I understand your frustration completely! Trust me! I've asked Peggy to send her saved game just past the HUGE Crocodile and chain-jumping sequence because I get so frustrated I just hit the ALT + F4 key to exit the game!

Try going into your CONTROL PANEL and set your resolution to 16 Bit or 24 Bit.....THEN go into the game and see if that helps you.... Leave your game set at 32 bit..

Please post back if this works for you...

Joanie, what type of video card do you have?

I gotta say that I had to get used to Indy running all the time. Couldn't play the game with thumb permanently stuck to ALT key. The good news is you can get used to it, just take it in short bursts. I could do it, and I'm a spaz.

The movement is not great in the game. Sometimes you get Indy stuck in a corner or something and you don't see him, you just see the object in front of you or whatever. Whether to hit the "w" key for forward or the "s" key for backward is not very intuitive. Keep your mouse pointed in the direction you want to go and try all the keys (not all at once, one at a time) until you get Indy out of his stuck spot.

Make sure all computer resources are as free as you can make it before starting the game to see if you can get better resolution (Indy's gray face). Disable virus checkers, make sure your video card's antialiasing is disabled (if you have this), don't have any other programs running in the background. If your video card is suboptimal, you may not be able to get good clarity. And what resolution do you have the game set at...1024, 800x600, etc. Lowering that might help you. Oh, and in the game options, disable shadows, as well.

Omigosh! Thanks for all the quick advice.
First of all, thanks for the "move the mouse in the direction you want to go" tip. Still stuck in the Infernal Machine mode. Never occurred to me to also use the mouse. What a pain it has been trying to get Indy to go "straight". That has REALLY helped.
Did all the other suggestions and it is worse.
Changed to 16 bit in the control panel. Left it at 32 bit in the game.
Changed resolution to 800 X 600.
Disabled shadows.
I now get the "debris" look when I get close to anything like trees and such. It seems to go into 1st person view at that point.
My video card is 64MB DDR NVIDIA GeForce3 TI 200 graphics card with DVI. I don't know about the antialiasing thing.

O.K., went back to 1024 X 768 and 32 bit resolution in both control panel and game options. Put shadow back in. Now, the gray blob of paint on Indy's face is there at certain angles but, at least some of the time I can see his face.
When that "debris" field comes up I get the message:
Abort! An invalid floating point camera matrix was passed to the D3D.
Hope this means something to you all.

Joanie, your video card *is* supported by this game, so you should be good to go. I would keep everything at 32 bit (both the game and the control panel display. I would keep the resolution at 1024x768. I do believe antialiasing is off by default, but you should check it only because it seems Lucasarts mentions antialiasing often as screwing things up visually in this game.

So doublecheck that you have it turned off: Go to Control Panel. Open up DISPLAY. Go to SETTINGS. Go to ADVANCED. You should have a tab for GeForce3; click on that. Click on ADDITIONAL PROPERTIES. The first tab should be antialiasing properties. You should be *either* at "allow applications to control antialiasing" or in the radio button selections below that it should be "off." Either of those options are fine.

You might make sure you have the most current direct X driver (I believe there's one on the Indy disk).

If after doing all this, you still hate the way it looks (and my Indy's face looks like a generic Harrison Ford), you might think about updating your video driver.

But go ahead and up the resolution to 1024 now that I see your card can handle it; maybe that will improve things a bit.

Peggy, excellent advice on everything. I am taking notes for future reference....although my attempt to play this game would probably resemble nothing so much as a total clown show.

Marian, there's nothing like trying to play a game a 10 year old can whiz through before his Coca Cola loses its fizz...whereas I have to have a little lie down after outracing a crocodile because my heart is pounding so hard.

I'm still hoping for a save-anywhere patch. They did it with Aliens vs Predator and I think also Vampire the Masquerade. I play a game for fun and not for frustration. But I'll keep on with the game until I hit a real bad sequence. If it's any consolation, I do see that I've gotten better at rope swings after having to do them several times repeatedly to where it's become an art. Sometimes you can teach an old dog!

Ditto, Peggy!
I finally got past that dang crocodile and cage/swinging chain sequence, only to be captured by the Germans! Now that's a fine howdy do for ya!

I'm in Prague now, and trying to figure out how to whip past that huge and very, very deep cavern. Did you pass that? And all those blades and stuff, I'm dizzy from all the somersaults I had to do to run and get past those! Geez...

I'm sure, however, that with all the complaining and no doubt e-mails that LucasArts has and will be receiving from folks about complains for stupid control defaults and twitchy controls they'll put out a patch....hopefully for saved games, too.

Playing each sequence over and over makes me mad, and frustrates the you-know-what outta me. I usually get so frustrated and mad I just hit the Alt +F4 to get outta the game quick and take a breather....clean house, vacuum, dust, laundry, cook dinner...you know, the usual stuff you're supoose to enjoy doing! I slam pots and pans, curse out loud to myself, punish the cat (not really), and a few other things all the while thinking about the game and what I should try next!

Take care and if there's anybody out there who knows ANYTHING about an upcoming patch for ET for saved games or any other patch for this game, PLEASE post here! :-)

Greetings!

A few comments for all from my first few sections of this game:

1.) Barb, the "sneak" function where Indy creeps along a ledge seems a bit skittish, but I got it to work. First, make sure you put your whip away (you have just jumped across, so it could be still in your hand). Second, make sure Indy is walking straight into the wall with the gray strip along the bottom and then press the E key (or whatever you have mapped to the ACTION command). You'll know you got it when Indy flips around with his back to the wall. Then just use the RIGHT and LEFT keys to slink him along the ledge. He won't fall so you don't have to be skittish once he is in the "sneak" mode. Click E (ACTION) again to release him from the wall on the other side.

2.) Movement is indeed tough with the way they made the keys work. I have had success with this:
- Use the mouse to continuously have the point-of-view facing the direction you want to walk. Try it... the mouse movement will cause the view to slide LEFT and RIGHT (or UP and DOWN) and this way I keep Indy always facing the direction I want to go, so I only need to press the FORWARD button to move. I still use the WALK button (LEFT ALT) a lot when I am near a place where I can fall. And I use the C button (1st person view)a lot to aim him precisely before a jump.

3.) JoanieS, I haven't had a problem with the graphics going screwy (I'm at 32bit), but I have a pretty hi-end machine. Try 16bit sometime after it saves next.

I am a devotee of the Tomb Raider movement controls, and "The Infernal Machine" was OK. This engine will need some getting used to.

Keep in touch. I will help if I can!

Dadguy

I finally figured out how to hug the wall. But having to hold down a key while moving to make him walk is really awful. For me, anyway, because I can only use one hand. I'm having a ball with the game so far, even though it's extremely frustrating! I've made it to the 4th sublevel.

Good luck, everyone,
Barb

Peggy:

Were you ever able to get across that chasm in Prague? I read somewhere where you're suppose to do a RUNNING JUMP and THEN use the WHIP to whip the hook and swing across. I've still NOT been able to get across and to be honest: I'm sick and tired of repeating all those saws and blades to get to that point.

Come on, LucasArts, put out a patch so people can save their games!

Linda, I tried about 10 times yesterday to do that running jump and then use the whip and haven't been able to do it. A couple of times were my fault...so many keys! I would jump and forget to snap the whip or jump and snap the whip but not jump high enough. It's awfully discouraging to have to go through the whole maze of traps again and again. It's not fun at that point. Although I'll probably try this again later on today just once or twice, I'm thinking of abandoning Indy until a patch of some kind comes out. This is really a fun game, but if I wanted a game with console features I would have bought an X-Box.

UPDATE: Got the rope swing over the chasm. Moved along only to get to another rope swing...seemingly easy...but fingers didn't move to hit the space key. So I get to do the WHOLE thing again....


Peggy

Linda, always after deciding to hang the game up I end up getting it and am out of the dungeon in Prague. If you need the savegame, let me know.

The jump over the chasm really isn't as bad as all that. It's a mind thing...when we see this big bad bottomless chasm, we (all right, I) become terrified and our fingers don't want to work right. But you can practice the move on the stairway by the red door...it's a basic W for the run, then hit the space bar when you're just at the edge ready to step off into air, then a quick left mouse click (while always keeping your finger on the W)so Indy's whip grabs the hook. I had to do it an additional three times after that (believe it or not, once because I forgot to equip the whip!) and it became old hat.

Peg:

Thanks for the advice, Peg. Actually, after I posted this morning (which is usually ALWAYS the case), I was able to get over the chasm. However, in my celebration for making it over to the other side, I inadvertently walked off the edge into oblivion! So, I'll give it a few more tries and then I think I too, will hang up this game (and Indy's whip) until I find a patch of some kind for this game!

Thanks for all the advice....taking it with a grain of salt (and alcohol to rub in the wound!). Ouch!

Figured out how to hug the walls, finally, and made it across the Chasm and along the thing ledge to the lever. Am now in Prague and out of the Dungeon! Boy, those chains are a pain!

Enjoying the game once again! Ya know, I think there should be an automatic save (since we cannot save on our own) after you've crossed that huge chasm and made it to the lever! Man, what a drag to have to continuously get past the blades and things, only to unsuccessfully try to cross the chasm...

Moving on now..