GameBanshee Forums

Well, I've spent 15 hours debugging my comuter, upgrading drivers, software, bios, troublshot the game so many damn times, and yet it still does not work. I regret to inform the community of NWN that I will not only be returning the game today or tomorrow (depending on when I can get the store) but I will also not pick it up in the future.

On top of that decision, I will openly warn people, and hope that they do not pick the game up either. If they do, they wil only be supporting a seriously flawed piece of software that has caused so many people to make drastic changes to their computer composition (don't believe me? Check out the tech help board at Bioware nwn.bioware.com/forums )

well it works for some people

mabey there is some faulty disks

i've already paid for it so it better work

(thursday)

There are also several people that can play the game, so warning people to buy it because it is a bad product might not have complete justification.

Some can't run the game, lets hope this get reticfied in a patch, but if other people can run the game, it might not only be the game that is the problem.

(I just hope I can run it )

So what happens? Will Bioware and Infrogames recall the game, and fix it up and release a less bugged version? Or are we to just install patch after patch to fix it up.

Sounds like a similar situation to Civilization 3. Also produced by Infrogames along with Firaxis(they make the game, Infro gets the money ). The game didn't freeze up alot, but it had alot of bugs. Like certain aspects not working. Obviously the developers had overlooked alot of stuff. With about 3 patches the game is finally working at it really should be.

I think Bioware, and Firaxis are both great companies, but Infogrames seems to hurry its games out and not test them enough.

Luckily I'm not buying this game till I come back from vacation which means it should be $5-10 cheaper, and maybe they'll have a less buggy version.

Good luck to people who are buying it!

ok I think a lot of good points made in the thread, I just want to present myself as someone who went and bought the game, installed it without issue and run it pleasurably with no problems whatsoever. So that does happen too. I don't have anything I need "fixed" or recalled. So ? is the problem.

I have not been checking the official forums at all. I am distressed by the tendency I see in the gaming community to bum-rush developers in an orgy of complaint, wailing and whining about every problem discernible and even just worries about perceived or possible problems when a game comes out. I'm not disputing that some people are having problems running the game, but it depresses me to read about when I am sitting here loving the game. Nothing seems "broken" over here. Why do other people have all these problems when a game comes out and I never do? I don't know but I see it over and over with each game that comes out.

It is well understood that PCs are funny beast to program for, that there are a million weird configurations out there and that it is difficult or impossible to create a program that will run perfectly on every system. It is unfortunate but true and important to remember in times like this. I remember actually that I had crash ssues with the original Baldur's Gate...It would crash when loading a new area. It was depressing to me because I really liked what I could see of the game. I didn't go on any forums or demand patching from developers or deride the game as "broken" though, I looked at what else was running on my system. Maybe I was just naive, maybe complaining on forums is a better way to do it, but I went through and deleted all the programs that came bundled with my OEM windows 98 install disk...I don't know which program was causing the crashes but sure enough when I had cleaned the bundled install disk for my computer down to a clean Windows 98 install, the game worked fine....who can say why? But was this Bioware's fault? Could they fix it? No, it was on my end and I fixed it. Oh well, that's just an example of how PCs can be weird, I'm not saying that that will fix anyone else's problem....Good luck everyone

If im not mistaken, most people that have problems running NWN have either older hardware (3dfx cards etc) or older drivers.

Please DO correct me if im wrong

Originally posted by Pebz
If im not mistaken, most people that have problems running NWN have either older hardware (3dfx cards etc) or older drivers.

Please DO correct me if im wrong

Actually most of the poeple having problems have newer systems. There are drivers to have the 3dfx stuff to work

Hmm.. that is strange indeed... well, as i was saying on the other board, just hold out for a little while longer and im sure you'll be able to run the game with flying colors

edit: do you mind posting your hardware specs? (i might be able to help you out)

Here is an idea, the newer stuff may not be what NWN was made on, think of it, when did they start making NWN? Well, about 5-3 years ago.....just a thought....

NWN was under development over the last couple of years, and meant to run on fairly recent computers. Its requirements include 96 MB RAM (that's the lowend), which was hardly the case a year ago.

Well I have 1 thing to say. The game is fine. If the game will play without hitches (as with mine..absolutely no probs and I have seen many others, again it looks like the majority, who has no probs) then there is nothing wrong with the game. Now I will tell you one thing.....LATEST DRIVERS DO NOT MEAN BEST. I ran the latest geforce drivers on Morrowind. Guess what? It thrashed, inv. screen was hosed, other glitches. Dropped to an earlier version (23.11 to be specific) and everything was fine. Same with EQ. Tried loading up the 29.42 drivers the other day, EQ crashed everytime I zoned to Velious or Luclin. I know this is NWN forum and I only brought those games up as examples. Thing I am saying is dogging the game just because you haven't found the monkeywrench in your works is not at all fair. If the game would not run on anyones machine or everyone had the same exact problem, then yes I agree, its the game. This just isn't the case.

edit: BTW just for the record I run a 800 AMD Athlon, Xstasy GeForce 3 Ti 200 64 MG, Turtle Beach Montego II sound card, 7200 spin 11 gig HD (not sure on the make, had it for a long time), Gigabyte GA-7ZX-1 mobo (aye its a not the best but it works), Plexwriter 40/12/40 CD, 512 Crucial Ram. I keep nothing running except Systray and Explorer. If you ctl-alt-del and you see anything but those 2 things running, that could be your prob also. Nothing gripes me more than having a freind or relative tell me their PC is running like crap, then looking and seeing 50 progs running in the backround and the dang thing not been defragged since 1986.

one of the biggest problems with running games is the background programs/defragmented/scandisk/system try programs not being managed proplery

Note to people: running 100 programs where you only need 1 is a bad idea

Well, Aegis, you got a lot farther than me. I have been unable to install the game--it freezes the computer during the installation of the 2nd disk. Of course, there is nothing like having the computer freeze while writing to the hard drive--now the computer is full of corrupted files, and I will probably have to re-format, since the computer has become highly unstable since trying to install NWN. I will probably hold off installation until more patches come out and they figure out what all the known issues are. For those of you who say, "Well, it worked for me", go take a look at Bioware's tech support forum--it's full of game freezing problems--more than I expected to see from Bioware. The type of system experiencing the most problems?--Athlon AMD cpu+Sound Blaster Live+Geforce. (In other words, mine) The soundblaster conflict with NWN seems to be the most common--with a lot of users forced to disable their sound card and use the mb sound instead. I think it's true that Infogrames is probably to blame for the bugginess--esp. judging from the un-helpfulness of their website. Also, yes, there are lots of different PC configurations out there, but Athlon+SB+Nvidia has the most problems and IMO is the most common gaming configuration--so I don't think that justifies these problems.

Originally posted by VoodooDali
For those of you who say, "Well, it worked for me", go take a look at Bioware's tech support forum--it's full of game freezing problems--more than I expected to see from Bioware. The type of system experiencing the most problems?--Athlon AMD cpu+Sound Blaster Live+Geforce. (In other words, mine)

Oh, I though it was only me who had this problem. My game has frozen at least twice a day and I have that very config. The game also froze every time I accidently pushed the WebWheel (Logitech Mouseware) - which is rather easey to do if you use the scroll function - so I had to desactivate this function. Sad, cause I like it when browsing.

Originally posted by VoodooDali
I have been unable to install the game--it freezes the computer during the installation of the 2nd disk.

That could well be a problem with your disks - have you checked for scratches and/or sent them back? As for cleaning up the mess that it left when it crashed, deleting your NWN directory (wherever it is) and C:\Windows\TEMP should sort that out - the registry isn't updated until installation is over, I think.

Aegis - it's been said before, but I feel the need to say it again. Just because the game doesn't work on your computer doesn't mean that you are in the majority, nor does it mean that it's Bioware's fault. Have you tried closing everything except Explorer and Systray? And have you tried reinstalling Windows/reformatting? I know it's drastic, but a friend had random crashes (Isn't a Radeon 8500 what you have? Could be a link), and he reformatted his computer, such was his need to get NWN to work. It worked, but then when he reinstalled everything it stopped working, so he's running on a totally clean install. It works fine now, and I haven't seen him for over a day so he must be having fun Just because it doesn't work doesn't mean it's not your fault or that you should go around shouting how bad Bioware are from rooftops - many people (including me) are having great fun with the game and no crashes.

The game is working very well

I use the game with windows xp and it runs just sweet.
I play 6 hours a day for 10 days now and it only crashed once and that could have been because I am running internet explorer and other stuff in the background.

looks like almost everybody here got some problems with Nwn thats not so fun but i have no problems wath so ever everything has worked just fine ! my biggest problem is that my PC isn't so very fast so the game doesn't run so very fast.
well i wish everyone whos got any problems with playing the game Big good luck
it's a darn good game and everyone should own there copy of it

Next to zero problems here.

With the exception of having the game crash when saving when I made some custom portraits incorrectly, I've only had two crashes in over 60 hrs of game play (MP and mostly SP). Much less problems than I've had with many other games upon initial release. I also set up my Linux server as a dedicated NWN server which loaded and ran perfectly on the first try.

One thing I recommend to those having install issues, is to make sure that you unload and virus detection software. In fact, I unloaded everything just to be sure.

I think that many of the problems that people are experiencing are related to the SecureROM disk copy protection that is being used. I'm not sure if that was fixed in 1.19 or not, but the noCD crack cleared up the problem(s) for a lot of people.

Its interesting how everyone was pushing Bioware to hurry up and release the game, and yet Bioware kept saying that they would release it when it was "done". The beta testing period seemed extremely short, and the developers swear that they've been playing the game for over a year on their various personal machines, without any problems. I don't know whether to think that this is a developer issue or a marketing-pressure issue. I think that Bioware's history speaks for itself though, their games are usually top-notch, and from what I can tell, this game isn't much different. Its hard to gauge what percentage of owners are having problems, since usually only those with difficulties make "noise" at the official site.

======================
System Specs:

Win XP Pro/Mandrake 8.1/BeOS 5 Pro
MSI K7T-Turbo SE (VIA 133a chipset)
AMD Athlon 900MHz
256MB Mushkin PC-133 CAS2
CL GF2 GTS
or
Gainward 64MB GF4 Ti 4200
Enermax 350W PSU
(2) Maxtor 20GB U-ATA/100 7200rpm
IBM 45GB U-ATA/100 7200rpm
CL SB Live! Value digital
or
Hercules Game Theater soundcard/breakout box
Netgear FS311 10/100 NIC
Plextor 12/10/32x CD-RW
AOpen 16x/40x DVD
Promise U-ATA/100 PCI card
Logitech Optical mouseman USB
Logitech Internet keyboard
=========================

Well I have had only 1 crash since I got the game, in again about 60 hours of play My system:

Gigabyte GA-7DXR
Athlon C 1.2 GHz
256MB PC2100 RAM
Creative Geforce 2 MX200 (32MB SDR)
Onboard sound (yes, I know)
Win ME (again, I know )
6GB Western Digital ATA-33 HDD (oh, stop looking at me like that. It's not a mistype!)
Bog-standard 32x CDROM

Not one crash yet,
and i'm not going into details of what system or machine i've got.