Egypt II The Heliopolis Prophecy

Just curious.

Does anybody remember what the patch was supposed to fix? I cannot get the game to play in my XP. I tried installing and running as 98 and without any different compatibility (just as XP). Either way, it crashes to desktop at the end of the opening scene. I didn't have any problem playing Egypt 1156 BC in the XP (installed and ran as 98).

I do have Egypt II from Big Fish and it is downloaded on my Win 7 computer. Big Fish says it's compatible so if that is true, that's probably the easiest way to go but I had hoped to play it in the XP.

What do you think?

I have the Dreamcatcher/Adventure Co 2 CD game. It shows Version DPV 1.0. Witchen's walkthrough says version 1.01 and says to apply the patch. Apparently there used to be a link to it in the walkthrough. I don't see it now but it shows on my copy which I printed in 2007. Jenny's review says that the Dreamcatcher version is already patched.

There's a patch here that claims to be for XP
https://www.patches-scrolls.com/dl.php?file=eg2_xp.zip

I played the game on Windows 98 when I wrote my review, and was referring to an older patch in the review. I think it was for a drum puzzle that didn't function properly. The XP patch is from after that review was written, and I don't know anything about it besides that it's there at patches-scrolls.

Oh yeah. I did read something about the drum puzzle.

Maybe I will see if this patch does anything.

Thanks Jenny!

The patch seems to be working. I'm able to play in XP!

Well, that's good to know! Maybe it fixed more than the drum puzzle!

Good to know that it worked.

Are there any problems with panning speed being too fast?
The original version of the game was very speed-sensitive, and worked best on computers that were between 200 and 300 mhz. On a 400 mhz computer the panning speed was too fast and the control for panning speed in the game menu did hardly anything. I'm wondering if the XP patch fixes the panning speed (as well as the XP compatibility), since most computers with XP are faster than 300 mhz.

I have it set on "normal" speed I believe and mostly it is okay. There are occasions where the cursor jumps and starts spinning around.

Not sure if this is the same thing you are talking about but this computer has a Pentium 4 CPU 2.60 GHz with 1 GB of Ram.

Yes, the 2.60 GHz processor is what I was talking about -- It's a lot faster than 200 or 300 Mhz.
I think this XP patch must do something about adapting the game for faster processors or you'd never be able to control the game.

I am at the drum puzzle now. What did the patch do to help it? I feel I may not be finishing this game. I only tried it for a very short time so far but I can't see ever getting it. My brain can't take the moves in that fast.

EDIT: Well, I don't know what happened. I tried the puzzle for 10-15 minutes and got out of the game, came here and posted the above, then found a walkthrough on Big FIsh that showed a sequence so I went back in the game to try some more but still didn't get anywhere. I left the game open while I came back to this computer and was still looking for more information which I didn't find. I went back to the XP and the puzzle was apparently solved as I was able to proceed. Is that what the patch did? Whatever it was, I'm glad I can continue on in the game!

The drum puzzle is a rhythm-based puzzle, not just which order to hit the drums.
If your computer is too fast, it will be impossible without some kind of patch.

Since some players still had problems with the puzzle with the patched version (year 2000 patch), it's possible they didn't realize it was a rhythm puzzle, or it's possible the year 2000 patch was insufficient to account for their computer speed.

I don't know if the XP patch from years later made the drum puzzle automatically skip the puzzle after a certain amount of time. It's possible.

If you hadn't gotten past it, I'd have suggested using the saved game at Mystery Manor
http://mysterymanor.net/Atticsaves/index.php?act=view&id=17

Thanks Jenny.

Yes, I know it was rhythm based but still my brain cannot take things in that fast (sequence, rhythm, conversations, instructions, whatever). I don't have an ear for music at all either, and the instructions went off the screen before I even had time to start reading them. All I saw was something about any keys on the keyboard. (Also, last night I could not spell rhythm right and was too tired to try to find the correct spelling so I left the word out of my post

Good to know there is a save available. I was wondering if there would be one around if I needed it.

I seem to remember typing similar words about some other puzzle in some other game. I leave the game and a puzzle gets solved. Maybe I have a magical XP machine!

I just "re-bought" the Egypt series DRM Free (from GOG I think) having traded or sold my originals years ago - so I'm hoping any necessary patches will have already been applied

I don't believe the Egypt series is available at GOG Mad. ?

Maybe it was FireFlower then ??

(I definitely got the series but I can't check up from where without my Win7 machine )

It was probably Fireflower.
I think they're the only DRM-free shop that currently sells the Egypt games.

I hope your Windows 7 computer gets well soon.

My machine is still being worked on but progress seems good now 👍

Any news on what happened? Poor GreyFuss lost his Windows 7 hard drive a month or so ago.

Is your son-in-law also going to set you up with Windows 10?

My Win 7 machine feels like it is on it's way to the graveyard also. My fault for not taking better care of it!

I still haven't decided about my Win 10 computer either. I just can't find the enthusiasm for it as I seem to be facing too many obstacles that I just can't deal with.

GreyFuss was not able to resurrect his Windows 7 drive despite multiple tries with his disk to repair - there were just too many bad sectors on it. He was heartbroken to lose the drive and figured he was looking at a new computer. But his computer is such a good one with a great motherboard, CPU and video card. I helped him purchase a speedy new SSD and install Windows 10 on it. Once he got it up and running, I told him to connect the old hard drive because there was a good chance Windows 10 would "see" his data. Lo and behold it did! So he was able to retrieve over 4,000 photos, videos and a very special audio file of his grandson when he was little announcing that GreyFuss had mail! First thing he did was that backup he had been "meaning" to get to with his Windows 7 drive! He is now zooming around in Windows 10 and it hasn't been nearly the learning curve he expected.

So, oldbroad, if your computer itself is good, you may be able to do something like this too!

That is great news that GreyFuss was able to retrieve his files!

That's not my problem Draclvr. You should know that by now. My problem is ME! It is very easy for people (including myself) to say "just do it" but it is often very hard for the other person to DO it.

If you think the problem is the hard drive, make a drive image on a 2nd hard drive. You should be able to preserve the Windows 7 installation as well as your data.

In my experience it's usually the power supply that goes bad. Symptoms can vary, but commonly a failing power supply will cause problems at startup, with the computer taking extra time to boot, or not detecting components properly (such as booting to a black screen because the video card needs more power than it's getting). If it boots to a black screen and you hear the fans, you leave it running that way and wait a few minutes, then reboot and this time it's successful, that's a pretty good sign the power supply is the issue.

The BIOS battery is a little coin battery that is easy to replace. Typically the symptom of a BIOS battery needing to be changed is the computer forgetting the time, but it can also "forget" other settings that can cause boot problems if the default settings aren't compatible with your hardware setup.


Did you buy a Windows 10 computer? or are you talking about choosing one?

Thanks for all that information Jenny.

I'm still choosing one .

It's better to wait until you're sure.
They're not so cheap that you can keep buying until you get a good one.

My experience is usually the same... it's the power supply which is easily remedied. If things are shaky, just don't put it off until you have a drive failure like GreyFuss did!

Thank you. This conversation had got me back to making some buying decisions and I (think) I know what I'm getting! Still have to figure out about the monitor and the where to set up. Then I have to worry about internet connection! (A whole different problem.) But, I think I just made some progress!

Progress is always good! I have a hard time getting off my duff and actually making a decision sometimes too... especially when there is a good bit of money involved! nice larger 22 and 24 inch monitors can be had for $100 or less right now. Just helped a friend pick out a nice 22" at Amazon for about $95. Can't wait to hear what you've decided to get!

Has anyone got this to run on Windows 10?

There's a guy here on YouTube who did.

He has information on the page about this - click on where it says "show more."

He says the following:

Thanks. The version in my store doesn't work on Windows 10 though. I get this error when I run Eg2.exe: Direct Draw (DDERR_UNSUPPORTED) : CDirectDrawWindow::Open

Since Direct Draw is part of your video card, could that be where the fault lies?

I found this page here and am wondering if you have tried installing the game in compatibility mode?

That's a great resource post for a lot of very old games, Marian.

Thanks, but there's actually no setup file for the game. The whole unpacked game directory is in the zipped file. So just an .exe to run the game, and that doesn't work.

You can try ddraw.dll from DGVoodoo!
I had not run this game on Windows 10, but on Windows 7 everything is fine.