Have you ever bought a game on PC and not been able to play it?
- Thread starter krazykidd
- Start date
Recommended Videos
I bought Fallout 3 on Steam many months ago and the thing just crashes on launch. Totally unplayable. I haven't had the motivation to jump through hoops to fix the damn thing. I dunno why Steam even makes it available if customers have to fix it themselves.
It's been a while since there's been a game which I haven't been able to get working after an hour or so of tinkering. Most recently the Mass Effect trilogy my sister bought had serious issues, which funnily enough all came back to origin being terrible. I fixed them all in the end though. Last game which I downright couldn't get working was Rome: Total War which kept complaining about my out of date flash player or something, so I gave up on it. It only cost £2 so I don't consider it much of a loss.
I almost never have problems because of how savvy I am, but I do get stuck helping friends fix their problems. The other day, I was wrestling with an issue of getting Supreme Commander to run on a friend's computer. Turns out, there was a .prefs file that never was created in the appdata folder and without it, the game would only tell me that it "couldn't create Direct3D." The error had NOTHING to do with the problem, but I was able to give him my .prefs file and it worked instantly.
I think the last time I remember having a real issue with a game was Bioshock 1, and that was because my video card's shader model was 2.0 instead of the minimum of 3.0. I ended up getting a far better card so that I could play it, but then I found later that someone modded BS to allow SM2.0. Damn.
I think the last time I remember having a real issue with a game was Bioshock 1, and that was because my video card's shader model was 2.0 instead of the minimum of 3.0. I ended up getting a far better card so that I could play it, but then I found later that someone modded BS to allow SM2.0. Damn.
The first Max Payne game refuses to run under normal circumstances, and when it does decide to run after some effort, it crashes within minutes. I knew beforehand that it had severe problems running on Windows 7, but I wanted to try anyway.
Back in the day I remember having dozens of games that didn't run on my computer, thanks to Windows 95 having absolutely no support for DOS games.
Back in the day I remember having dozens of games that didn't run on my computer, thanks to Windows 95 having absolutely no support for DOS games.
Only once has a PC game not worked for me. I don't remember what game it was but it would crash during the opening screens. I did some research and found a patch for it. It worked fine after that. I've had several that were buggy. Pretty much anything from Ubisoft that isn't aa AssCreed game tends to randomly crash my video drivers. Both Dead Island games did something similar. Not unplayable but super annoying.
Fallout 3 is a broken mess of a game on Windows 7 and up. Even with heaving modding to get the fucker to even start up correctly, it still periodically crashes to desktop.
After about a month of yanking my hair out over it, I finally said "fuck it" and bought it for my 360 (which hadn't been turend on in about three months because I had just gotten into PC gaming).
After about a month of yanking my hair out over it, I finally said "fuck it" and bought it for my 360 (which hadn't been turend on in about three months because I had just gotten into PC gaming).
The original Far Cry. I bought it for my last laptop, which surprise surprise was too crappy to run it. I keep meaning to try it on my newer one which I've had for about a year (which can run The Secret World with a bit of fine tuning, so should be able to run the original Far Cry without a problem). Haven't gotten around to it yet though.
Also, Fallout 3, which kept crashing at the first screen (I eventually gave up and sold it, buying the Xbox 360 version instead), and Myst (the five game box set) - the original worked like crap and I had to rebuy it off GOG (although to be fair I got the boxset cheap anyway so it wasn't too much hassle financially); Riven was pretty decent (and didn't have the game breaking crash that I kept getting in my old copy years ago whenever I was in the Jungle Island submarine); Myst 3: Exile was fine; Myst 4: Revelation was mostly fine; Myst 5: End of Ages is a nightmare to run and I haven't touched it for half a year...
Also, Fallout 3, which kept crashing at the first screen (I eventually gave up and sold it, buying the Xbox 360 version instead), and Myst (the five game box set) - the original worked like crap and I had to rebuy it off GOG (although to be fair I got the boxset cheap anyway so it wasn't too much hassle financially); Riven was pretty decent (and didn't have the game breaking crash that I kept getting in my old copy years ago whenever I was in the Jungle Island submarine); Myst 3: Exile was fine; Myst 4: Revelation was mostly fine; Myst 5: End of Ages is a nightmare to run and I haven't touched it for half a year...
Only time I can remember is GTA3 a long time ago, it was one of my first proper PC games and for some reason I couldn't make it work, but I was just a kid back then.
Aside that and a couple games I bought for the wrong platform by mistake when I was younger, no it never happened.
I gradually switched to PC completely during the last console generation. From time to time there's a problem with a game so it won't start or work correctly and I actually enjoy finding a solution. Though 9 out of 10 times it's no mystery and I know what it is right away and can fix it in a minute.
Aside that and a couple games I bought for the wrong platform by mistake when I was younger, no it never happened.
I gradually switched to PC completely during the last console generation. From time to time there's a problem with a game so it won't start or work correctly and I actually enjoy finding a solution. Though 9 out of 10 times it's no mystery and I know what it is right away and can fix it in a minute.
I have a game that used to work, like worked for a few weeks, and then no longer works on any computer. It doesn't make sense, the disk wasn't damaged, it installs and even if I run patches, it won't launch, and then rarely properly uninstall. The last non-free Tribes game, I think it was called Tribes Vengeance, I really wish I could play it because I love the skiing and jetpack stuff in Tribes but the F2P Tribes Ascend, last I checked, is multiplayer only and I don't want to try that hard, I remember playing the story in Vengeance and while not knowing what was going on, I did enjoy the level design and the combat. I tried installing it several times on multiple PC's, XP and Windows 7. I even, shamefully checked to see if there was a CD crack that might offer a working version, I still have the discs and at the time decided that would definitely make it okay.
Game didn't even have a torrent available, I found an unofficial patch that in hindsight was probably sketchy but it didn't work either.
I haven't had a game that didn't work at all since XP came out, I rarely buy games that I don't check forums to see if they work. I have bought games that didn't work for a time because I didn't check the specs but they later worked, I also have some old games that wont work anymore on Windows 7.
I did have an old game for 98 or 95, Backyard Soccer or something, I was like 8 and it worked for a while but then somehow it decided my computer needed more RAM when I got a certain distance into the tournament mode.
Game didn't even have a torrent available, I found an unofficial patch that in hindsight was probably sketchy but it didn't work either.
I haven't had a game that didn't work at all since XP came out, I rarely buy games that I don't check forums to see if they work. I have bought games that didn't work for a time because I didn't check the specs but they later worked, I also have some old games that wont work anymore on Windows 7.
I did have an old game for 98 or 95, Backyard Soccer or something, I was like 8 and it worked for a while but then somehow it decided my computer needed more RAM when I got a certain distance into the tournament mode.
Tomb Raider doesn't seem to work on my laptop, despite everything else working. It installs and runs, just has severe graphical errors that make it unplayable.
I'm fairly sure it's not a Steam/computer issue and just that Tomb Raider has shit-tier coding though.
I'm fairly sure it's not a Steam/computer issue and just that Tomb Raider has shit-tier coding though.
There's only one game I ever bought that I couldn't play and that was a long time ago.
It was a splinter cell sequel I picked up for a only a couple bucks and the securom protection would mess up the installation proces somewhere in the middle each time and on two different drives too. There wasn't even the tiniest cratch on the disc; Ubisoft had simply messed up the tracks a bit too far even for a good drive to read.
It was a splinter cell sequel I picked up for a only a couple bucks and the securom protection would mess up the installation proces somewhere in the middle each time and on two different drives too. There wasn't even the tiniest cratch on the disc; Ubisoft had simply messed up the tracks a bit too far even for a good drive to read.
Bioshock, when it first released, had issues with certain HD audio drivers... including the stuff on my motherboard at the time. I didn't get to play it until that was patched out.
...that's all that springs to mind, aside from Assassin's Creed being a godawful port with wonky controls. Could play it, but after about half an hour, I didn't want to.
...that's all that springs to mind, aside from Assassin's Creed being a godawful port with wonky controls. Could play it, but after about half an hour, I didn't want to.
Nah, that's just dual channel, a minor performance boost. Wouldn't affect the volume of RAM.suitepee7 said:
There are some versions of windows that limit usable RAM, such as starter edition and 32bit versions. But it's usually 3.1-3.4gb in my experience. Also some motherboards have Memory mapping, which will decrease or increase displayed RAM size.
About Dark Souls, I don't think it qualifies here. I mean, the game works, it's just really really shit;/
Quite a few times actually. Usually a bit of troubleshooting or patching solved the problem. In one case, I ended up figuring out the fix and posting it on the forums for that game.
Once too, it was a question of buying the game when I didn't have the hardware capable of playing it WELL.
Once too, it was a question of buying the game when I didn't have the hardware capable of playing it WELL.
I have never had a game my pc was not powerfull enough to at least run.
But back in the day, DOS and to some extent Windows 95 had 640kb base memory.
For a time this was fine and all, DOS didn't used a lot.
A lot of games did require a minimum amount of base memory free to use.
But then came the cd-rom drive, this ate a bigger chunk of the base memory.
So using the cd-rom drive disabled me to start a game from the CD-rom.(not always a HDD install option back then)
a solution came from MEMmaker, this could expand the base memory (EMS memory).
The first DX version for win 95 also solved the problem partly.
Win 98 resolved the problem entirely.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conventional_memory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expanded_memory
But back in the day, DOS and to some extent Windows 95 had 640kb base memory.
For a time this was fine and all, DOS didn't used a lot.
A lot of games did require a minimum amount of base memory free to use.
But then came the cd-rom drive, this ate a bigger chunk of the base memory.
So using the cd-rom drive disabled me to start a game from the CD-rom.(not always a HDD install option back then)
a solution came from MEMmaker, this could expand the base memory (EMS memory).
The first DX version for win 95 also solved the problem partly.
Win 98 resolved the problem entirely.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conventional_memory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expanded_memory
I brought the Witcher 2 years ago when I was still on my previous PC and whilst it was able to physically play it the graphics card obviously couldn't handle it and the game played like a bad webcam connection even on the lowest settings.
But then I got my current PC and was able to play it on max settings.
But then I got my current PC and was able to play it on max settings.