, it's like that the problem lies somewhere in your windows setup/system/drivers configuration.

Perhaps installing the latest drivers for your graphics card would solve the problem (or if drastic measures are required, a clean re-install of Windows). There are only 2 video files in the game, both at the beginning, so if you can get to the title screen, you'll be able to play the game from beginning to end from there.

LazerFX · #7 Post by **LazerFX** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 2:43 pm

Well, I just renamed 2.vf2 into 2.vf2.mpg, and it played in WMP fine... I wonder if it's because I've got WMP10, Winamp, and TCPMP on the machine - it doesn't know which media player to use or something?

BTW - nice evocation of the Sierra theme music in the intro movie

Anyway, I've renamed both movies, so it loads and runs fine without any fiddling now

Thanks for the assistance - you guys rock! I've known paid-for software that's had worse support than this.

Angelus3K · #8 Post by **Angelus3K** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 4:54 pm

Its not a case of which media player to use its which mpeg codec to use. So re-installing some divx/mpg codecs might fix the problem.

#9 Post by **Anonymous Game Creator 2** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 5:34 pm

I recommend installing the ffdshow codecs/drivers, available here:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/ffdshow

LazerFX · #10 Post by **LazerFX** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 6:59 pm

Hi,

Thanks again... I've downloaded the FFDShow media package - tried the standard one first, then the alpha package; still crashes. Then I tried the K-Lite 'Mega Codec Pack' (http://www.codecguide.com/download_mega.htm) which didn't help either...

However, it works with the files renamed, it works in every other player on the system; so I just guess that I've got a 'sticky codec' somewhere that's messing things up.

Thanks again for the help, and keep up the good work with the conversitons - KQIVGA is really entertaining so far

Angelus3K · #11 Post by **Angelus3K** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 9:26 pm

Wait till ya try KQII!!

LazerFX · #12 Post by **LazerFX** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 10:26 pm

No worries, I'm looking forward to it already

BTW, gratz on the 3K posts...

I'm going to do them in order, though - and then there's a KQ3 remake out there too, so I'll do that next

Should keep me going for a while...

pass · #13 Post by **pass** » Sat Jun 24, 2006 10:30 pm

Yeah. It's still a little buggy, but most bugs should be fixed by the time you get to it (at least I hope so... ;) )

jimby · #14 Post by **jimby** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 2:32 am

I was experiencing similar crashes with both KQVGA and KQ2VGA on my new Vista machine, and renaming 1.vf1 allowed both of them to load properly. I'm running Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 on a HP Pavilion dv6700 notebook, and my video card is a NVidia GeForce 8400M GS.

Both programs worked fine on my old XP box, so maybe some codec that was installed on XP isn't installed on Vista by default.

MusicallyInspired · #15 Post by **MusicallyInspired** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 3:11 am

Wow. This thread is exactly 2 years old today.

LazerFX · #16 Post by **LazerFX** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 9:09 am

Good grief, I feel old

Draggon · #17 Post by **Draggon** » Wed Oct 08, 2008 10:25 pm

I just tried to fire up my remade King's Quest games for the first time since building my new PC in May. They both ran flawlessly on my old Win XP system, but I experienced the same lockup at startup described in this thread on my new machine (also WinXP on a Core 2 Duo).

Changing the filenames 1.vf1 and 2.vf2 in the KQ1 directory allowed the game to run. Changing the filenames 1.vf1, 2.vf2 and 3.vf3 in the KQ2 directory allowed that game to run. I changed them all by adding ".xxx.mpg" to the end. I know that looks bad in hindsight, but that's not what I meant!

Anyway, as others have noted, these mpg files played flawlessly in Windows Media Player, but are obviously responsible for locking up the game.

Also of interest for those that have downloaded the King's Quest 3 remake from Infamous Adventures - it suffers from the same problem. It appears to be written/compiled with the same software that KQ1 & 2 are as the setup screen looks nearly identical (just a guess on my part - I know not of which I speak). Anyway, the offending file there is called KQ3.000 and after I renamed that, the game ran fine.

I'm posting here to potentially help others, but also to point out that this problem is not limited to the few who have posted here. It appears this is something that could be isolated and addressed.

Thanks for the great remakes! I was really bummed when they wouldn't run on my new machine - until I found this thread!

#18 Post by **Anonymous Game Creator 2** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 9:43 am

You shouldn't need to rename those files. Most times the game hangs, it's due to an issue with the FFDShow drivers. Following the advice mentioned under "Issue 5" in the QFG2 remake Technical FAQ will fix the problem, more often than not:

http://www.agdiforums.com/forum/viewtop ... &sk=t&sd=a

Draggon · #19 Post by **Draggon** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:41 pm

Thanks, AGC2. I will try that tonight!

I searched and read a lot, but didn't see that particular FAQ as I wasn't having problems with GFG2...

Draggon · #20 Post by **Draggon** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 10:39 pm

Anonymous Game Creator 2 wrote:Following the advice mentioned under "Issue 5" in the QFG2 remake Technical FAQ will fix the problem, more often than not:

Worked like a charm! Again, thanks!

I must have a slightly different version of ffdshow on my machine. This part:

Next, go to the "Info & debug" panel and tick the "Don't use ffdshow in" box.

was called "Directshow control" in my version.

#21 Post by **Anonymous Game Creator 2** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 4:51 pm

Great, glad to hear it!

KQIVGA Crash on opening

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