Timeline

About 10 or 15 years ago, I played the Michael Crichton game Timeline - a bit clunky but there you go.

When I originally tried to set Timeline up, I found that it would not run on XP - it would not load, saying that it would not run on NT. I guess that shows the date most explicitly. It also would not run on VirtualPC, a consequence of the video card in VirtualPC.

However, the experts of GB managed to instruct me how to make it run in XP, and their solution required me to download and run "imagecfg" and incorporate it in the loading of the game.

However, when I try to repeat the modus operandi today, I cannot make it work again. It bluntly gives me the "Will not run on Windows NT" and will not allow me even to run setup.exe.

Does anyone have any ideas of how I might be able to make it run again in XP?

petert

Since this is a technical issue, I have moved your post over to Glitches.

imagecfg is for forcing computers with multicore processors and/or hyperthreading to use a single thread for a game.
This is a different problem from a Windows 98 executable not wanting to run on an NT-based system. There is more about problems with hyperthreading and/or multicore processors here
http://www.gameboomers.com/Members/legacygameshyperthreading.htm
Timeline is not listed on that page, but the list is incomplete, so forcing the game to run on a single processor may help. However it won't fix everything if the problem is with the game .exe not wanting to run on NT-based Windows.


You might be able to change compatibility mode on the setup.exe to Windows 95 or 98 before running it, and get it to run that way. Right-click the .exe, choose Properties, change to Windows 95 or 98/ME on the compatibility tab.

Managed to get the game loaded in compatibility mode, but it is not correctly installed.

The image is flashing and flickering too badly to make any progress.

However, your advice was sound and I am grateful - as always - for your patience.

petert

Maybe something like DxWnd would help.
I've never used it, but this YouTube video shows how the person used it with Black Dahlia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7Hi5UMhkuQ

If I remember it correctly, in order to run this game on newer OSes, you have to set 'Windows 95' compatibility mode and make some registry tweeks. Edit file 'compreg.bat' (it could be necessary to rename it into *.txt, write the changes, then rename it back to .bat and run it) - the Windows path should be:
PATH=C:\Windows\System;C:\WinNT\System32;C:\Windows\System32.

And if you have flickerings, the most easy way to solve them could be using DgVoodoo (http://dege.freeweb.hu)! Just put d3d8.dll and other *.dll files into the directory with the game's EXE.

Unfortunately, I do not connect to the internet on my old XP machine - I confine internet usage to my Windows 7 laptop - so I cannot easily access either dege.freeweb.hu or DxWnd for the possible XP workarounds. And I don't think that trying to load Timeline into my W7 machine would prove any more successful at the end of the day. But perhaps I will try it.

petert

Can't you download and save the DgVoodoo installer to a USB drive using the Windows 7 computer, then copy from the USB drive to the XP computer? Or does the DgVoodoo installer need an internet connection to install?

I don't know if I'd want to risk editing the XP registry just for this game. I don't remember it being very well reviewed. Gameboomers and Adventuregamers didn't even bother to review it, though there was a review at JA+.
http://www.justadventure.com/2013-05-20-21-09-14/1026-timeline

I fear that you are correct - not only would it be foolish for me to try and fiddle about in the registry when I would have zero chance of getting it right, but Timeline is probably not worth the effort.
The only reason would be that I have an enforced period of idleness ahead of me and I was looking for an easy game to replay just to pass the time. Not worth it, as you imply.

petert

DgVoodoo does not need to be installed. Just drop the files in the game's folder. Keep in mind that the current version (version 2) will not work on XP as it requires DirectX 11. Another wrapper you can try for XP is Zeckensacks. http://www.zeckensack.de/glide/index.html

@ Iurii, You do not need to change the extension of a batch file to edit it. Just right click it and choose "Edit".

Thanks for the tip - perhaps I will try Zeckensacks.

I assume there is no point in my trying any of these clever wheezes to make the game run in Windows 7? Just asking!

petert

I do not know this game so I cannot say what may help or not. The use of Imagecfg is for multi-CPU or multi-core to assign affinity with a single core or processor. If your XP PC is old enough it most likely is not multi-CPU or multi-core. It might have hyperthreading which could introduce similar issues, but this usually can be disabled in the PC's BIOS. DxWnd has been around since the XP days, but cannot say if it might help or not with this game.

Most likely it is a matter of the game relying on some depreciated API or DirectX feature. You can try playing around with other compatibility settings. Just do it from the compatibility tab in the executable's properties dialog. The compreg.bat would only apply to Windows 2k, not XP or later.