Sid Meier is always right
I was at Firaxis yesterday, mostly tagging along with a fellow scribe as he worked on a preview of an upcoming game. He had a chance to talk to Mr. Meier about a wide range of things. One of the topics touched on was how nice it would be to just plop a disk into a computer and have the game just start. You know, like a console game.
At the time, I smirked a little on the inside, mostly because I don't usually have enormous problems installing games. We have a wide range of machines with a wide range of abilities. I like this flexibility and the install time gives me opportunity to read the manual.
But today I spent well over 90 minutes trying to get a single game to install. First the game was on a 16x DVD-R, so that ruled out the first machine. So I moved up a level and the installer kept starting and stopping. Starting and stopping. Sometimes not starting at all.
Then it started well, but prompted me to register. No problem. I always register. This crashed the install.
Finally I get it on the computer. But wait - it has to update my DirectX. Actually, it doesn't since we keep Dx up-to-date at all times, but games now require that you use their Dx installer. Fine.
Oh, and it's Starforce. So it has to install "additional libraries". Install those. But before I can play, I need to reboot so that installation can complete.
Done. Everything installed. This being a press review copy, I put in the "start disk" (some European thing...) so I can actually launch the game.
"The code you have is invalid or incorrect. Please enter a code or contact customer service."
Code? CODE!? There is no code on any of the stuff they sent me.
Some days it doesn't pay to get out of bed.
At the time, I smirked a little on the inside, mostly because I don't usually have enormous problems installing games. We have a wide range of machines with a wide range of abilities. I like this flexibility and the install time gives me opportunity to read the manual.
But today I spent well over 90 minutes trying to get a single game to install. First the game was on a 16x DVD-R, so that ruled out the first machine. So I moved up a level and the installer kept starting and stopping. Starting and stopping. Sometimes not starting at all.
Then it started well, but prompted me to register. No problem. I always register. This crashed the install.
Finally I get it on the computer. But wait - it has to update my DirectX. Actually, it doesn't since we keep Dx up-to-date at all times, but games now require that you use their Dx installer. Fine.
Oh, and it's Starforce. So it has to install "additional libraries". Install those. But before I can play, I need to reboot so that installation can complete.
Done. Everything installed. This being a press review copy, I put in the "start disk" (some European thing...) so I can actually launch the game.
"The code you have is invalid or incorrect. Please enter a code or contact customer service."
Code? CODE!? There is no code on any of the stuff they sent me.
Some days it doesn't pay to get out of bed.
posted by Troy Goodfellow at 6/21/2006 03:40:00 PM
2 Comments:
By the way, "First the game was on a 16x DVD-R, so that ruled out the first machine" doesn't mean it requires a 16x DVD-R to read the disk. It means it's a blank DVD that supports speeds up to 16x for burning.
Any DVD should read it, at any speed.
Shows what I know about hardware...
Anyway, I ended up copying it onto an 8x DVD and having no problem with the older machine. Who knows what was mucking it up the first time.
It's all for the best that I didn't get it working right the first time through since I was a tiny ball of rage by the end of the afternoon.
To cap it off, the game is only average and was worth neither my anger nor my time.
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