Hello everyone,
I discovered this forum last week and it's been quite informative. I've managed to get the DVD version up and running which is awesome. However, I've discovered a couple quirks that I wondered if anyone else had run into. They don't make the game unplayable, but they are disruptive.
To start off: yes, I have DVDExpress, the patch, and RSX3. My computer is an HP Presario, AMD 2800 processor with 512MB of RAM. I have XP SP2, and no, I don't have hyperthreading.
That said, I installed the game by using Windows Compatibility Mode (henceforth referred to as WCM) and happy as a clam, I immediately began spending way too much of my non-work time playing the game.
Then came the sudden crashes while talking to people. I first noticed it with Delores Lightbody. I had done quite a bit of other stuff before talking to her and didn't have any problems up to that point. When it crashed I had to close the program using Task Manager. While annoying, it didn't stop me from playing the game since it didn't happen all that often and when I would start the game again, it would actually remember roughly where I'd been so even if I hadn't saved recently, I didn't lose much, if anything.
But then, it started happening with everyone I talked to and there was no way to predict (as far as I could tell) when it would happen. I scoured the forums and I think I saw one person who mentioned a similar problem but there hadn't been a solution. However, I had seen another topic where someone posted that you didn't need to run the game in WCM for it to run.
Interesting, I thought. I decided to give it a shot, and sure enough, it ran even without WCM. And glory, hallelujah! It no longer crashed during conversations! I could once again bask in the beautiful video (I had also discovered that if I hit ESC to skip the cutscene where the person answered, it wouldn't crash).
But then I went somewhere where I needed to do a bit of exploring. I was astounded when I tried to move. There would be a 2-3 second delay after I pressed a key to move. And when it did respond, if I hadn't done a very light, quick tap I'd suddenly be smooshed up against the wall on the other side of the room. Or, if I was turning, the camera would start going in circles and just not stop. I think once it did this for about 20 seconds before finally deciding to acknowledge one of the other keystrokes I'd entered and stopped spinning.
At first I thought maybe something was up with my computer. So I restarted and looked a few things. Cleaned up my registry a bit, etc. Opened the game again and it was still doing the jerky/delayed movement with a propensity to zoom across the room and spin in circles.
I got suspicious and exited out of the game and turned WCM back on. Sure enough, the movement problem was solved.
So...I have a mostly functional game. I can easily switch back and forth between running in WCM and not, depending on if I'm doing more talking or walking around and exploring. It's a bit disruptive but it beats not being able to play Overseer at all.
From my hours spent browsing the forum here, I understand that there is likely not any solution to this other than playing it in Windows 98, but I figured I'd throw it out here as an FYI and on the off chance that someone does know of a better way to deal with it.
I discovered this forum last week and it's been quite informative. I've managed to get the DVD version up and running which is awesome. However, I've discovered a couple quirks that I wondered if anyone else had run into. They don't make the game unplayable, but they are disruptive.
To start off: yes, I have DVDExpress, the patch, and RSX3. My computer is an HP Presario, AMD 2800 processor with 512MB of RAM. I have XP SP2, and no, I don't have hyperthreading.
That said, I installed the game by using Windows Compatibility Mode (henceforth referred to as WCM) and happy as a clam, I immediately began spending way too much of my non-work time playing the game.
Then came the sudden crashes while talking to people. I first noticed it with Delores Lightbody. I had done quite a bit of other stuff before talking to her and didn't have any problems up to that point. When it crashed I had to close the program using Task Manager. While annoying, it didn't stop me from playing the game since it didn't happen all that often and when I would start the game again, it would actually remember roughly where I'd been so even if I hadn't saved recently, I didn't lose much, if anything.
But then, it started happening with everyone I talked to and there was no way to predict (as far as I could tell) when it would happen. I scoured the forums and I think I saw one person who mentioned a similar problem but there hadn't been a solution. However, I had seen another topic where someone posted that you didn't need to run the game in WCM for it to run.
Interesting, I thought. I decided to give it a shot, and sure enough, it ran even without WCM. And glory, hallelujah! It no longer crashed during conversations! I could once again bask in the beautiful video (I had also discovered that if I hit ESC to skip the cutscene where the person answered, it wouldn't crash).
But then I went somewhere where I needed to do a bit of exploring. I was astounded when I tried to move. There would be a 2-3 second delay after I pressed a key to move. And when it did respond, if I hadn't done a very light, quick tap I'd suddenly be smooshed up against the wall on the other side of the room. Or, if I was turning, the camera would start going in circles and just not stop. I think once it did this for about 20 seconds before finally deciding to acknowledge one of the other keystrokes I'd entered and stopped spinning.
At first I thought maybe something was up with my computer. So I restarted and looked a few things. Cleaned up my registry a bit, etc. Opened the game again and it was still doing the jerky/delayed movement with a propensity to zoom across the room and spin in circles.
I got suspicious and exited out of the game and turned WCM back on. Sure enough, the movement problem was solved.
So...I have a mostly functional game. I can easily switch back and forth between running in WCM and not, depending on if I'm doing more talking or walking around and exploring. It's a bit disruptive but it beats not being able to play Overseer at all.
From my hours spent browsing the forum here, I understand that there is likely not any solution to this other than playing it in Windows 98, but I figured I'd throw it out here as an FYI and on the off chance that someone does know of a better way to deal with it.