The
***Balmoral Software Review/Walkthrough*** suggests a save game edit to be applied after using the patch:
Frequent game crashes and lockups were completely fixed by installing Patch 104, available on Dreamcatcher's web site. After installation of the patch, an indication appears on the Main Menu screen to confirm that it has been applied. However, even after the patch was installed, we experienced a bug in the game that prevented further progress without a manual edit of the saved-game file (described below). And at least one game resulted in a random glowing green fang appearing in the inventory, even though it had already been used to solve a previous puzzle. However, since we had found a workaround for the worst of these issues, our enjoyment of the game was not affected...
...Arkampus shows you another diagram on the wall in the statue room and gives you an "Unknown amulet" (unused in this game). Return to the puzzle in the statue room and re-enter the same solution you used before. A cutscene shows the statue lever being operated again. Go to the back of the puzzle and operate the statue lever twice to tilt the statue back and provide access to another passageway above the statue.
Note: We experienced a bug in the game at this point. There were some saved games that provided no statue-lever hotspot even though the puzzle in the center of the room had been completely solved. The only way around the problem was to manually edit the saved-game file to provide the correct statue status information. To make this edit, exit the game and change the value of %Statua from 1 to 2 in the Saved\Storednnnn.str text file in the Aura installation folder. Then restore the game and change your position once to see the correct statue orientation and passageway access.
Hopefully Balmoral's save game edit will help with your current problem.
I've never played the game using XP SP3. I played it using XP SP1. MaG may also have played using XP SP1, since she writes walkthroughs as soon as the game is available. As you probably know, Microsoft tightened up security in XP SP2, which caused problems for many games. Multi-core processors on new computers may also cause problems -- some game information goes to one core, other game information goes to a different core, and they don't communicate with each other properly so the game messes up. Even with games that work well with dual core processors (Broken Sword 4 was this way -- worked fine with dual core, messed up with tri-core, quad-core, and higher).
If Balmoral's save game edit procedure doesn't help, here are some
general, non-game-specific troubleshooting tips you can try:
- Install the game into your My Documents folder instead of into Program Files (Program Files is the default). Windows XP SP2 and later tries to "protect" the computer from changes inside Program Files -- which can make some games not work properly -- at least on some computers.
- Make sure your antivirus isn't blocking parts of the game. Maybe you can add the name of the game's executable file to the antivirus exception list.
- If using a walkthrough, make sure you follow every step. Sometimes it's necessary to do some minor thing in order to trigger puzzles -- something you'd do without thinking if you solved the puzzle yourself, but which you might not think of if following a walkthrough. I've had this happen to me several times -- I thought I was following the walkthrough, but missed a step. I'd figure out what I'd missed myself, go back and check the walkthrough, and sure enough that step was there -- I'd just missed it somehow.
- Do not mix saves from different versions of the game (patched, unpatched, or different publishers) unless you know for sure they are compatible. Compatibility problems may not show up immediately, but can show up later in the game.
- It sounds like your video card is more than capable of playing the game, however different video drivers may work better for this particular game.
- If you suspect a multi-core processor could be the problem, it may be fixed simply by running the game in compatibility mode (try Windows 98 or 2000 compatibility). Or you can try one of the solutions ***here*** that are supposed to lock the game to a single processor.
Also, near the beginning of
***MaG's walkthrough*** it says:
Note: If the active spot disappears during gaming, exit the game and replay from a saved game.
So there may be some issues with the active spot going nonfunctional from time to time -- including within puzzles. Big nuisance with a game like this with difficult puzzles, but you may just have to start the puzzle over to get it to work.
These are just my best guesses. The game may need another patch to run well on modern computers. The patch 1.04 was apparently released in 2004, not long after the game was released.
***Gamewatcher lists date of patch 1.04 as December 2014***