Problems with Kotor crashing

[Rob]

I recently purchased this game for the PC. I borrowed it from Gamestop when I worked there and had no problems. That was when it was first released so version 1.0. I have installed the latest patches (1.3) and updated all my drivers. The game plays fine until it loads a new area. The crashing at area load is random, so I can't say it is a bad install. The load bar completes, and at this point the game crashes to desktop. I have run the game from a clean boot, defragged harddrive, run antivirus, ran the program with antivirus not running at all and prayed to the game gods, but still the crashing occurs.

My PC more then passes the minimum specs (probably the optimal as well). Any thoughts or suggestions that I can try? Random crashing is quite the game killer for an otherwise enjoyable game.

[RHooks]

What video card do you have Rob? Also, I'm moving this to the help forum.

[NotSoFast]

Maybe try reverting to an older graphics driver? I had problems with graphical issues with a couple of drivers. Went to an older one and it fixed it.

[Rob]

I am willing to try that, but considering it only happens on loading screens (randomly as well) could that really be it?

So much has been added since I first had it, it would be impossible to determine if it was a program conflict of some sort, or even if it were the new direct x (9c).

RHooks, I have a Radeon 9500 Pro. Game plays very smoothly with no graphical anomalies. I can move on past the problem areas, it just happens to be sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't sort of thing. That is why I am leaning away from the graphic card issue. Also, this is the same hardware config when I successfully played through half the game the first time.

I am perplexed. I appreciate the ideas so far though.

[RHooks]

I got my Radeon and KOTOR at the same time last year. I had problems even getting KOTOR to run until I upgraded my drivers so this is a finicky game with Radeons. I wish I could remember which version I went up to. That would have been around last January.

[Rob]

That is possible. It ran well before, but that was of course on an older version of Radeon drivers...

And some people do not understand why consoles are popular. Xbox Kotor, drop in the CD and play! :mad:

[Rob]

With more research I found this was a common problem with Radeon cards and all drivers except 4.2, which, incidently sounds about right when I had the game before. So, I either buy it for XBox, continue with frequent crashes, buy a NVidia card or wait out ATI. For a Game of the Year game that has won many awards, you would think a little more attention would have been garnered by ATI. How dissapointing.

[Fzoulcmbyl]

Hey Rob,...you are not able to get ahold of the 4.2 drivers? If you could, then it would be just a matter of un-install, and then re-install.

It is a great game, and it just gets better as you move along further into it.



Fzoul

[Gaim Mastr]

I've got the 9800 pro and I get the same problem, relentless number of crashes to the desktop during map loads.

I've even had it happen once while quicksaving. It even corrupted a quicksave on another occassion, which is why I hard-save a lot more often then normal now. I also now quicksave right before any are transitions (new maps, movies, etc.). I stand there, quicksave and then step forward. If it crashes I can reload right to the last point I was at, instead of having to do a bunch of stuff all over again.

And I get graphical problems where the skins for the environment don't load and leave me floating in space only being able to see the NPCs and a few items, like doors. Nothing short of exiting the game and restarting will fix that.

And the game refuses to reactivate the in-game brightness slider whenever I reload it, even though the slider remains in the correct location. So I'm having to go in and move the slider one notch to one side and then move it back to get the lighting back to normal.

There are a lot of other games from 2003 that don't have problems with ATI drivers. As per reviews from multiple people at the time of the game's release, it's just buggy and there's nothing we can do about it.

Maybe you can hit on a specific driver version that works well with it. But I don't play the random driver test game. If it doesn't work with my current driver, I'm not about to burn time randomly testing other version until I hit just the right one.

Fortunately, my system loads the game real fast, so when it crashes to the desktop I just reload and in less than 30-seconds I'm back in the action. But it still is very irritating. I seriously hope that KotOR 2 has better QA testing.

[RHooks]

This is one of the reasons some of the old computing hands like Mr. N and myself are not ATI fanboys. Over the years ATI drivers have been known for querky problems in gaming. I've had a lot of luck with my 9800 but I haven't seen anything that will make me automatically stick with ATI over Nvidia next time I upgrade. I would try to find a version from last year and rollback.

[Rob]

I found a hack that works from a sticky thread on KOTORs offical forum. By extracting a certain file from the Catalyst 4.2 drivers and sticking it in the KOTOR folder if forces the game to run on 4.2 without having to revert your entire system. A nifty, though should be unnecessary fix. I can see a small downgrade in picture quality, but so far no crashes, better frame rates and quick transitions from room to room.

I would never go as far as saying I am an ATI fanboy, just less of a fan of NVidia. Course, I can see myself upgrading in a year or so, so who knows what card will be put in next.

Gaim, try this link (http://www.geocities.com/teamhota/) here to see if the work around will work for you. This is posted on the official forums and it worked for me.

[tatilud]

i notice that some peoples play this game with radeon & have this problem , so this is what they tell me :

in the option menu ; graphics , no shadows & no grass then advance options , low , 4sample aa , anisotropy off , no frame buffer effects. then sound options , no force software & eax disabled ...

it should work or change your graphic card , i know thats troubling but there is some game who need special graphics stuff that not all graphic card are perfect , in this moment the higher rated in the market is nvidia ...
so i hope this will help a little bit becose this is a great game & i find this awful that you have to play-it like that ...

here is 3 links that i offer you to visit :

1 : the official support web page of bioware & this one talks about radeon problems .you can ask them a question & they will answer you very fast ( i know this for i have done it )
http://www.bioware.com/games/knights_old_republic/support/known_issues/pc/

2 :lucasarts's official trouble shoothings web page
http://support.lucasarts.com/trg/tg.asp?id=148&x=114&y=0

3 : my personal help webpage , where you can find the most complet infos on the web
for kotor , walkthrough,cheats,hints & much more ...
http://furiokotor.bravehost.com/

anjoy & good luck !

[Rob]

Thanks for the reply Tatilud, but with the hack I mentioned in a previous post I am able to play at 1024x768 at high detail, Ansiotrophy at 6x, 4xaa, frame buffer on, grass and shadows on with no problem now. I might even be able to get higher settings, just haven't tried. And the game looks and plays great. I still autosave here and there just in case, but after the hack, I have not had a single crash in over 7 straight hours of play. The link I provided in the previous post already has the file extracted, just place it in your KOTOR folder and no more tweaking and a whole lot less worry. Plus, then you do not have to revert to an older driver for your other games.

I will cgeck out your personal site when I get a chance. :thumbup:

[tatilud]

thats good to ear robo cose this games rules !!!!!

tell me what do you like & what you did'nt like & also make comments when you have the chance to see my web site :)

[Gaim Mastr]

Well, I had some serious doubts, but that 4.2 fix Robo linked seems to have worked, to a degree. I did have much fewer crashes during map transitions, which is good. But I still got the random mid-action crash.

After considering the evidence, I believe that this KotOR problem with ATI cards is a mutual pooch screwing on the part of both companies. Complaints of crashes were noticed at the time of the game's release. ATI on the other hand seems to provide drivers that are worse and worse for this game, respectively.

If ATI is going to go back to putting out poor drivers, I'm going back to nVidia.

I'd owned an nVidia last time, an ATI now, but I'll go with whichever is best upon my next purchase. The name on the box means nothing to me. It's the performance in my system that this gamer is interested in. :yes:

[neilv]

4.10 beta just released is suposed to have KotOR Fixes(havent tryed it yet) in it but I have found 4.2 the most stable drivers over a lot of games (I have a 9600) i have most versions of the drivers and dont mind uninstalling and reinstalling a diffrent version if that works better