Dracula, Path of the Dragon won't play

I purchased the game from Amazon as a download. I downloaded the game and it installed on my computer, but when I try to open it to play, nothing happens. I just get the little circle going round and round.
I made sure I had all updates to my computer installed, updated my drivers, have the newest version of DirectX, and it still would not play. So then I uninstalled the game and redownloaded it, it installed, but it still won't play.
I don't know what else to try and unfortunately Amazon doesn't offer any tech help and I looked at Microids but can't find any help.

Any suggestions will be appreciated.

I am running it on Windows 7 and have all the requirements for the game.

Have you attempted to right click on the launch file , and select "run as administrator" ? Also , you may want to check your firewall and see if it is not preventing the game from launching .

The system requirements are fairly low, are you by any chance running it on a laptop with an integrated video processor?

I was thinking one of these Dracula games had Tages copy protection??? I can't remember for sure... if that's the one I'm thinking of, you will need to update the Tages drivers to the ones compatible with Windows 7.

Thanks for the suggestions. I have tried right clicking and running as admin. I am on a laptop but I don't know about the video processor. I just finished playing Dracula 2 with no problem. Don't know about tages......how do I update?

Press the Windows Logo Key+R and enter DXDiag - Press the OK button. After it completes, what does it say on the Display tab?

I'm at work now, but I will do that as soon as I get home and let you know. Thnx

I did some checking, UruKat, and I don't think Path of the Dragon is one with Tages.

Have you right clicked the game icon and selected Troubleshoot Compatibility and followed the prompts there? Do get your video card specs for Inland too.

The latest DirectX for Windows 7 is DirectX 11, which is not backward compatible. The game uses DirectX 9, not the DirectX 11 that comes with Windows.

You can try the web installer for DirectX 9
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35

Also, as described in ***this Microsoft forum***, there can be a problem if your sound card isn't detected, and you may have to look for DirectX 9 drivers for your sound card.

As Inland said, seeing your dxdiag might help us see what's wrong.

And as Draclvr suggested, using "Troubleshoot Compatibility" might help the game run. If the game was bought as a download, you shouldn't have to worry about updating TAGES drivers because that's something that only affects CD's and DVD's.

You guys are the BEST!
It was the compatibility setting. I assumed since it's not a real old game I didn't need to change it, but once I set it to Windows 7, it worked fine.
I'm so glad to have this forum....you have helped me SO many times.

Glad you got it working.
Enjoy the game.

does dracula cd have to be in the drive, because everytime i click the icon, i get this blue screen and have to reboot my computer.

In actuality Jenny 100 , DirectX 11 is backwards compatible with older versions . DirectX capabilities are contingent on the gpu being utilized . The sound device also , to a point . If my memory serves me correct , Dracula has an option for installing DirectX files , so allowing that to happen , in addition to what has been mentioned previously , should hopefully alleviate most if not all issues . My source of information : DirectX 11

Your link doesn't seem to be working... but, so far as DirectX 11 is concerned, it is only backwards compatible with DirectX 10.

The link doesn't work because it starts with
http://http//social.technet.microsoft.com...
instead of
http://social.technet.microsoft.com...

Just a typo. I notice Firefox is doing something weird and cutting the "http" off of links. It used to put the whole link in the address bar, including the http or https. It makes copying a link less convenient.

Anyway, here's the ***fixed link***

However the link does not say that DirectX 11 is backward compatible with DirectX 9. It says you have to "install" DirectX 9. This doesn't overwrite DirectX 11, but adds what's missing from DirectX 11 to make it compatible with games that use DirectX 9. But the DirectX 10 and 11 included with Vista and Win7 are not backwards compatible with DirectX 9 out of the box, and DirectX 11 updates for DirectX 11 will not make it compatible because they are meant for games that use DirectX 11, not for older games that use DirectX 9.

If you've already installed DirectX 9 from a previous game, you may not need to install it for another DirectX 9 game, depending on whether it uses the same DirectX 9 dll files.

I'm sure all this extra explanation would just be confusing to UruKat, who only wanted to know what to do to get Dracula: Path of the Dragon running on Windows 7. Fortunately that problem has been solved.

sorry if i am confusing urukat now when i reboot i get a error report, and have to send report.

Do you have Path of the Dragon, like UruKat does?
Did you try Compatibility mode or was it something else you tried?

What does the error report say? Anything remotely useful? Do you get the error report every time you reboot or only after you've tried to play the game and got the blue screen?

yes and i had to install update and do 2 error report, i right click local c and did the first one now doing the second, i got the window microsoft something.

Do you mean you right-clicked the CD drive to change to compatibility mode?
If you're using compatibility mode, you need to right-click the game shortcut (if you have the game installed) or the Setup file on the CD (if you aren't able to install the game).

no i got microsoft window error report page, under it stop blue screen cause by driver and device.

It sounds like you got a bad driver install then.
Did you try to change the video card driver or sound card driver for the game?
If you did, is that when you started seeing the error report screen?

no after i click the dracula 3 icon, the blue screen came up and i reboot, it happen twice which i click on the error page and i was sent to microsoft window error report page, which i did all that was on it, and i took it in and they install window 7 on it, now i get color schem has change.