No sound or music

[Andy38]

Since the game came out I have not had any sound (ambient, clicks units) or soundtarck (the actual music). I uninstalled four times, and verified the game files with no success, several times, also with the Demetrius patch.
I also tried removing the DLCs, thinking some of them may have some weird conflict

Poking in the game files, the music folder (D:\Steam\steamapps\common\ImperatorRome\game\music) is empty, while the sound folder (D:\Steam\steamapps\common\ImperatorRome\game\sound) has two sub-folders: Banks and MOD_banks but none of the WAVE or mp3 files older Paradox games have, only BANKS files.
Same story in the DLC folder (D:\Steam\steamapps\common\ImperatorRome\game\dlc\dlc001_dde): empty music and sound sub-folders, except for a BANKS file.
I tried deleting these folders, and then verifying the game files, but the same file were downloaded
Game runs fine, but is creepy as hell without sound
It's the first time something like this happens to me with a Paradox game
In the image you can see what the audio tab in the settings looks like

 

[AndrewT]

Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-Imperator
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/Imperator AND Documents/Paradox/Imperator folders
- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add imperator.exe to the exceptions list/whitelist of your antivirus app

In particular you need to make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam Stellaris or Documents Stellaris locations, before installing again.

Then BEFORE starting the game for the first time run a system file check:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-au...er-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system

Weird I know but we've seen this work!

 

[Andy38]

Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-Imperator
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/Imperator AND Documents/Paradox/Imperator folders
- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add imperator.exe to the exceptions list/whitelist of your antivirus app

In particular you need to make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam Stellaris or Documents Stellaris locations, before installing again.

Then BEFORE starting the game for the first time run a system file check:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-au...er-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system

Weird I know but we've seen this work!

Sadly, I tried everything and it gives the same result.
I'm no expert, but it seems as if the game does not read the audio and music files, and therefore does not display anything.
I repeat, it's the first time I see something like this on a Paradox game, never had issues a clean installation would not fix

 

[AndrewT]

Did the SFC find any problems, or it ran clean?

DXDIAG is a program you run from a command prompt or the Windows start menu 'run' dialog box (or 'search programs' in Windows 7 or later). After running it will open a window and start collecting info with a progress bar in the lower-left corner. When it completes click the 'save all information' button and save it to a file then attach that file here.

Please attach your Documents/Paradox/Imperator/pdx_settings.txt.
From your Documents/Paradox/Imperator/logs/ folder, attach system.log .

 

[Andy38]

Did the SFC find any problems, or it ran clean?

DXDIAG is a program you run from a command prompt or the Windows start menu 'run' dialog box (or 'search programs' in Windows 7 or later). After running it will open a window and start collecting info with a progress bar in the lower-left corner. When it completes click the 'save all information' button and save it to a file then attach that file here.

Please attach your Documents/Paradox/Imperator/pdx_settings.txt.
From your Documents/Paradox/Imperator/logs/ folder, attach system.log .

SFC ran clean.
Attaching dxdiag, pdx_settings and system files
Thank you in advance!

 

[AndrewT]

We've seen a few issues with that sound driver:

Driver Name: RTKVHD64.sys
Driver Version: 6.00.0001.8581 (English)
Date and Size: 27/11/2018 00:00:00, 6486608 bytes

Please uninstall it then reboot. Source the latest one available from realtek and install that, and reboot again.

Good luck!

 

[AndrewT]

I believe this is the one you want:
Realtek-ALC3266-Audio-Driver_0V67W_WIN_6.0.1.8098_A04.EXE

 

[Andy38]

I believe this is the one you want:
Realtek-ALC3266-Audio-Driver_0V67W_WIN_6.0.1.8098_A04.EXE

Yay it works!!! Thank you so very much @AndrewT!!!

 

[Akbar The Great]

Still no sound I have followed all the steps, in fact the realtek driver advised broke my souns entirely. There's clearly an issue with IR and sound, otherwise other games would have no sound.

 

[Andy38]

After the last update all of my Paradox Games lost sound due to that dirver. I just uninstalled it and now everything works perfectly

 

[Akbar The Great]

Two days into support ticket now, haven't heard anything from PDS for over 24 hours I think they're flummoxed. No problems with any other game with any driver...

Very poor.

 

[AndrewT]

Still no sound I have followed all the steps, in fact the realtek driver advised broke my souns entirely. There's clearly an issue with IR and sound, otherwise other games would have no sound.

On the other hand if it was solely a bug in the game, no player of it would have sound. Clearly it's a combination of both.

It only happens to Realtek installations.

As you can see above the 6.0.1.8098 version did fix it for that user, and I have had that same success with other users too (here and in ZenDesk). What installation procedure did you use? I'd suggest you uninstall your existing driver then reboot. Thenn install that one, and reboot again.

If still no good, we may have to hunt around for other versions for your hardware. Which is a pain as RealTek's driver site is a total nightmare, I've never once found what I was looking for there.

 

[Akbar The Great]

I've already done all that several times.

 

[Akbar The Great]

Problem solved, I've managed to fix the sound issue myself. If anyone else has a similair issue and are runnung out of options, look for a piece of software called 'Nehalim' or something similair, it comes comes bundled with mobo software and sometimes sound drivers, and remove that. It did the trick for me after all the conventional options had failed.

 

[AndrewT]

Nahimic, no doubt.