Dark Messiah Problem on Vista

You can't play Dark Messiah? You lucky bastard!

If the game has just randomly stopped working, and doesn't work after a reinstall, I would look at the other software on your PC rather than the game itself. Have you installed anything else recently, or modified anythink else recently, that could cause conflicts?

It could well be that you're running something now that you weren't before (or a different version of something you were running before) that is causing conflicts. Update any video drivers? Any video software? Install any codecs?

I dont know. If something randomly stops working, it could be a lot of things. I would try the patch first, and then head over to the Dark Messiah official tech forums.

btw for me dark messiah is lag.i hate it.i know its a decent game but the game sometimes spike too much.

even with patch i can play it smoothly.

what version of Vista are you running, 32-bit or 64-bit? my mates game always crashed in 32-bit, mine never has in 64-bit and now he has 64-bit so his doesnt either..dunno if that happens for everyone.

spewin though, Dark Messiah is sick. :)

what version of Vista are you running, 32-bit or 64-bit? my mates game always crashed in 32-bit, mine never has in 64-bit and now he has 64-bit so his doesnt either..dunno if that happens for everyone.

spewin though, Dark Messiah is sick. :)

gtarmanrob

im running 32-bit. i dont really know what that means, but can i just switch it to 64-bit or do you have to get a whole new OS? anyways im downloading the patches right now, we'll see if that helps.

Try downloading the patches manually, just in case Steam's not doing it's job (I know that it's very unlikely, but you never know). When I got it, it would always crash on the second level, coming up with that message, until i downloaded the patch, which fixed it all up.screamingdoom

i downloaded both patches but when i tried to install either one it just said that the game is not installed and i need to install it first. and it didnt give me the option of locating the file directory manually, so i dont think thats going to work.

I'll continue to search for you ahem!biggest_loser

thanks man i havent found anything so far.

bumping this in the hopes that someone will have found something.

try running from steameva89

i have, no luck with that.

Whats the situation at the moment? have you tried reinstalling it again? Checked the disk for scratches etc?biggest_loser

havent tried reinstalling since you were last here. and i bought it through steam so theres no disks.

Played through it with no problems on XP the first time, Vista with no problems the second time. Has nothing to do with your OS.

Played through it with no problems on XP the first time, Vista with no problems the second time. Has nothing to do with your OS.

vfibsux

yes it does because tons of people have had problems with it on vista, and i had no problems with it on my old xp. some people have problems with it, some dont, but the fact is a lot more people with vista have problems with it as opposed to xp.

well after tons of research and hours of hopeless trial and error, i fixed the problem.

basically, i didnt know that there were programs that ran in the background that wouldnt show up under the process' tab in the task manager window. ive been closing backgrounds tasks for a long time, but didnt know there were some that wouldnt show up there. so after i found that out i went through the tedious process of disabling every background process/service and one by one re-enabling them, restarting my computer, and testing the game. i literally did this for hours over the past two days. i finally just narrowed it down to two background services that were causing the problem: Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), and Windows search. so i know have these two disabled and dark messiah, as well as portal are working fine again. but this leads me to my next question.

is there any risk in disabling WMI for good? im pretty sure that disabling windos search just makes file searches take longer, because i tested that. but i only have a very vague idea of what WMI does, let alone if there is any risk in disabling it. im under the impression that there isnt, because from what ive read it seems to be just a convenience tool, but i want to make sure that im not putting my pc at risk, or making a drop in performance. if someone could please let me know about this, or direct me to someone who knows, i would appreciate it, because all the research i have done on it has come up with a bunch of useless jargon. thanks for all the help through all this.

well after tons of research and hours of hopeless trial and error, i fixed the problem.

basically, i didnt know that there were programs that ran in the background that wouldnt show up under the process' tab in the task manager window. ive been closing backgrounds tasks for a long time, but didnt know there were some that wouldnt show up there. so after i found that out i went through the tedious process of disabling every background process/service and one by one re-enabling them, restarting my computer, and testing the game. i literally did this for hours over the past two days. i finally just narrowed it down to two background services that were causing the problem: Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), and Windows search. so i know have these two disabled and dark messiah, as well as portal are working fine again. but this leads me to my next question.

is there any risk in disabling WMI for good? im pretty sure that disabling windos search just makes file searches take longer, because i tested that. but i only have a very vague idea of what WMI does, let alone if there is any risk in disabling it. im under the impression that there isnt, because from what ive read it seems to be just a convenience tool, but i want to make sure that im not putting my pc at risk, or making a drop in performance. if someone could please let me know about this, or direct me to someone who knows, i would appreciate it, because all the research i have done on it has come up with a bunch of useless jargon. thanks for all the help through all this.

chesterocks7

I don't think there is - you are feel to tweak your desktop as you like.

Another story solved.

Case closed.

Mate I had the same problem as you, but I didnt really understand how didi you fix yor problem... How did you disabled those process (WMI and Windows Search)? thanks for your helpGonaldo

Ok you need the Run command on your Start menu. If you don't have it just right click on the start menu, click on properties, click on customize start menu, then click on Run command.

Now select the Run command and type in: msconfig. Click on services, then uncheck Windows Management Instrumentation and Windows Search. Make sure you hit Apply at the bottom then restart your computer. That should fix the problem.

I've done what you said, but it didnt work. Thak you very much anyway, at least it worked for you:)Gonaldo

Well what you can try is what I tried, although it's time consuming. Follow all the steps until you reach "Services" then shut off everything. Re-boot your PC and try the game. If it works, one of those programs is causing the game to not work. So then turn one back on, reboot, and try the game. Once the game doesn't work again (provided it worked when all were shut off) then the one you just turned on is the one causing the problem. Very time-consuming, but it can pinpoint the problem. I guess it depends on how badly you want to play the game. Good luck pal.

I use to have a problem with "mm.exe has stopped working" in Vista x64 every time I exited out of the game. The executable has a 32-bit CD check built into the mm.exe executable. Vista x64 won't run it and in turn crashes. After I figured that out I knew what to do.AdamK47

Well, what did you do, in case that's what the other guy is running into?

Thank you for the explanation, but I guess I'll just skip this game:)Gonaldo

Well if you have a weekend where you don't have anything to do, I would try and figure out what's causing the game not to work, because IMO it's an amazing game that every gamer should enjoy, but if you don't have the time, then just skip it. I still highly recommend it however.

Hey mate, I finally got the game working :D After all this time, I fully patched the game and asked some friends to help me in other processes, and my system finnaly ran it..

I wanted to thank you for your help as well, without you I probably would never have played Dark Messiah :D

Hey mate, I finally got the game working :D After all this time, I fully patched the game and asked some friends to help me in other processes, and my system finnaly ran it..

I wanted to thank you for your help as well, without you I probably would never have played Dark Messiah :D

Gonaldo

[QUOTE="Gonaldo"]

Hey mate, I finally got the game working :D After all this time, I fully patched the game and asked some friends to help me in other processes, and my system finnaly ran it..

I wanted to thank you for your help as well, without you I probably would never have played Dark Messiah :D

Makari

Oh I certanly did :D I've only been playing it for two weeks and I'm already on my third playthrought xD