Release FAQ

[PqLear]

Below is the FAQ/unofficial readme -- there's always a bunch of things which for various reasons didn't make it into the manual or readme.

Almost all of these (hopefully helpful) hints and tips have been initiated or created by you guys here on the forum, a big thanks to all of you for helping us at Atari, the developers at Eugen and of course all other gamers to make Act of War a kick-ass experience we think it is!

I hope you'll enjoy it as much as we do, and come back to tell us about what you liked and what you think can be improved!


Patches

• For details about the various feature upgrades and fixes in the patches, please refer to the readme file included in the patch.
• To be able to play Online, all users must have the same, latest version of the game. For this reason, when you log on to GameSpy your version ID is verified against the "latest version ID", and if it doesn't match you will be asked to download the latest version before you can proceed into the Online lobby. Clicking Yes when prompted will quit the game and launch a download manager which will display the various download sites available.
• You can also download the patch manually from ftp://ftp.atari.com/patches/aow/. Download the file "ActOfWar_DirectAction_PatchX.exe" (where X is the highest available number) to your hard drive, when you launch it, it will install itself to the correct location on your hard drive.
• DIRECT ACTION ONLY: to be able to install the patch, you must have launched the retail version of the game at least once.
• DIRECT ACTION ONLY: please note that in order to support game replays, some modifications were made to the way games are saved. As a consequence, save games created with the UNPATCHED RETAIL VERSION of the game are NOT compatible with any of the patches, apologies in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. If you have a single-player campaign going, we recommend you finish it before installing the patch.

GameSpy

• GameSpy provides a free-of-charge match-making and stats tracking service for Act of War: Direct Action. They do not host the patch or the Online game sessions. If you have latency problems in the game, this is caused by one of the players having a slow connection or PC -- not by GameSpy.
• If you have problems finding a unique nick, we suggest adding a "clan tag" to the beginning of your nick, i.e. "[REDSOX]MannyRulez"
• Please note that when creating a new GameSpy user profile, you cannot enter an e-mail address that contains two dots in the domain name, such as "gamer@us.freedomain.com".
• If you get a message "Invalid password" when creating a new user ID, it means that there is already an existing account using the same E-MAIL ADDRESS. Try again using a different e-mail address, or try and remember what password you used when you previously created a GameSpy user ID with the same e-mail address (probably for another game).
• If you have problems logging on or connecting to the GameSpy server, please verify that your internet connection is OK and try again in a couple minutes.

CD Keys, copy protection and online play

• Please don't make illegal copies of Act of War: Direct Action. Thanks in advance.
• The CD Key for Act of War is printed on the inside of your manual cover, and you'll need to enter it when you install the game. Each time you launch the game, it will 1) look for the presence of the Act of War DVD in the drive, and 2) look for the presence of a valid CD Key in your registry. (Once you've launched the game, you can remove the DVD if you wish.)
• Each time you log on to GameSpy to play Online, your CD Key is validated against an online database. If the records match, you'll be logged in to the online lobby. If they don't match, or if for whatever reason you can't connect to the authentication server, you'll get an error message. Please double-check your login details and connection and try again.
  
• IMPORTANT!!! When logging on to GameSpy, if your CD Key is already in use by someone else, that person will immediately be disconnected without any warning, explanation or error message. Read that again. It means that if you give your CD Key to someone else, that person will always be able to automatically kick you out of your Online game, at any time, without any notice or warning. So, DON'T GIVE OUT YOUR CD KEY! Each logon attempt is IP tracked and it is possible to identify CD Key violations, please contact Atari Customer Support if you believe your CD Key has been hi-jacked (=if you FREQUENTLY find yourself kicked out to the Main Menu with an error message saying "Connection to online server lost".)
• Each time you log on to GameSpy, we'll also verify that you have the latest version of the game installed. If you don't, you'll be requested to download the latest patch to be able to play Online."

InstallShield Error message -6001

If you experience InstallShield error message -6001 right at the get-go, this is probably caused by a defective or obsolete version of the InstallShield runtime application still being resident on the hard drive, possibly left behind by an incomplete installation in the past, or an installer using an obsolete version of InstallShield.

Anyway if you get this, try and simply delete the contents of the folder:

C:\Program Files\Common Files\InstallShield\Professional\RunTime\0701

... this should hopefully do the trick.

InstallShield Error message -6003

If you experience InstallShield error message -6003 when you try and uninstall, locate your original game version and double-click the file "setup.exe". Do NOT delete the folder indicated above if you experience this issue!

Not able to re-install the High Treason patch?

If you have installed and uninstalled Act of War: High Treason (including the patch), and then try and reinstall it again, when you reinstall the patch you may receive an error message stating that the patch is already installed. In this case, simply delete the file "PatchVersion.nfo" from your Act of War: High Treason installation folder, and try again.

Disc Authentication Problems

We've seen three different issues being reported related to disc authentication problems:

• nothing happens when you inserts the AoW disc; it's not recognized as a valid disc, can't be opened, accessed, or read from; nothing. Like inserting blank, unwritten media.
• you can install the game, but not launch it because "Disc could not be verified within time limit", or similar.
• you can install and launch the game, download and apply the patch, but then not launch the game again because "Disc could not be verified within time limit", or similar.

First, if you're running under Windows XP, try following this link and http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en and follow the installation steps (thanks CiTNoH).

If you're still experiencing issues, chances are they're caused by the copy protection or your hardware, for some reason, not recognizing your game DVD as a valid Act of War disc. In cases 2 and 3, our customer support have been able to help everyone that has contacted them so far. In all these cases, please make sure

• you have no potentially conflicting disc emulation/duplication software installed
• your DVD drive can read dual-layer DVDs
• your game DVD is clean and unscratched
• you have the latest drivers for your DVD-drive
• you don't have any virtual drives on your PC

Some specific workarounds reported on this forum:

• If you have a combo drive (that also can write CDs and/or DVDs), try disabling digital CD audio for the device. Under Win XP: My Computer => Right-click your DVD-drive => Properties => Hardware => select your DVD-drive => Properties => Properties => uncheck "Enable digital CD audio for this CD-ROM device". (thanks coldkill, muppetts and and Mobilemick).
• If you have a Pioneer drive, please visit http://www.pioneer-eur.com/eur/suppo...pport/software to ensure you have the latest firmware (thanks Jenard).
• If you have a Plextor drive and experience this problem, you can try using the PlexTool application that came on the install disc, and try on different speed settings (thanks Buadyen and m_sunny10).
• It seems the copy protection on the disk does not like Sonic DLA (drive letter access) with some DVD drives. Right-click the DVD drive => Properties => DLA tab => uncheck "Enable DLA on drives" (thanks Krayzee and performance4men).

If this doesn't help, or you are not able to try different speed settings for your DVD drive, please follow these steps:

1. Locate your Act of War executable (default location is "C:\Program Files\Atari\Act of War - Direct Action")
2. Right-click "ActOfWar.exe" and select the option "Launch Analysis" (normally third from the top under "Open" and "Run as...")
3. Follow the instructions.
4. ZIP the file "AnalysisLog.sr0"
5. Go to atarisupport.com > A > Act of War: Direct Action > [O/S] > Launch: Cannot Launch > [if nothing helps, click "No, this did not help...continue troubleshooting"] > Email Atari Technical Support.
6. Fill out the form and attach the file "AnalysisLog.zip"
7. Customer support will send this file to the copy protection developer, who will supply a modified game executable that, fingers crossed, should work on your system. Turn-around time is typically 24-48 hours.

Ladder Site

• The Direct Action ladder site can be found here: http://gamestats.gamespy.com/actofwar/
• The Direct Action ladder site can be found here: http://gamestats.gamespy.com/actofwarht/

Cheats & Unit Stats and Data

• The strategy guide from BradyGames contains a handful cheat codes and stats and data for all units in the game, as well as a full walkthrough of the campaign and a bunch of multiplayer strategy hints and tips from the developers and testers in Atari's QA department (who have spent thousands and thousands of hours beating each other up in multiplayer…)

The Intro Movie (Direct Action only)

• If you skip or miss the intro movie, you can watch it again by copying the three files in the folder "\VIDEO" on the game DVD to your hard drive, rename the file "ENG_Cutscene_00.wav" to "Cutscene_00.wav", and then drag the file "CutScene_00.avi" to the application "mplayerc.exe".

Keyboard Commands (Direct Action only)

• The Keyboard commands in the manual (pages 94-95) are all over the place, sorry about that. You'll find the correct ones in the retail game readme file, and printed in the strategy guide.

Changing Install Language on a European Master (Direct Action only)

• For European users, if you want to install the game in a different language than your Windows version, hold down SHIFT when inserting the game DVD (to diasble the autorun feature), then right-click your DVD-drive icon in "My Computer", select Open, and double-click the file "setup.exe". You should now get a language selection menu instead.

Performance Issues

• I can only repeat what's said in the game readme file; the game will automatically detect your hardware settings and choose the optimum settings (or, rephrased for clarity: if you increase the settings, you WILL not have perfect performance). This is particularly true for the GeForce FX series; if you increase the shadow settings to Medium or High, this card's poor performance with pixel shaders 2.0 will make gameplay pretty choppy.
• If, when you launch the game nothing appears to be happening, try hitting ctrl-alt-del to open the Task Manager. If the Act of War process is running, terminate it and right-click your ActOfWar.exe file (default install path C:\Program Files\Atari\Act of War - Direct Action\) > Properties > Compatibility tab. Check the "Compatibility Mode" box and selcet your O/S in the drop-down menu, then try again.

Compatibility Notes
Aside from what's mentioned in the game readme file, here's some additional compatibility notes:

Sudden, spontaneous reboot
Sudden, spontaneous reboots can happen at any point of any application, even Act of War, if there is a driver conflict. Try this:

• Right-click My Computer > Properties > Hardware > Device Manager > Sound, video and game controllers. Right-click your sound card and select "Disable", then try the game again and see if the problems disappeared (you won't be able to hear any audio though; this is normal). If this resolved the issue, try updating or reinstalling your sound card drivers, or switching to a different sound card.
• Double-click the Display adapter driver in the Device manager. Make a note what driver version you have and download a copy of it from the Internet. Uninstall the driver and reboot your PC in VGA mode. Reinstall the driver, and reboot. Try launching the game again.

Crash at 30-38%:
Users have been reporting an issue where after you've installed the patch the game will either crash to the desktop or freeze on the loading screen at between 30% to 38%. We are currently in the process of trying to track down this issue but, in the meantime here are some steps to try that have worked for some users who are experencing this issue:

1. If you run under Windows XP, try disabling the data Execution Prevention security feature. http://www.ataricommunity.com/forums...50#post6932850 (thanks phoenix.ger).

2. Try launching the game in Compatibility Mode:

• Locate your Act of War executable (default install path: "C:\Program Files\Atari\Act of War - Direct Action")
• Right-click the file "ActOfWar.exe", select Properties > Compatibility tab > Check the box "Run this program in compatibility mode for:" and then try BOTH "Windows 2000" AND "Windows NT" (regardless which system you have).

3. If you have an ATI-based video card running the latest Catalyst 5.3 drivers, try downgrading your drivers to the 5.2 Catalyst drivers to see if this helps.

4. Also, if you have an ATI-based video card, you can try disabling the VPU recover feature (thanks Morpheus11); START > Control Panel > Display > Settings tab > Advanced > VPU Recover > uncheck "Enable VPU Recover".

4. Update the chipset drivers for your motherboard.

• If you have an Intel-based system go to http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scri...6&DwnldID=8178
• If you have an AMD-based system using a VIA-based chipset go to http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?PageID=2&Type=1
• If you have an AMD-based system using an Nvidia-based chipset go to http://www.nvidia.com/content/drivers/drivers.asp and download the latest Nforce drivers.

If none of these steps help please 1) refer to this forum thread: http://www.ataricommunity.com/forums...readid=459532, and 2) contact our Customer Support department and provide a copy of your DXDIAG file to the representative along with details as to what steps you have taken to resolve this issue.

Flickering graphics: If you have problems with flickering graphics, try setting the mouse cursor to "SMALL" in the in-game options (thanks Troll-Killa).

Athlon 64 Processors

• Windows XP SP2 introduces the NX security feature for Athlon 64 processors, and for Pentium 4 processors with names ending with the letter "J". This feature can make the game crash during startup, if so you have to disable it. To do so, please follow these steps:
• Control Panel => System => Advanced.
• click Performance => Settings => Data Execution Prevention.
• Either select "Turn on DEP for essential Windows programs and services only", or select "Turn on DEP for all programs and services except those I select" and make sure to add Act of War to that list.
• Also, you should get the latest AMD processor drivers and tools for Athlon 64 from www.amd.com.
• Please refer to the readme file for further information.

nVidia Video Cards

• If you experience issues with the ground or unit textures not displaying properly (i.e. gray), try verifying against the settings in this thread by Tybalt: http://www.uk.atari.com/third_party/...&threadid=7597 before reporting the error to Customer Support.
• Please note that the GeForce4 MX isn't supported by the game because it doesn't have pixel/vertex shader support.
• please check out this thread from the UK forum for more information about nVidia card compatibility: http://www.uk.atari.com/third_party/...&postid=157005

ATI Video Cards: Act of War sometimes causes an issue with full screen Anti-Aliasing on some ATI cards, resulting in a flickering screen during the game. If you experience this, try disabling it (or simply hit the Windows key to play the game in windowed mode):

• Open the ATI control center => Settings => ATI Display Settings => 3D => Use Custom Settings => Custom => Anti-Aliasing; make sure the "Application preference" is checked.
• We've seen some forum reports that downgrading your Catalyst drivers from 5.3 or 5.4 to 5.2 has solved various graphical issues; our internal compatibility lab has however not experienced any issues with the 5.3 drivers.
• We've seen several forum reports that activating (or deactivating) DXT texture format (under 3D settings > Direct3D settings) may resolve various stability issues.

Audigy Sound Cards: We have heard of several random issues from people with Audigy 2 sound cards, perhaps related to driver bugs. We have tested thoroughly with this card, without experiencing any issues. Nevertheless, some forum posts have suggested these work-arounds have helped them resolve their problems.

• Set the Sound Hardware acceleration to low. START => Run... => type "dxdiag" => Sound => set the "Hardware Sound Acceleration Level" to the lowest notch.
• Make sure your Sound option in-game is set to "Stereo".

Technical Support and Help

• The Atari Customer Support site (http://atarisupport.com) is a great source of information and also contains a link where you can send an e-mail about issues that do not appear in the various help sections. It's in English but contains links to local Customer Support sites, too.
• As you know by now, this forum is also a very good way to get fast and helpful feedback from other gamers who have had the same or similar questions.

Happy Gaming wishes the entire Act of War team!

[MajKnuckles]

Good info.. i'm glad I read that first line after the delays though, it really did nothing for me. Like I said i'm not pissed at Atari, but I would have expected a warning of some sorts beforehand, instead of having to read about it in a "FAQ".

[HarneyEMPIRE]

dont sweat the impatience ones PqLear on the release date.

Today, tomorrow - what's the difference.

Keep yourselves busy impatience ones.

Me - figure i level in City of Heros, read, hang out with friends,
pay bills, watch CSI, extract some files, read remail, fix my
cousins PC ( which suxs because family dosen't pay), cook
dinner, goto sleep, wake up 2morrow, goto store in the late
afternoon and get my copy of AOW -

what i'm saying is this - get on with LIFE - Problem Solved.


HarneyEmpire

[Fred DM]

For European users, if you want to install the game in a different language than your Windows version, hold down SHIFT when inserting the game DVD (to diasble the autorun feature), then right-click your DVD-drive icon in "My Computer", select Open, and double-click the file "setup.exe". You should now get a language selection menu instead.

that's great news indeed.

does that mean the game is completely multilingual and that all cutscenes and the in-game spoken lines are in english as well as in german? just like in Driv3r?

[PqLear]

Originally posted by Fred DM
does that mean the game is completely multilingual and that all cutscenes and the in-game spoken lines are in english as well as in german? just like in Driv3r?

The European master is, yes. The U.S. master only contains the English version.

[Fred DM]

Originally posted by PqLear
The European master is, yes. The U.S. master only contains the English version.

thanks again. that's exactly the kind of response i expect in an official forum. great job, you made my day!

[kc.pwns.gman]

94-95 pages? WOW, you never see any of the good manuals anymore... as for it not being in stores, well, i can only say i have waited for half life 2 for 2 years :P

How big is the DVD going to be? 4gb? 6gb? 8gb? 63.1gb?

ps, cant wait to play

[Gen.Killer]

On PC requirements, I belive that it said 3½ gigs. I think...

[RPhilMan1]

Originally posted by kc.pwns.gman
i can only say i have waited for half life 2 for 2 years :P

2 years? I waited 6 years, right after I beat Half-Life in 1998.

[ESTEBAN]

I PRE ORDERED ACT OF WAR THRU EBGAMES AND I HAVENT RECIEVED ANY "PASSWORD" TO ACTIVATE THE SPECIAL SKIRMISH MAP. NOTHING WAS IN THE BOOK OR ATTACHED TO THE OUTSIDE OF THE BOX. IM TRYING TO GET AHOLD OF THE MANAGER AT THE STORE BUT WHEN I ASKED THEM BEFORE ABOUT THE SPECIALS THEY DIDNT KNOW TO MUCH ABOUT IT.

[ESTEBAN]

WHAT ABOUT IN A MONTH OR SO RELEASING THE CODE OR PASSWORD TO THE SKIRMISH MAP?? BY THEN MOST PPL THAT WANTED THE GAME WILL HAVE IT AND RELEASING THE CODE MIGHT MOTIVATE OTHERS THAT DONT HAVE THE GAME TO PURCHASE THE GAME JUST TO PLAY THAT SKIRMISH MAP. THE PPL THAT HAVE ALREADY PRE-ORDERED THE GAME AND ARE PLAYING IT CANT RETURN IT AND GET THERE MONEY BACK SO ITS NO LONGER EXCLUSIVE. THOSE THAT DID PRE-ORDER THE GAME OR PURCHASED THE GAME AFTER ITS RELASE BUT FOR WHATEVER REASON DIDNT HAVE ACCESS TO THE CODE CAN END UP ENJOYING THE BONUS MAP. EVERYONE WINS AND ATARI LOOKS GOOD!! DOES ATARI KNOW WHAT THE CODE OR PASSWORD IS? DO THEY HAVE THE ABILITY TO RELEASE THAT INFORMATION? IM SURE THEY CAN INFLUNCE GAME RETAIL STORES TO FOLLOW SUIT.

[ESTEBAN]

THE MANAGER AT EBGAMES GAVE ME A NUMBER...1.800.800.5166...AND TOLD ME TO CONTACT THE EBGAMES CUSTOMER SERVICE TEAM ABOUT NOT RECIEVING A CODE TO THE SPECIAL PRE-ORDER SKIRMISH MAP. I HAVENT CALLED YET BUT I AM ABOUT TO SOON. THE MANAGER SAID THAT HE HASENT RECIEVED ANYTHING AND HE SEARCHED HIS STORE AS WELL AS CONTACTED OTHER EBGAME STORES IN THE AREA AND THEY ALL TURNED UP NOTHING TOO. I AM HOLDING ONTO BOTH RECEIPTS JUST INCASE. IF ANYONE FINDS OUT ANYTHING OR COMES ACROSS THE CODES I WOUNDER IF THEY SHOULD BE PUBLISHED IN THIS FORUM??? OR ATLEAST AT A LATER TIME WHEN APPROPRIATE.

[ESTEBAN]

what does "sticky" mean? this is my first time using a forum and i dont know alot of the terminology. what do you think about EA's Battlefield 2 coming this summer? Are you guys going to try to answer it with something because its unique in its own way and unlike alot of war/strategy type games out in the market currently. I played Battlefield 1942 and it was ok..not that great but i didnt like using my keyboard and mouse b/c it made controlling the action alot harder..i would need a hand held controller..like an xbox or ps2 controller type for a game such as that. But i think AOW is really good and im excited about Empire Earth 2 too.

[SimonTheSaint]

Hi,

Thanks for this post and I HOPE that Atari/Eugen will continue to give support until Act of War 2 will go in store.


Also I hope see soon a expansion pack of Act of War which will contain Navy !
Oh Yeah baby !


Enjoy !

PS
I would find a good idea that the US version of AoW contain also the spanish language. Since in USA many talk spanish.

[SimonTheSaint]

Originally posted by kc.pwns.gman
94-95 pages? WOW, you never see any of the good manuals anymore... as for it not being in stores, well, i can only say i have waited for half life 2 for 2 years :P

How big is the DVD going to be? 4gb? 6gb? 8gb? 63.1gb?

ps, cant wait to play

You need :

1. MINIMUM SPECIFICATIONS
==========================================
* Windows 2000/XP
* Pentium® 4 1.5 GHz or AMD Athlon™ 1500+ or higher (Pentium® 4 2.5 GHz or AMD Athlon™ 2500+ recommended)
* 256 MB RAM (512 MB RAM recommended)
* DirectX 8.1 compatible 64 MB video card (128 MB video card recommended) with full hardware support for vertex and pixel shaders (i.e. not GeForce 4 MX)
* 2x DVD-ROM drive (6x recommended)
* DirectX 9.0c
* sound card, mouse, keyboard


* 6 GB free hard drive space <----------


When I think Apple ][+ had any hard drive...and have 48 KB of RAM and 280x192 4-8 colors on TV monitor

[SimonTheSaint]

Originally posted by ESTEBAN
what does "sticky" mean? this is my first time using a forum and i dont know alot of the terminology. what do you think about EA's Battlefield 2 coming this summer? Are you guys going to try to answer it with something because its unique in its own way and unlike alot of war/strategy type games out in the market currently. I played Battlefield 1942 and it was ok..not that great but i didnt like using my keyboard and mouse b/c it made controlling the action alot harder..i would need a hand held controller..like an xbox or ps2 controller type for a game such as that. But i think AOW is really good and im excited about Empire Earth 2 too.

Since you have Battlefield 1942 try the mod "Desert Combat"
http://www.desertcombat.com/

Personally I find this mod like create by Professional (well some of this guys work for EA now and help to create Battlefield 2).

Desert Combat take 3D engine of Battlefield 1942 and create a modern war (like Desert Storm). And it's a lot cool.
If you like you will be a lot happy to buy Battlefield 2.

Enjoy !

PS
Try not use Capital Letter. It's like you are anger and/or you cry. And think that anybody listen you when you do that.

[Heavyarms]

Pqlear, why don't you just sticky this?

[ESTEBAN]

what does sticky mean asnd what is he trying to stick?

[Padlock]

Where do I get Plextool? I can't find it on the install DVD.

I have a Plextor drive, and I cannot play the game! Help!

[PqLear]

I don't have admin rights on this forum so I can't make it sticky -- and our web master seems to have been AWOL the past few days, lol!

Simon, you can get the on-screen text in Spanish in the U.S. version if you want, but not the audio. If you want a full Spanish version, you'll have to buy it from Spain I'm afraid.

[ESTEBAN]

My cursor disappears during game play and i cant select any options when that occurs so im stuck looking at a game i cant interact with. It disappeared on me last night but then shortly reappeared but a few days ago it completely disappeared and i had to restart the game. Now, i am not having a constant problem with this and it seems rare but what is causing it and what can i do to prevent it in the future?

[volinator]

I preorderd a few weeks before

2 ays before I went in asking about the bonus and they said here is a card and on the card it had the code.

I am in Ottawa Canada.

[Trisaw]

I'm having a problem with the DVD cutscene voices being too low, even with my volume bar up halfway. Has anyone else experienced this? I really can't hear what the actors/actresses are saying.

And when the game starts, WHOA, the sound is LOUD! I find the game commander's voice not clear. What did he say? Mumble...mumble...

I have external speakers and use SoundBlaster set to "Stereo."

There just seems to be a great inbalance between the voice volumes of the DVD scenes (too soft) and the game voices. Atari needs to ensure the volume is equal in both parts.

Subtitles would be nice.

[V-ger]

Don't mess with your sound setting on the account of this faq.
Set everything to their defaults for best results.
Could also set Wave-Out and Master-Volume to max.
Then adjust only the settings in-game if you want to change volume level for the game.

Set your sound settings in windows to the number of speakers you have.

[Bluesmoke]

Atari FIX THOSE DISCONNECTS everyone with same problem post here
1: This is not only happening to me problem is ping shoots up
into the 1000 and repadly more till something of 12000 and
then disconnects the unfortunate player

2: To me this happends only 1 out of 4 games but in general
in those other 3 games one of my enemys/allies disconnects
with the same problem

3: This has nothing to do with me hosting if i do it might or might not happen this also happens when i join other games to me or any of the other players in the map

4: it is not my system i asked at least 50 other players (its eastern
and i have to much time on my hands) with all different hard and
software combinations(winxp home, win2000, winxp pro)
all machines heavy medium to high and extreme machines
all internet acces adsl or cable all 1,6 mbit or above

5: this is also not our hardware in my case i play WARC3, generals
zero hour, neverwinter nights, battlefield, unreal 2004 and 2003
on the internet and in all of those games i never had even one
disconnect

6: to beat any one with stupid suggestions i read almost all other
posts i have tried 5 different ati catalist driver versions updated
the audio card drivers for my soundblaster live value, nothing
overheats i have an xp 2800 processor on an asus mb with 1gig
of memory more than sufficant power supply and a 9800pro card
i already did a clean install of win2000 too had the problems from
the start and still have them

7: all other asked players suffer from the same problems with better
or equal pcs with ati or nvidia vga cards with amd or intel
processors with 512 to 2 gig of memory all have tried different
drivers, it happens as said above on all kinds of command
systems winxp home, win2000, winxp pro.

8: dont dislike the game it rules but ATARI DO SOMETHING ABOUT
THESE HANG UPS AND REACT TO IT AND DO NOT KEEP BEHAVING
LIKE YOUR NOSE BLEEDS

[Sporty]

Because the original post was not an "Announcement" or "Sticky" type I added this post to bump the FAQ to the beginning.

[Beergoggles]

What happens when you do all the stuff you mention and the game continues to crash --and it's only THIS game thats doing the crashing.
When all your drivers are UPDATED (If I hear that one more time I'll write a song to it)
When all the other little quirky checks are accomplished, all the little doo dads done, all the little BS tried and failed.
all AFTER my checking accounts been billed $52.80 for your game.

WHY did you guys have to make this damn thing so difficult to run? The securocom BS, the crashes, no-loads, freezes, system dumps --I have had NO FUN trying to play this nightmare of a product it's just ridiculous.
This is the LAST product I buy from you people --I'll pirate the SOB from the hacks before I give your corporate thiefs another dime. Put me down as a full time hacker --pushed into a life of crime by your own people!

you got your last piece of change outta junior --and BTW -- your tech support is worthless -- the game will NOT run and they cannot answer why, they don't answer at all as a matter of fact-- put me down as the 1% who GIVE UP.

[thehitman]

Hello,

I bought this game when it came out on the 16th of march. Between its release date and now i have been playing the singleplayer campaign and have no trouble running the game. Recently i have been trying to play online but am experiencing some trouble trying connect to multiplayer. I am able to create an account but when i connect i get this message: "Unable to connect to the server, or disconnected during the attempt."

I am on a college network I play other games including counter strike source and do not have any problems with those games. I disabled my firewall program Zonealarm, used the advice on the sticky thread and even called technical support and still have trouble playing the game online. Can someone offer some help or advice?

[thehitman]

can someone help me?

[Cool_gamer101]

try going to www.gamespy.com and create an account there.Then use that account and try going online to see if it works.