MarjoryM
Member
I got it in one of game giveaways and it was working at least 2 weeks ago.
I see a couple updates for W10 but who knows.
I also tried the compatibility troubleshooter with no luck.
my setup
Dell XPS 8900 with 2 24in monitors
Nvidia GeForce GTX 745
Windows 10 Pro
Any ideas? Suggestions?
TIA!
Tiffany
Member
Mine still works in Win 10. In Compatibility mode, I have it set at Win 7, 8-bit(256)color and a tick in the box that says Disable display scaling on high DPI settings.
I that still doesnt work then maybe go to MPC and redownload it again. Also are you on the Anniversary Mode for Windows 10?
ChrisS
Administrator
You should have an error reported in "Event Viewer". Type "Event Viewer" in a search box (or enter "eventvwr.msc" in a run box), open "Windows Logs" and you should find something under either "Application" or "System".
Note: "Event Viewer" reports a lot of stuff but the report is sortable by "level" (you're only interested in "errors") and by "date/time" so you can look for when the problem happened. However, it's far easier to run the program again, get the failure, and have the error at the top of the list.
mikiem2
Moderator
If the other suggestions don't work for you Marjory...
You might check the logs &/or quarantine folder for your security software. New data & samples etc. are continually uploaded to Virus Total, and many [most?] companies making security software automatically update their software based on that. Sometimes the new info is bad or inaccurate, so after updating itself security software mistakenly latches onto innocent files it never had a problem with before.
You might also check the history in Windows Update & if you're using the current drivers for the GTX 745. Windows 10 could have replaced those drivers, & that replacement might not work properly. Or you may need to update to the current version drivers so that they're compatible with recent Windows updates.
MarjoryM
Member
Thanks but still no go..
I had updated the video drivers after I posted since there was a new driver - no change
Oddly enough - no events in either log?
Nothing in McAfee
I've even tried Admin mode
Now... what happens is I start 4 Elements, it loads, music plays and the Click to Start appears. As long as I don't click, it will sit & wait. The second I click, the screen reverts back to normal and the game stops/quits.
ChrisS
Administrator
It sounds like it's a problem with your graphics card. The game is trying to set a certain video mode and the card says "nope, not going to happen".
You can try manually setting the video to 1024x768, and if that doesn't do the trick then manually set the compatibility to XP, Vista or Windows 7 (right-click the icon, select "properties", click the "compatibility" tab, and select a prior version of the OS (I'd go with XP but that's just my preference). I'd also select "Disable display scaling on high DPI settings" that Tiffany mentioned while you're there).
FWIW, this Steam article suggests that it's a directx problem (the game apparently dates from 2008) and provides a fix. In theory, setting the OS to XP, Vista, or Windows 7 should also fix the directx problem as that tells the system which version of directx to use. Note that your game will be installed in a different directory than the one in the link since you don't have the Steam version of the game.
It looks like, as Mikiem suggested, that an update broke your video driver. Instead of the newer driver, you might actually need an older one.
MarjoryM
Member
Chris,
Thanks for the suggestions but none of them helped. It may be time to let it go & move on. But I am curious as to why you think it's video card/driver? Since I have 2 monitors, I can see my non-primary screen change when I start the game. I see the Playrix screen and then the 4 Elements loading screen. You think there's another display change when I click the Start?
ChrisS
Administrator
It really sounds like a directx issue. The program was issued in 2008 and was probably written for DirectX version 9. Windows 10 shipped with DirectX version 12 and it's supposed to be backwards compatible with DirectX 9 but some programs actually require version specific DirectX libraries. Most games will install the library if it's required and not already present.
Obviously, at some point every thing was OK and the game worked. It may be that a video driver update broke the backwards compatibility to DirectX 9. It's also possible that a video card driver update, or other update, reinstalled DirectX 12 and simultaneously uninstalled a DirectX version that was installed with the game.
I don't have Windows 10 but it should be possible to manually install the DirectX 9 runtime in Windows 7 compatibility mode (or XP SP3). Or, do what Tiffany suggested and just reinstall it from MyPlayCity.
It could also be a problem with the C++ runtimes but you should have seen an error in "Event Viewer" if it were.
mikiem2
Moderator
I am curious as to why you think it's video card/driver?
As Chris posted, "it really sounds like a directx issue". Lots of people installed DX9 in earlier versions of 10 because the backwards compatibility in current versions just didn't cut it with some games. If you had installed it, there's a good chance it didn't make it, or maybe didn't make it fully functioning in 1607. I don't know if it's needed for 4 Elements -- I had installed it on my Wife's PC as a matter of course when I originally set up 10, and she hasn't reported any problems since. Beyond that...
RE: Changes to 10.
MS changed the way the display end of things works in 10, & they're continuing to make changes in that respect. They're also removing more and more Windows 7 [& older] code that had been (re)used until they came up with new stuff to replace it. With 1607 they wound up removing most or all of the supporting code that let Media Center work for example. It wouldn't surprise me if they didn't remove stuff that helped running older games, not to purposely break them, but because it was no longer needed.
MS is also pushing the companies that make games to offer them in their store -- ideally the universal apps that appear in their store use newer coding languages &/or methods, & that can mean different ways of handling the display, e.g. something that was available using win32 may require new methods. They're making changes to 10 to make that easier &/or work better.
MS is pushing their Xbox, with the Xbox One S now, & a beefed up model in 2017. They're also hoping to capitalize on VR. Part of their push is to have companies include both PC & Xbox versions of their games in one purchase, & MS wants to make creating both versions as easy as possible. At the same time they're actively working to improve its gaming capabilities, and likely already working on changes to better accommodate next year's new Xbox. They don't want the code to be all that different between Windows 10 versions [desktop, Xbox, Mobile etc.], & since improving the Xbox probably means changes to Direct X & a better working Mantle, much of that could [should?] make it into the Windows 10 we run.
RE: Older Stuff...
PC & laptop sales are declining -- have been & are forecast to continue dropping. Heavier duty gamers -- those willing & able to spend serious cash -- are a bright spot in both current & future markets, so they're mostly the folks AMD & Nvidia focus on nowadays. Those in their preferred market are not going to run old graphics cards -- those in the lower end of that market are going to be encouraged to upgrade via forced obsolescence.
I've been seeing more & more reports of games no longer working with the 1607 build or after recent driver updates to work better with 1607. I've been seeing more discussion on Nvidia's drivers artificially decreasing performance on their older cards, & on AMD phasing out support entirely.
MarjoryM
Member
Hi mikiem2,
I was curious about graphics card because that's Chris commented:
"It sounds like it's a problem with your graphics card. The game is trying to set a certain video mode and the card says "nope, not going to happen". "
and I as said, I could see the mode change when it started. So I thought I could rule the graphics card/driver out.
I've installed a couple of versions of Directx - both the one mentioned and the level for older games that Microsoft mentioned. - Neither made a difference.
I'm running the most current version of W10 that's GA - not a preview build. That would include the Anniversary version and a couple of updates since then.
I'm reluctant to install using MPC since I didn't get it from there. It was from the Giveaway site long ago.
While not a serious/heavy duty gamer of the MMP types, I do like my games and like to upgrade my system about every few years.
I also know that the extent of my self-support is becoming less & less and it irks me but I'm not able to keep up the changes (since Windows 3.1 *snicker*). It would be a fulltime job and I have one already.
mikiem2
Moderator
And I just spotted this
"NVIDIA has a fix out for a bad driver update"
windowscentral[.]com/nvidia-has-new-driver-out-fix-old-broken-one
---
I don't know if this will help or be of interest... The way it works over-simplified is that the electronics on the graphics card [or chipset] have X number of capabilities. The companies making those electronics write software to translate instructions from Windows & Direct X into stuff that that graphics hardware can perform. That's one area of glitches & breakage, since not all of the stuff Windows & DX ask can be done, depending on the model & version of the hardware, or maybe it can only be done part way.
With games it gets trickier since developers try to push the envelope, and some of their stuff works, and some doesn't, again varying by the brand & model of graphics hardware. So the folks working on the graphics driver software have to try to fix things by modifying their code in ways that hopefully won't break anything else.
And both of those are what's encountered by gamers running maybe $500 - $1500 in graphics cards, with an additional $1000 - $1500 maybe on the rest of their PC, plus the monitor(s). There Never is a final driver version where everything works -- improving & updating their drivers is a continual process.
Cheaper graphics cards [& on-board GPUs], including mainstream hardware at ~$200 [or more], are often cheaper because stuff is disabled to justify the higher cost of more expensive products. With less capable hardware, less stuff works when it comes to gaming. Add that Nvidia & AMD are less concerned about what works & what doesn't the lower you go on the graphics card ladder, with older & less expensive cards receiving even less attention.
Now with a game like 4 Elements, it uses an older game engine that used a set of Direct X instructions different than what's used with the latest & greatest games. And you could probably guarantee that no one at Nvidia or AMD ever tested their latest drivers with any games of that generation. So when 4 Elements tells the graphics card to do the stuff it needs to do to display the game, it might go so far, processing the commands as they come in, & then something doesn't work and it all just fails.
Why now? It could be that newer drivers just don't process some old commands the way they used to, maybe because some old section of code was removed because it caused problems with newly added code, or maybe changing one or more things in an attempt to fix something with a new game broke the parts that used to work with 4 Elements, or maybe someone just screwed up, which is incredibly easy to do if you're talking parts of the base code that have been there, often ignored or neglected for years. [Old code seldom dies, but just keeps getting added to & added to -- Windows 95 is still there in parts of 10].
The same sort of thing could have happened with the people writing code for Windows 10. It has a lot of compatibility functions & code, & maybe one of the things 4 Elements tells the graphics card to do used to be handled one way for compatibility, but now it's handled some other way, & that way doesn't, maybe never worked with that graphics card.
If one of the Nvidia driver crew were to tackle the problem, to narrow it down as a 1st step they'd likely attach a debugger to get a better idea of what was failing, when. What the more serious gamers do is try different driver versions, test & benchmark, & share their results. I run AMD graphics & at guru3d[.]com the driver threads can run into a dozen [or more] pages per driver release, with folks doing just that.
If you wanted to try & tackle the driver aspect yourself, if nothing showed up using Google, you'd probably use something like DDU [at Guru3d] to remove the current driver in Safe Mode, then when Windows restarts add the next oldest version, & if that didn't work, try the one before that, & so on until you decided to give up. That's what the folks in those threads at guru3d do.
Trying a new download of the game would be faster & easier, but it may lose your saved progress, & might not work either -- the only way it would work is if one of the files had been damaged or removed, or updated in the version you downloaded. OTOH it would install to a MyPlayCity.com folder, so your old copy would still be there -- if you installed the MPC version you could compare the files to some extent without running the MPC game. The MPC version would have extra files for their advertising, while the actual game files may or may not have been altered to handle those ads.
Otherwise you could just try troubleshooting compatibility &/or experiment setting compatibility yourself. Unfortunately one of my constant complaints with 10 is that it's not as consistent as earlier Windows versions. That makes it harder -- what works or worked for Tiffany might work for 6 other people, & fail for 6 other people after that, even if every one of them had identical PCs.
[I've got 3 copies of 10 64 pro on this PC (along with win7) -- 1 main copy, 1 backup, & 1 Insider. The backup copy has graphics driver problems -- the other two are just fine. IMHO yes, you can have a bad copy of 10, or rather a bad installation, everything else being identical & equal. And the AU or build 1607 was a new install of 10.]
MarjoryM
Member
I've tried the compatibility troubleshooter with as many options as I could click - compatibility with XP, Win 7, use 256 colors, run in 640 x 480 resolution and nothing has worked.
Yeah - I did have the "bad" update but 4 Elements was not working before I did the update. I've updated to fixed version but no luck with that either.
Well - I tried the MPC version... and it works!?!!? Sigh. Oddly enough it's using my current game & settings
Marjory,
That's actually not so odd. Even if you removed the old copy using Revo Uninstaller, the data files (often in your Documents folder or ProgramData) is usually left behind.
I'm glad you got it working!
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