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Corner of Screen Flickering
02/27/2015, 11:17:49

    Peter writes:

    Dear Community,

    I am a long-time MM fan and I've finally decided to replay MM9. However, I've been having some trouble. I have more-than-good computer specifications and am running Windows 7. First I tried installing MM9 from my Sold Out disc I bought some years ago and applying 1.2 and 1.3 patches. Everything seemed right, except the top right corner of my screen flickered at times, sometimes revealing slightly the start menu, sometimes showing a black window corner, and sometimes just slightly increasing the brightness of the image displayed in that part of the screen. I ignored that for the moment, but after party creation, saving the game in Ravensford and loading back to that point, the screen froze, and when I ran the game again, there were no saved games files - they were deleted! Then I re-installed the game without any patches and the same problem with flickering persisted. I didn't try playing the game because I assumed the previously encountered problem could still be possible. Finally, I got the GOG version of the game, but the flickering stayed. I made sure every I was running the application as an administrator. I also recall playing the game on Windows XP without any problems. Could this be due to Windows 7? Did anyone else have a similar experience? I do not want to start playing MM9, not so much because of the corner flickering, but because I am afraid I might lose my saved games at a late point in the game. This happened to me in MM6 and I do not want that situation again Any comments will be really appreciated.





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This sounds like it's a problem with the graphics drivers....
02/27/2015, 20:24:51

    Bones writes:

    It might not be, but that would be my first guess. I'm assuming you have the most current graphics drivers, and *that* might be a problem, but let's not worry about that first.

    Try running the game in different graphics modes --- windowed or not, with and without hardware acceleration. Make sure that all the EXEs and DLLs are tagged for WinXP compatibility. I think the game had a setup program to set graphics options. Explore the possibilities of that.

    Please let us know what you discover. Thanks!





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Still no luck
02/28/2015, 09:47:37

    Peter writes:

    Thanks for replying and helping me out! Unfortunately, I couldn't resolve the issue, but here are my results.
    First, I returned to the Sold Out MM9 + 1.2 + 1.3a Patch game.
    I did try to update my graphic driver NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT, and it turned out I didn't have the latest drivers, but even after updating the problem persisted.
    I made sure that all EXEs are tagged for WinXP compatibility and ran as administrator. Didn't know how to do that for DLLs, there's no option like that when I do right click+properties for them.
    Then I tried to run the game windowed by adding the suffix "-w" in the target for the shortcut. That did not get the game to run windowed (is there another way to try and force the game to run windowed?), but surprisingly, the game ran smoothly, no flickering, and Ravensford loaded nicely. However, after trying to run the game a second time, everything was the same: flickering, and getting stuck on load screen while only hearing the audio of Ravensford. Really confusing.
    The only options the game itself allows to be changed are
    Disable: sound, music, light mapping, fog (nothing checked)
    Enable: optimized surfaces (checked), poly gap fixing (checked), triple buffering (not checked), single-pass multi-texturing (checked). On the Display Settings, the only option is to choose renderers, but there is only one on the list: LithTech Direct3D Renderer (d3d.ren).
    I do not know how to try to run the game with and without hardware acceleration.
    Also, I'm attaching an image of the top right corner that flickers, maybe it will be of some help. Note: the flickering is here demonstrated on the options screen, but it also occurs during party creation and in game (albeit more rarely in game).
    I am seeking help here with the assumption that this game is playable on Windows 7, I hope that is at least correct? I am also assuming that the flickering has something to do with the fact that the game crashes.
    Thanks for taking the time to help me, may the blessings of the Ironfist Dinasty be upon thee
    image

    Related link: http://s12.postimg.org/terbg2tm5/Picture1.png

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I don't think this problem is originating in the game....
02/28/2015, 15:13:24

    Bones writes:

    This looks like there's another program that's writing to the display in such a way that conflicts with the LithTech display routines -- probably something running in the background. Are you running a desktop widget?

    Go to your Start menu and type in 'config.sys'. Go to the Startup tab and uncheck anything that might be trying to update the screen display periodically. Send a screenshot of your startup list if you don't suspect anything.





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Working smoothly now
03/01/2015, 18:32:19

    Peter writes:

    Yes, I think you got it!
    I didn't even check the System Configuration, I immediately put blame on my clock gadget. Now that I've removed it, no flickering is happening. I hope this will also put an end to the save-load crashing.
    Thank you very much, especially since this was not really MM9-specific issue.
    Good show!




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That's wonderful news. I'm glad I could help. Enjoy the game!
03/01/2015, 23:44:26

    Bones writes:





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