Game won't work with sound

[T'pek]

Hi there,

I've had the game for some time, and gave it a break, while still regularly patching it everytime a new patch came out.

Today I wanted to return playing it, when I noticed that the game won't load (blank black soundless screen) unless I disable all sound options in it.
I updated my audio drivers to the latest version, and it still won't work.

Last time I played the game was before the 1.6A version, and then the game worked perfectly with sound&music.

Could this be some sort of bug (so I just need to wait until it gets fixed)? or do I require some rare exquisite codecs or something like that (in which case I require an instruction list of how to get the game going).

Thanks for any help.

[calvinus]

Not a bug. If you see a blank black screen at start, it means the game is trying to play the intro avi sequence, unsuccessfully. In fact, if you hit the Esc key, you will be brought immediately to the loading procedure.

Solutions:

1) Wrong codecs? Not updated?
2) Have you installed a language different from that one installed the first time? Check the LogoUK.avi or LogoFR.avi file inside the Data\Avi folder. The UK/FR must match with the language set in the WW1.ini file (Language="??").

[T'pek]

Not a bug. If you see a blank black screen at start, it means the game is trying to play the intro avi sequence, unsuccessfully. In fact, if you hit the Esc key, you will be brought immediately to the loading procedure.

Solutions:

1) Wrong codecs? Not updated?
2) Have you installed a language different from that one installed the first time? Check the LogoUK.avi or LogoFR.avi file inside the Data\Avi folder. The UK/FR must match with the language set in the WW1.ini file (Language="??").

Thanks for the quick reply.

Concerning the intro, it sometimes shown and sometimes not, but the sound is always played. I tried disabling the intro as well, and it still won't do.

And the logo avi file is LogoUK and the language in the ini file is UK as well.

As for codecs, I updated my drivers to the latest for my hardware. Is there any specific set of codecs or something I should try?

[calvinus]

No specific codec... What happens if you disable only the Intro avi?
Does the game work? If yes, the problem is the DivX codec...

[T'pek]

No specific codec... What happens if you disable only the Intro avi?
Does the game work? If yes, the problem is the DivX codec...

No, if I enable sounds but disable the intro the game won't work.

The game will only work if sound is entirely disabled.

Also, the intro, when enabled, does show most of the times I run it, it's the loading screen that comes after it that doesn't get shown.

[calvinus]

Is the option "load all sounds at start" disabled?
Also, have you disabled the option "play sounds in streaming mode"?

If both options are disabled, does the game work?

[T'pek]

Is the option "load all sounds at start" disabled?
Also, have you disabled the option "play sounds in streaming mode"?

If both options are disabled, does the game work?

With them enalbed or disabled the game will not work.
It only works without any sound enabled.

[T'pek]

Just wondering if there are any suggestions on how to get the game working with sound.

Thanks.

[calvinus]

Sincerely, now I have almost no idea why the game is not working with sounds, till 1.06D only on your PC. Have you installed a new sound card or upgraded some codec/driver just before 1.06D?

I can only think that maybe some audio file is missing or corrupted... so when the game is launched, you get an error message...
Open the LogError.txt file (located in the Logs directory) and see if there is some error log such as:

Unable to initialize music: ...
Unable to initialize sound: ...

[T'pek]

The LogError.txt only shows success messages. The only one about audio is
"SUCCEED : AudioManager".

I will try to reinstall the game, and first try it out unpatched.

EDIT: Now the game doesn't work even when unpatched. It must be something in my system then. The question is what. I guess I'll have to experiment a bit.

[T'pek]

Well I thought of trying again to get it to work. And there are results.

Right now I've tried starting the game with sound again, this time the intro was not even shown, so I alt+tabbed out of it, and then went back again, and saw the intro, I then needed to do the same to see the loading screen and the main menu. However, when I reached the main menu, the mouse cursor didn't move, I tried alt-tab again and then saw the game was listed as non-responding and even the music stopped.

Guess there's more to look into it.

[T'pek]

Well, I've been itching now to try to get the game to work again, and I have indeed managed to!

Previously the game wouldn't load if I enabled sound for it, but now I've tried setting the compatibility to Win2000 and it works! (I'm using XP SP3)

So if anyone has similar problems, I suggest you try this out.

[Franciscus]

Well, I have now this same problem

It's been several months since I played WW1, but now with the upcoming patch my interest grew again and I decided to fire it up. But the game only loads with sounds not enabled, and setting the compatibility to win2000 doesn't solve the problem.
My system is WinXP (in my laptop with win7, no problems), and I have an onboard Realtek audio board, that is unchanged since I last played WW1.
Here's what I did:
- I checked and my directx 9.0c is updated (June 2010)
- And installed the newest Realtek audio drivers (2.63)
- I reinstalled from scratch (total uninstall with Revo Uninstall) WW1 gold 1.08l
- I tried with my AV program (F-secure) OFF

And allways the same: WW1 only loads if sounds are not enabled...

And this is only a problem with this game: all my other games and applications have perfect sound. It is also not a problem of compatibility of IrrKlang and my audio drivers, because my other game that also uses IrrKlang (World of Goo ) loads and plays sound without problems, and the examples that we can download from IrrKlang also play nicely.

I PM Calvinus, but he also does not understand my problem...

So... any ideas ? (Nikel ? )

Edit: IrrKlangplayer.exe (available from IrrKlang) plays perfectly all the sound files of WW1...

[Franciscus]

Well, I have now this same problem

It's been several months since I played WW1, but now with the upcoming patch my interest grew again and I decided to fire it up. But the game only loads with sounds not enabled, and setting the compatibility to win2000 doesn't solve the problem.
My system is WinXP (in my laptop with win7, no problems), and I have an onboard Realtek audio board, that is unchanged since I last played WW1.
Here's what I did:
- I checked and my directx 9.0c is updated (June 2010)
- And installed the newest Realtek audio drivers (2.63)
- I reinstalled from scratch (total uninstall with Revo Uninstall) WW1 gold 1.08l
- I tried with my AV program (F-secure) OFF

And allways the same: WW1 only loads if sounds are not enabled...

And this is only a problem with this game: all my other games and applications have perfect sound. It is also not a problem of compatibility of IrrKlang and my audio drivers, because my other game that also uses IrrKlang (World of Goo ) loads and plays sound without problems, and the examples that we can download from IrrKlang also play nicely.

I PM Calvinus, but he also does not understand my problem...

So... any ideas ? (Nikel ? )

Edit: IrrKlangplayer.exe (available from IrrKlang) plays perfectly all the sound files of WW1...

I attach here the logs that I get when I try to load game with sounds enabled. Apparently everything succeeds, but there is a loop somewhere in LogError. I count at least 10 instances of "SUCCEED : AudioManager" ??
(But the logs are apparently equal when sounds are not enabled and the game loads...:wacko

BTW, the only way to get out of the black soundless screen is by Ctrl-Alt-Del. Task manager states that WW1 is working, and my CPU is almost at 100%...

[Nikel]

Thanks Franciscus, but if calvinus cannot help, how could I

But IIRC you had this black screen problem from the beginning, is it the same or different?

If I delete the video in the avi folder there is a black screen, but clicking escape then the game starts.

I guess you already tried disabling the intro, but you did not comment it...

[Franciscus]

Thanks Franciscus, but if calvinus cannot help, how could I

But IIRC you had this black screen problem from the beginning, is it the same or different?

If I delete the video in the avi folder there is a black screen, but clicking escape then the game starts.

I guess you already tried disabling the intro, but you did not comment it...

Thanks Nikel

In the beginning my troubles were indeed with the intro movie (divx). But now the movie runs fine, but AFTER the movie, if sounds are enabled, the game hangs and I get a black screen. If I disable the intro movie, I simply go straight to the black screen. The only way that the game loads is if I disable sounds...

[Nikel]

In the configurator, do you disable all the sound effects? And if you disable only the music?


Here is one hour later, time to sleep

[Franciscus]

In the configurator, do you disable all the sound effects? And if you disable only the music?


Here is one hour later, time to sleep

Well, I am going crazy with this

I followed your sugestion, and SOMETIMES I get sounds in game indeed enabling sound effects AND the intro movie, but without music (but only sometimes, other times with the same combination the game hangs :mdr

So:

- If Sound effects on, music off and intro movie off: game hangs

- If sound effects on, music off and intro movie ON: game loads SOMETIMES with sounds (but of course without music)

- If sound effects on, music on, and intro movie on or off: game hangs

- If sound Off, game loads OK

This also after a full uninstall of all DivX traces and installing the DivX codecs that come with WW1.

[calvinus]

The worst is that I do not find a common factor in all these combinations...

[calvinus]

I attach here the logs that I get when I try to load game with sounds enabled. Apparently everything succeeds, but there is a loop somewhere in LogError. I count at least 10 instances of "SUCCEED : AudioManager" ??
(But the logs are apparently equal when sounds are not enabled and the game loads...:wacko

BTW, the only way to get out of the black soundless screen is by Ctrl-Alt-Del. Task manager states that WW1 is working, and my CPU is almost at 100%...

Examined the logs. SUCCEED refers to irrKlang initialization. So it seems the audio engine of irrKlang is successfully setupped, but then the game hang takes place when loading a music file (mp3). The I/O operation (file access) is done by irrKlang core functions. If it had been by WW1 procedures, a failed file access would have reported on LogError, indeed. So I believe irrKlang is hang when loading a music file. Can you try to play all music files (use WinAmp or any other player...) so to check if a file is corrupted??

[Franciscus]

Examined the logs. SUCCEED refers to irrKlang initialization. So it seems the audio engine of irrKlang is successfully setupped, but then the game hang takes place when loading a music file (mp3). The I/O operation (file access) is done by irrKlang core functions. If it had been by WW1 procedures, a failed file access would have reported on LogError, indeed. So I believe irrKlang is hang when loading a music file. Can you try to play all music files (use WinAmp or any other player...) so to check if a file is corrupted??

Thanks Calvinus.

Will do later today and Report back

Regards

Edit: As reported, all music files play ok in iTunes

[Franciscus]

To test a far-fetched hypothesis :

Is there anyone playing WW1 gold without problems in Win XP SP3 ?

Thanks

[Random]

Me. Have noted here that I can seldom get more than three consecutive turns complete without lockup and there are some graphics issues when WW1G is restored after being minimized but my sound works fine and as I am aware of those problems I do have, they don't bother me at all.

I have seen nothing similar to your issues in my installation. Sorry.

[Franciscus]

Thanks Random. That at least rules out one "possible" cause.

I am a few little steps from quitting trying to solve this bug...

[Random]

Dumb question but have you tried playing any of the sound files outside the game in your Windows environment?

Perhaps there's some sort of conflict between your default sound player system and the .mp3 format used in WW1G. Slim chance but I'm out of ideas.

Good Luck

[Franciscus]

Yes, all WW1 sound files play perfectly fine outside the game...

[Franciscus]

Well, I quit.

After uninstalling and reinstalling WW1 several times, disabling my AV and firewall in instalation and when trying to play, reinstalling directx, rolling back graphic drivers, updating and then rolling back audio drivers, uninstalling and reinstalling DivX, trying with various released versions of irrKlang dlls, trying W2000 compatibility, checking EVERY sound file of WW1 to rule out any file corruption, trying EVERY possible combination of options in WW1.ini, killing all non-essential background processes with GameBooster, I quit trying to have sound in this game.

No big deal about music (it can be played on the background), but the sounds give some useful feedbacks. And I can allways play in my laptop with all sounds

But what makes me mad is WHY ? Why a few months ago in the same PC, with the same hardware, WW1 loaded OK ? Why sometimes I can get WW1 loaded with sounds (never music) but most of the times it hangs, in the same session, with the same options ?. Why all my other games play sounds happily ? Why even World of Goo that also uses irrKlang loads without problems ?

And WHY apparently only me ?? And why so many smilies ?

Thanks anyhow for trying to help

(PS: I think I am going to Flotsam and kill a Kayran to relax... )

[Franciscus]

Well, once more into the breach...

Patch 1.08m did not solve this problem (I was not expecting it did).

As my hardware is the same as last year, when sounds played OK, as I tested old and new audio and video drivers, and the problem persisted, I went to see what else has changed in my PC this year.
One of the things I noticed is that this year several games installed visual C++ redistributables (dated 2005, 2008, 2010). As WW1 is coded in C++, I went ahead and unistalled everyone of the redistributables. The older ones were needed for Shogun 2 demo and EIC. 2010 is needed for HOI3 (games that I am not playing, BTW...:bonk . Even with all redistributables uninstalled, no sounds in WW1

Good news: I only need the 2010 VC, not the older ones.

I had a bunch of Windows XP actualizations also, could it be it ??

Any other ideas ?

Regards and thank you for your patience...

[Franciscus]

...and updated my CPU chipset Intel drivers, my graphics drivers (now ATI 11.8), and my sound drivers (fresh Realtek 2.64, from this month)...and still no sound in WW1 gold (and only in WW1 gold) leure:

[calvinus]

@Franciscus: I finally managed to get the codecs list on my WinXP laptop, I can say the list is composed by several codecs, like yours. I'll send you a screenshot later tonight.