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Just purchased Europa Universalis and installed the game. Everytime I try to run it, a little white box appears in the center of the screen, the CD spins for a bit and then the game crashes with an 'Illegal Operation' error.
I have a Pentium III 450, 192mb of ram, a 3D Prophet II MX video card and am running Win98 SE. Out of desperation, I tried downloading the UK patch. That actually starts to run, then halts because it cannot find an EU cd. HELP!
 
copy protection

Ok... I already sent an email to them. Was just hoping I wouldnt have to wait till Monday to play :)

btw, the EU cd error only happened when I tried using the .exe from the UK version. Never even got that far when I used the original US release.
 
I have the exact same problem. Did you email the Strategy First email in the manual?

I thought it was because I was trying to run it with 48MB of RAM. I know that's below the requirement, but I was told that they tested it with 40 and it ran. They didn't reccomend it but...
 
Re: copy protection

Originally posted by wombat
Ok... I already sent an email to them. Was just hoping I wouldnt have to wait till Monday to play :)

btw, the EU cd error only happened when I tried using the .exe from the UK version. Never even got that far when I used the original US release.
Click to expand...

The exe from the UK update CAN'T be used with the US/CAN CD.


Patric
 
Originally posted by wombat
Just purchased Europa Universalis and installed the game. Everytime I try to run it, a little white box appears in the center of the screen, the CD spins for a bit and then the game crashes...
Click to expand...

Same here, little white dot and all, then the freeze up after CD spin for a moment. Was running WinME, but when my other machine w/ Win98SE ran it fine, I reinstalled Win98SE on my main PC but got exactly the same results!

The only material differences in hardware and configuration are:

(1) Working machine has a SB16 card and non-working machine has a SB Live! Value card;

(2) Working machine has a Philips 4x-8x-32x CD-RW drive, and non-working machine has a Kenwood True-X 62x CD drive;

(3) USB Mouse on non-working machine and PS2 mouse on working machine.

Pretty identical otherwise...

Mazarin
 
We experienced problems with the Swedish distributor's copy protection on certain CD readers. They used SafeDisc from Macrovision and that may be the problem here as well. You should definately contact Strategy First with this problem.

I will talk to them tomorrow about this as well.

Patric
 
Patric:

I'm going to write a longer note elsewhere, but would the copy protection be the issue if you eventually get PAST the little white box? My machine takes 2 to 3 minutes to get to the SF logo screen, then runs fine (for a while...)

Kurt
 
I think I may have found the problem. I did not isntall Winsock 2.0 when I installed the game. I was reading the readme file this afternoon and realized that it was required to run the game. However when I tried to install it off the CD it failed and created ws2setup.log. In the log file the following was listed:

WS2SETUP begin: 02/25/2001 23:53:26
RegQueryValueEx(VendorInstallDll) failed
VendorWantsMSTCP=1, WantsMSIPX=2, WantsSetupUI=1
WantsMSDNS=1, WantsMSSAP=0
New wsock32.dll file version: 0004000a.00000678
ERROR: Incompatible version of DCOM detected (426)
Winsock2 setup requires DCOM version 812 or newer
WS2SETUP end: failure

So apparently my DCOM is the wrong version. What is DCOM and how do I update it?

I don't know if this will solve the problem I'm seeing, but it couldn't hurt.
 
They used SafeDisc from Macrovision

Actually Safedisk version 2, if they had gone with the older ver 1 there wouldn't have been literary hundreds of people pulling their hair in agony.

Safedisk v 2 was(is?) just in too much of a beta state to be released to the general public in the Swedish version IMO. Obviously they still hasn't completly solved their issues yet.
 
Originally posted by JasonMa
I think I may have found the problem. I did not isntall Winsock 2.0 when I installed the game. I was reading the readme file this afternoon and realized that it was required to run the game. However when I tried to install it off the CD it failed and created ws2setup.log. In the log file the following was listed:

WS2SETUP begin: 02/25/2001 23:53:26
RegQueryValueEx(VendorInstallDll) failed
VendorWantsMSTCP=1, WantsMSIPX=2, WantsSetupUI=1
WantsMSDNS=1, WantsMSSAP=0
New wsock32.dll file version: 0004000a.00000678
ERROR: Incompatible version of DCOM detected (426)
Winsock2 setup requires DCOM version 812 or newer
WS2SETUP end: failure

So apparently my DCOM is the wrong version. What is DCOM and how do I update it?

I don't know if this will solve the problem I'm seeing, but it couldn't hurt.
Click to expand...

Wsock2 is only needed when running Windows 95. Is that what you use?


Patric
 
I talked to one of the companies here in Sweden that implement SafeDisc and they told me that there's no list of incompatible CD-rom drives from Macrovision. They told me that it is very sensitive when it comes to TSRs in the lower 640kb of memory. Virus scanners and dos drivers can affect SafeDisc.

If you have more than one CD drive in your PC I would recommend that you try to run it from the first one in the chain (d: before e: etc).

Patric
 
I have only one CD drive on the non-working machine. Ironically, on the working machine, I have two CD drives and it runs on the 'lower'-lettered drive.

Both machines have Norton AV running when I start the game, and the working machine has less RAM, and slower RAM at that.

What is it? CD drive copy protection issue? Sound card (latest drivers)? Video card (latest drivers)? USB mouse?

Everything I have is name brand (not a 'store bought' machine), pure vanilla stuff. Nothing generic or finicky.

I tend to believe it is a copy protection issue b/c when started, the screen never leaves the DT and freezes as soon as the CD copy protection [apparently] kicks in.

When it has been something else, I've usually gotten a black screen, then a DTD. Not so here. :confused:
 
Alright, I've confirmed it's a CD drive issue. I just moved my Philips CD-RW over to my primary platform (something I should have done anyway when I bought the thing!) and the game runs just fine!

If I were Strategy First (or Paradox, as the case may be), I'd focus on the Kenwood Multi-Beam True-X drives, as I can confirm they will not work with the game.

Anyway, w/ my problem solved, I'm off to play in earnest, now!!! :D
 
Originally posted by Mazarin
Alright, I've confirmed it's a CD drive issue. I just moved my Philips CD-RW over to my primary platform (something I should have done anyway when I bought the thing!) and the game runs just fine!

If I were Strategy First (or Paradox, as the case may be), I'd focus on the Kenwood Multi-Beam True-X drives, as I can confirm they will not work with the game.

Anyway, w/ my problem solved, I'm off to play in earnest, now!!! :D
Click to expand...

Mazarin!

That is great news!

Unfortunately the problem with the CD rom drive is not with the game itself but with the copy protection. We are trying to find a way to solve it together with Strategy First. I've learned today that this is a well known problem with SafeDisc.


Patric
 
Originally posted by Patric
Unfortunately the problem with the CD rom drive is not with the game itself but with the copy protection. We are trying to find a way to solve it together with Strategy First. I've learned today that this is a well known problem with SafeDisc.
Click to expand...

Good news for me, Patric. However, for others, here is the official reply to my tech support email I sent to Strategy First yesterday:

Hi! It could be because your cdrom drive doesn't like the copy protection of the game. It seems to be a problem with some drive and unfortunately, if it's not supported, there's nothing we can do. Just in case, make sure you get all the latest drivers for both video and sound card. Install directx8.0a from microsoft and make sure there's no other programs running in the background while you try to start the game.

Michel Chouinard,SFI Tech Support
Click to expand...

So, if you have this problem, it's either get a new CD drive, or return the game. Of course, you are welcome to comment on that, but that is SF's definitive position as stated to me. Luckily, I had another drive and the resources, etc., to deal with it. Others may not be as fortunate. :(

You know, I would hope that this matter would lead to some firms reconsidering this hyperparanoid copy protection position. Yeah, it's there to an extent, but look how you can manage to hurt your good, valid customers as much or more than the con men!
 
I got the same response. Needless to say I'm more than a bit dissapointed by their lack of concern. Apparently they already have my money so they don't care. Luckly I plan to buy a new system in the next 3 months or so, and hopefully that will eliminate the problem.
 
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