x-files crashing to the desktop

hi all, i hope someone can help...

i've just installed the X-Files game on XP (full install) and it started off great. (i love FMV games!) haven't gotten too far yet. twice now i've crashed to the desktop when i try to examine stuff on agent willmore's desk. no error messages or anything... game just shuts down and back to my desktop i go.

i have set the game to Win95 in compatibility mode and have disabled visual themes. didn't bother with the 256 colors or the 640x480 resolution because the game seemed to be dealing fine with the colors and resolution i have on XP.

before installing, i uninstalled the version of quicktime i had (it was installed with Law & Order, which i just finished). during X-files installation i installed quicktime 3.0. i know older games can be finicky about the quicktime version...

i have a 1.7GHz processor, nvidia geforce 2 card (64 MB), and 512 MB of ram.

any chance there's a patch that would fix this? i looked around on the internet but the only patches i found were for cheats.

i first set the game for "best quality," then tried switching to "best performance," but it didn't fix the problem.

please help... i loved the first few scenes of this game and it's killing me that i can't keep playing! thanks in advance!

-emily

I could not see if you have tried to lower the sound acceleration. So if you have´nt do that first.

Good luck

I had a similar problem with another game that was caused by a conflict between hardware and software rendering. If you have a choice during set up, try one then the other to see if that helps.

Otherwise try adjusting video and audio acceleration. Also, have you tried to just install on Xp without using compatibility mode?

do you guys mean adjusting video and audio acceleration on my video and audio cards? can someone walk me through how to do that?

(my sound card is integrated, don't know if that makes a difference...)

there was no option for hardware or software rendering with this game.

i haven't tried unchecking compatibility mode, that's a good idea. i'll try that.

-emily

For audio acceleration, go to Start/Run and type dxdiag and click OK. The Direct X screen will appear. Click the Sound tab and there should be a place to adjust audio acceleration.

For Video acceleration, right click any open space on your desk top and choose Properties/Settings/Advanced/Trouble Shooting and there should be a place to adjust video acceleration.

This sounds like a Quicktime problem to me. I am no expert but, I have seen this problem before caused by having another version of Quicktime already installed on the system. Make sure you only have the Quicktime version that came with the game installed. The best way to do this is to search your entire system for anything Quicktime and delete it. Reboot and reinstall the games version of Quicktime.
This might be a stab in the dark but, I think it would be worth trying. Let us know how you make out.
Rusty

P.S. - Don't forget that even after uninstalling Quicktime there are usually residual Quicktime system files left over that have to be removed manually.

thanks guys! i'll try the quicktime thing first and if that doesn't work, i'll start messing with audio and video acceleration.

i know how picky the old games can be about quicktime... i think the only reason i got riven DVD running in the first place is because my computer was brand new and i didn't have any quicktime installed yet. as soon as i saw that x-files required version 3.0, i thought it was going to be trouble...

emily

EDIT: looks like it was a quicktime problem, after all! i uninstalled quicktime, deleted all the quicktime files left on my machine, and then reinstalled the version that came with the game, and voila! i'm good to go! thanks so much, i'm really enjoying it so far! (they just don't make games like they used to...)

Glad to hear that my advice worked (it doesn't always!). Quicktime can be a real pain in the neck.
I have played X-Files and hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
Rusty