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Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD #896071
06/21/13 12:57 PM
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Hi all,

I'm new to this forum. I'm into classic adventure games.

I just got the multilingual DVD from Amazon of the "Pompeii: The Legend of Vesuvius" adventure game from 2000, also known as "Timescape: Journey to Pompeii".

I'm playing this Windows 95/98 compatible game on a Windows XP Home Edition system. I had hardly any installation problems, though you do get that familiar old Cryo/Dreamcatcer "no disk space left" message when only, in this case, 262 MB are required! Old school limited disk space, I guess.

In the past, I used to install it on a 1 GB USB flash drive to avoid this, but this time straight installation to the C-drive turned out fine.

So, the game works fine, even without a switch to Windows 98/Windows ME compatibility mode for the executable, no choppy audio, good 3D panning, fluent cutscenes, accessible menu options.

But there's one major glitch: I can't save the game! This is frustrating when you can get killed in this game, and you have to start all over again.

This is what I get: just an endlessly blinking cursor in the lower lefthand corner, not resolving into anything.



User "char" in this old review on Amazon appears to have had the same problem, but I've been looking all over the place for a solution.

Amazon.com review

Does someone recognize this, and know what can be done? Emulation does not appear to work. Patch?

Thanks!

Rich

Last edited by RichAlexis; 06/21/13 01:05 PM.
Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #896074
06/21/13 01:00 PM
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Hi RichAlexis and welcome to GameBoomers. I have moved your post over to our Glitches forum where the techies should be able to give you some advice. smile

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Marian] #896076
06/21/13 01:05 PM
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Oh thanks, still finding my way around!

Rich

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #896109
06/21/13 03:34 PM
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If you installed to the default location, then it went in C:\Program Files and Windows may be preventing changes (like making saves). Try installing the game to your My Documents folder.

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Jenny100] #896124
06/21/13 04:24 PM
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Thanks, Jenny.

I see what you mean, but I doubted this would be the solution, as I've never had any problems writing to Program Files. I tried it anyway.

I've found what it's about: the bar at the bottom of the save screen is not a sliding bar filling up during the saving action, as I'd thought, but a form where you're supposed to enter a filename!

Gee, I feel like an idiot, but I hadn't expected this 'manual labour' after years of automatic saving!

I have to work out, though, if I have to keep track of sequential file numbers, because otherwise I feel I could overwrite existing saves.

Rich

Last edited by RichAlexis; 06/21/13 04:27 PM.
Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #896136
06/21/13 05:05 PM
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Hi, Rich. wave

I've recently spent some time installing a few of my "semi-older" games on Win7 systems. It's been an exercise in troubleshooting! So far, I've had luck though.

First I installed realMyst (download version), trying to work with compatibility and widescreen resolutions. Then I put Ankh (disc) on my laptop. Had to patch it using Google translate (the readme was in French!). Then I installed the 4 disc version of Secret Files: Tunguska on my desktop. I had to install the Tages drivers for that one. Each game requires a different tweak!

Anyway, just wanted to say I understand how you feel about getting used to the mechanics of older games. But GameBoomers is a great place to search for answers or ask for help.


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Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: lanlynk] #896147
06/21/13 06:21 PM
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Thanks, Lanlynk! wave

You get a wave back from me!

Yes, I had the same thing trying to get Atlantis II (aka Beyond Atlantis) running on Windows XP.

It took me ages, got it running in a Qemu Windows 95 emulation after much tweaking of DirectX settings, hardware acceleration, compatibility settings and the like.

Then I found a patch to get it running without all this tinkering.....

Still, a valuable learning experience - which I could share with others too!

As I haven't found the exact saving procedure for Pompeii anywhere yet, I will report on possible file naming conventions and the risk of overwriting later on.

Rich

P.S. At least I can read French and German reasonably well, being a fan of these mostly French-originated games wink

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: lanlynk] #896152
06/21/13 06:45 PM
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Originally Posted By: lanlynk
Anyway, just wanted to say I understand how you feel about getting used to the mechanics of older games. But GameBoomers is a great place to search for answers or ask for help.

Some of the most confusing older games I played were those that were early 16-bit Windows games. You had to type in the name you wanted for your save, but it couldn't be more than 8 digits long and you had to add whatever extension the game wanted, be it .txt, .sav, or whatever. One game gave almost no clues at all -- it filled in ********.txt for me, but wouldn't accept that. Eventually I figured out I needed to replace the *'s with letters -- and no more than 8 of them. All the readme said was to type in the name of your save -- no details.

Another confusing one required you to click the picture of the screen, then type in a name before it would save. The trick was figuring out you had to give it a name. There was no box or anything to indicate you had to name it. Since some other games from around the same time only had a picture for a save, it wasn't obvious that you had to name it or do anything other than OK the picture of the save.

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Jenny100] #896504
06/23/13 01:31 PM
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Hi Jenny,

Thanks for letting me in on this!

So many games, so many customs, apparently. wink

I think it would make a valuable addition to walkthroughs, cheat sheets and the like. It's important to know how the controls of the game work before you start. It has very little to do with your intelligence or problem solving skills, which is what the game should be about.

Now I just read hints like "save as often as you can, but don't overwrite", while it would be great getting the exact details how to go about this.

Rich

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #997058
01/08/15 02:28 PM
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I just found out a weird bug of the "Pompeii" game - multilingual DVD edition. If your system clock changes, which happens regularly at Daylight Saving Time in spring, and back in autumn, you lose all your saved games, and even the ability to use Visit Mode!

Or at least, the 'mtime' (modification time) of those saved files, which is used to preserve their order, gets messed up, because this is apparently calculated relative to the system time.

So, unless you find a way to edit these timestamps, the only thing you can do is start a new game, or perhaps even better, reinstall the whole thing!

I wonder if this is something that plagues other games too?

Rich

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #997080
01/08/15 03:36 PM
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I've never experienced anything like that and I have several old games permanently installed on at least one of my computers eek


Time : The Most Precious Commodity
Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Mad] #997088
01/08/15 03:51 PM
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Well, perhaps if you wait long enough for the clock to move back in fall, (or forward in spring) the problem resolves itself!

Rich

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #997119
01/08/15 08:44 PM
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That is certainly a weird bug.
I suppose it's possible that some other games developed by Arxel might have the same problem -- at least if they produced saves in the same way.
http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/arxel-tribe-doo/developed-by/

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Jenny100] #997176
01/09/15 10:52 AM
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Yes, there is a possibility. sherlock

You come across errors like these on game boards, but it appears to be very rare:

Heroes Charge:
Quote:
Shortly before daylight savings, new day appears earlier (not normal) and some tasks reappear as completed (not normal) but neither can be selected (which is normal). Once the hour changes automatically, everything goes back to normal.

Reply: This is a known issue and is being worked on at this moment. Thanks for your effort.

Pokémon Black/White:
Quote:
This happened to me and I haven't been able to access the Dream World for a couple days now because I decided to finally update my DS' clock for daylight savings. It almost let me tuck in my Pokemon this morning, but then basically said "Nope, this Pokemon can't be tucked in!" and gave me the "Game Sync has run out of energy" deal again the next time I tried. I'm going to try your method tonight, here's hoping it works.
Rich

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #997192
01/09/15 12:20 PM
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If you're going from a game started in winter to playing in summer, I suppose you could try disabling daylight time in your clock settings. I don't know if that would work though, and it wouldn't be so easy the other way (game started in summer). Have you tried resetting your computer clock by an hour?

I checked for Pompeii/Timelapse saved games at the usual saved game websites, and there weren't any.

Seems like a serious flaw in the game design for saves to be affected like this.

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Jenny100] #997209
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Originally Posted By: Jenny100
If you're going from a game started in winter to playing in summer, I suppose you could try disabling daylight time in your clock settings. I don't know if that would work though, and it wouldn't be so easy the other way (game started in summer). Have you tried resetting your computer clock by an hour?
Yes, I tried that, moved the clock forward by an hour to mimic DST - which is indeed easier than trying to modify the saved files, but the game still froze, and the error log read: "MTIME is not the same", so it is a serious flaw.

Rich

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1109731
05/07/17 06:10 PM
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I don't know if I'll get an anwser after two years of inactivity on this post, but I'll give it a try.
I can't install the game, I have it on two CDs, but whenever I try to run the installation process, a window pops up with this message:

Error copying to TEMP directory : source:D:\vcl35.bpl
dest:C:\Windows\\TEMP\vcl35.bpl

Anyone knows how to fix it? Thanks

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1109735
05/07/17 07:26 PM
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Try Right-clicking the game setup and choosing Run As Administrator.

You might also want to delete the contents of C:\Windows\Temp
before installing if you're low on hard drive space.

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1109892
05/09/17 08:02 AM
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That's a well-known problem for almost all Arxel Tribe games! Running as an administrator etc. would not help. Saving games does not work as well.

But I have asked a friend of mine to make a patch! It is in Russian, but it works with most English versions as well. Here: http://nquest.ucoz.com/index/0-106#NQ_ATGSF

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1109894
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Thanks Iurii!

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Iurii] #1109997
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I can't understand a word, will it solve my installation issue?

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1110004
05/10/17 11:29 AM
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Copy/paste the Russian text into Google's online translator and you get this:

+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+

The main objective of this program, to solve the problem with the inability to implement the preservation of the games developed by the company "Arxel Tribe" when starting them in the OS "Windows 7" and younger. Also, this program will help you solve the problem with installing games from "Arxel Tribe" in the OS "Windows 7" and younger, and run them without CD or DVD discs in the drive. Also, in this program, there are instructions for installing some other games from the company "Arxel Tribe".

SUPPORTED GAMES:
- Ring: The Legend of the Nibelungen (4CD) (6CD) (DVD);
- Faust: The Seven Games of the Soul (RU "1C") (EN 4CD) (DVD);
- Pompei: The Legend of Vesuvius (RU "1C") (EN 2CD) (DVD);
- The Legend of the Prophet and the Assassin (RU "1C") (EN 2CD);
- The Secrets of Alamut (RU "1C") (EN 2CD);
- Casanova: The Duel of the Black Rose (RU "1C") (EN 2CD);
- Jerusalem: The Three Roads to the Holy Land (EN Fargus) (EN 2CD);
- Ring II: Twilight of the Gods (RU "1C") (EN 2CD).
Author, company: Kirill Games
Version: 1.06
Compatibility: "Windows Vista", "Windows 7", "Windows 8.1", Windows 10 "
OS type: 32-bit, 64-bit
Website: visit
Help: Forum "Naphthalene Quests"


I can't get the patch to download, but maybe you'll have more luck.

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: Jenny100] #1110333
05/13/17 04:04 PM
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I downloaded it, but as I expected, everything was on russian lol

I don't know what I'm supposed to do now...

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1110364
05/13/17 11:39 PM
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Sorry - Kirill (the author of the patch) is unavailable for several months already, and the patch is not yet translated into English.

OK, let me help:

1. On that page, press the green button on the right.
2. On the next page, press "⤓ Скачать", i.e. 'Download' button.
3. Unzip it.

(The patch has the text help on how install the games, but it is in Russian. Here is some translation as for English CD version of 'Pompei')

4. Create a directory on your HD, like "C:\Pompei" (without empty spaces in the path).
5. Put your 1st CD in the drive and copy all the files to your new directory.
6. Put the 2nd disk in the drive and copy folder 'DATA' to the directory on your HD answering 'Yes' to replacing the file.
7. Put the unzipped 'nq_atgsf.exe' to your 'C:\Pompei' (or something).
8. Run 'nq_atgsf.exe'.
9. The options on the bottom row are: language (that's for DVD versions); speed correction (on/off - turn it on if the screen rotation is too fast for you), launch the game (green button), make a link to the program on the desktop (white button), exit (red button).

Please tell me if it works!

Re: Saving problem with "Pompeii: Legend of Vesuvius" (aka Timescape) DVD [Re: RichAlexis] #1110402
05/14/17 09:31 AM
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Thank you, Iurii!


Gardens put to bed for the winter. Time for some gaming!
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