NOTE to PEOPLE WITH TECH ISSUES

[Makeo]

[Cosmos]

Today, I purchased Rise of Nations as it was the type of game which is in my interest. I was excited to play it and when I found that there was a MAJOR problem with crashing I was extremely disappointed. I have read on numerous message boards that report hundreds of people have had problems with crashing. My computer specs are listed below and any other information which may provide vital in finding a symptom. The problem is the game crashing forcing me to restart. I am entered into a blue screen where I get different errors, I think this is due to the current file the game is using as the file has been different nearly every time. One time it was nv4_display.dll and then it was w32k.sys. I have tried booting with minimal options enlisted on the Microsoft support service website where I had booted up with the least possible programs to run the game and the same problem occurred. I have altered my AGP memory to 256 on the bios and I have also altered the video performance slider on the display properties under troubleshooting. I have patched the game to the latest and have tried running the game unpatched, with the first patch and the latest patch and the same trouble occurs over and over. Usually happens within 5 minutes of game play every time. I am not running any cracks, trainers or any cheats or mods it is the original retail game full version and my computer meets the requirements by a long shot.

O/S:
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1 (build 2600)

Processor:
2050 megahertz Intel Pentium 4
8 kilobyte primary memory cache
512 kilobyte secondary memory cache

Drives:
70.14 Gigabytes Usable Hard Drive Capacity
29.01 Gigabytes Hard Drive Free Space

Mobo:
Board: ASUSTeK Computer INC. P4S533 REV 1.xx
Bus Clock: 100 megahertz
BIOS: Award Software, Inc. ASUS P4S533 ACPI BIOS Revision 1010 Beta 003 05/23/2003

Memory:
1024 Megabytes Installed Memory

Slot 'DIMM 1' has 256 MB
Slot 'DIMM 2' has 256 MB
Slot 'DIMM 3' has 512 MB

Display:
NVIDIA GeForce2 Ti [Display adapter] (Version 44.03 Drivers – Also Tried 44.10)
LG Electronics (GoldStar) 63LE [Monitor] (14.9"vis, February 2001)

Other Info:
Direct X Version 9.0a
All Official Windows XP Updates Installed / No Alpha-Beta Updates Installed.
No Problems in DxDiagnostic.
All DirectX Features Enabled.

[Q Classic]

that Nvidia GeForce2 TI... how much onboard memory does it have? if it's got less than <16mb, won't work.

[PashaSBU]

GRRRRR! I love this game, but I hate these problems!
I cant even play it at home on my own computer, I get the same message even after I upgrade my vidoe drivers and patch the game. Any suggestions are welcome, my computer specs are listed below:

CPU: Authentic AMD Athlon processor 1.33
RAM: 256 DDR
Graphics Card: NVidia GeForce MX 420 64MB
Graphics Card Drivers: 5-02-2003
Sound Card: Sound Blaster live 5.1

I get a message that my video card is not compatible right after the intros of the "Big Huge Games" and the game itself are played, the game crashed back to windows (windows 98)

[PashaSBU]

Also, when I test Direct 3D with DirectX Diagnostic Tool, the test just would start it give me this error message "Test failed at step 8 (creating 3D device): HRESULT = 0x80004005 (Generic failure)

[Cosmos]

Originally posted by Q Cubed
that Nvidia GeForce2 TI... how much onboard memory does it have? if it's got less than <16mb, won't work.

Its 64Mb DDR... 4 times the requirements. It runs on a 4X AGP Bus.

[Q Classic]

i remember reading something about some issues with certain motherboards on this forum. gimme a bit to find it, maybe it's got something to do with asus or not...

[Scrubs]

I recently fixed my computer with multiplayer problems by uninstalling any privacy service software, such as McAfee's Privacy Service, and everything started working normal.

Try doing a clean boot and see how it does:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...kb;EN-US;331796

If it still doesn't work, check for any viruses.
After that's done, try to uninstall any software thats might be causing problems.

I ended up troubleshooting my own system by installing a clean copy of Windows XP on a new hard drive, then installed SP1, all my drivers, etc.

When I installed RoN and made it work in multiplayer, I knew it wasn't my hardware (at first I blamed it on my A7N8X because of the Nforce2 chipset). After I installed my McAfee security services, I noticed that RoN's multiplayer wasn't working again. So I went back to a system restore point, and the game worked again. When I went back to my old hard drive and uninstalled my privacy service, it worked!

However, that won't pertain to this issue, but that's just how I ended up solving the problem.

I'd save a system restore point, tweak around with some graphics and accelerations settings, and see what you end up with.

[Cosmos]

Originally posted by Q Cubed
i remember reading something about some issues with certain motherboards on this forum. gimme a bit to find it, maybe it's got something to do with asus or not...

Ok... See what you find.

[Cosmos]

This game has been a great dissapointment to me. I have playdeed many many games in my time and this has to be the one with the most problems... its like the game is still in its beta or alpha stage there are so many bugs and so many patches which aren't fixing all the problems. I will wait for a few more days to see if any patch comes available or any cure comes along. I will be returning my game next week and get my money back if it isnt resolved.

[Cosmos]

I've returned the game now and got my my money back respectively.

[PashaSBU]

Hmmm....reinstalled my video drives today, actaully downgraded them, and then express installed RON, and as weird as it sounds, IT WORKED!!! Hopefully this helps someone.

[Skanky Burns]

My game keeps crashing to the desktop. The demo worked perfectly after using newer drivers, but I have changed them once again for the full game but it still has not helped. Anyway, to the details.

CPU: Athlon 1GHz
Memory: 512Mb
Mobo: Asus A7V kt133
Sound: Soundblaster Live
Graphics: GeForce 4 Ti 4600
Driver: 40.72 (ms signed)
(crashed with this, 41.09 and 44.03)

I have not yet patched the game, trying a few other things first. Will report back if something happens. Right now I'm trying the game without soundcard hardware acceleration.

EDIT: Ok, that seemed to work for a while, but still crashed. I got about 5 minutes play rather than 15 seconds. After restarting, XP said the system instability was caused by my graphics driver.

EDIT2: Its the soundcard that is killing the game. I set the sound flag in rise2.ini to off, and the game works perfectly. Time to look for a new soundcard driver. Well, tomorrow anyway. I stayed up until 2am "testing".

EDIT3: New SB Live driver, game still crashes when sound is enabled even with music disabled. :sigh: I guess this will have to wait for a patch.

EDIT4: And it is crashing even with sound disabled completely.

[Katalyst54]

connection

when i play multiplayer games it worked fine but now (i think it was the 2nd patch that caused it all) it gets to the "attempting connection" screen and just stays there for about 5 min. then changes to "Attempt failed: Unknown causes" and i cant play multiplayer??!!

i have cable modem and have 2nd patch. i also tried reinstalling.

PLEASE HELP!
Katalyst

[Skanky Burns]

I formatted and reinstalled WinXP with all the latest drivers, patches, etc. The game is much more stable now, however it still crashes every so often (freezes the computer but the mouse can still move).