It doesn't work!

[Muzman]

Ok slightly long story;

I only have the demo of the game. Was having fun playing it. Got rid of it after a while. Got the second demo.
It didn't work. So I looked up how to get it to work; turned off EAX in the ini file and voila, it goes (but the sounds were all odd, not that it matters).
Then I upgrade my video card to a Radeon 9700, install directx9 etc. The demo stops working. hmmm
I put the old demo back on, cancel EAX etc. That doesn't work either.
Thinking this is some problem with old software and a newish card or something, I go rent the actual game, download the patch, install, cancel EAX just in case.
Doesn't go. At all.

System is currently; Athlon XP 2000, Ati Radeon 9700, win 98, DX 9.
Start up is the same for any game/demo, any version. Start it up (or use the setup thing with any settings at all); screen goes black, blinks back to the desktop, goes back to black, then drops out to the desktop. No errors.

The log reports a problem with eax.dll, sometimes. but 1) I disabled it (didn't I?), 2) why didn't this happen before? My soundcard hasn't changed and I didn't have to disable eax when I had my old video card.
This points to DX 9. But I dunno.

Any thoughts?

Cheers.

[Xcom]

Originally posted by Muzman
[B1) I disabled it (didn't I?)[/B]

You did if you typed:

UseEAX 0
EaxDisable

[twisty]

What sound card are you using? If its an Audigy 2, sound rendering doesn't work because Hitman 2 seems to insist on using its own OpenAL wrapper.

[Muzman]

Hey guys. thanks for reading

I tried and double tried all the variations of disabling EAX that I could think of, find, and the ones listed here.
No dice. The demo won't start (this is the first demo now, although the same happened with the second demo as well).

I've got a Hoontech soundcard (Yamaha DX-G), so I don't think the Audigy problem applies.

hmm

[Saba]

Maybe you should switch to OpenGL rendering mode (if you're currently using DirectX). It definitely has to do with your new graphics card and maybe with DirectX9:

Originally posted by Xcom
You may, try to the run game in opengl mode. No guarantee that it'll work... (there have been some contradicting reports about this: some ppl claimed it fixed their probs and some ppl said it didn't).

Find hitman2.ini file in your Hitman 2- Silent Assassin directory. Open it in Notepad and change the line:


DrawDll RenderD3D.dll

to

DrawDll RenderOpenGL.dll

You can also try running in 16bit mode.
In the same file, change:

ColorDepth 32

to

ColorDepth 16

[Muzman]

My drive started dying a few weeks ago and I had to rebuild the software setup from the ground on a new drive.
And now it works (switching EAX off that is. Haven't tried it with it on). So much changed during that process I have no idea what it was; new video drivers, maybe newer sound drivers (I forget) or just the fresh windows install (after so many years using the same old one laden with all manner of crap). But it goes and that's the main thing.

So cheers again

[a2antoni]

Hi, I tried running my version in opengl and it solved all the problems. You have to go to the hitman.ini file and change the rendering. If you see below, find DrawDll Renderd3d.dll. Change the Render3d3.dll to Renderopengl.dll. I had corrupt shadows running the game in direct 3d, and changing it to opengl fixed the problem. But I'm still bugging ATI to fix this in their drivers... I might change my video card to in case it is defective.. I'm running a P4 2.53 Ghz, and Asus P4PE 845 chipset....

DefaultScene=AllLevels/levelmenu.gms

EnableConsole 1
EnableCheats 1
SoundDll SoundEngine.dll
ScriptDll SDL_Engine.dll
ScriptIfDll ScriptInterfaces.dll
DrawDll Renderd3d.dll