64 bit compatible?

[pctinker]

I have the original civ 3 cd and have played it on various OS's (win xp, vista, win 7, and win 10) with no problem. I have just recently changed win 10 from 32 bit to 64 bit and it cannot be played at all.
Has anyone played it on a 64 bit win 10?
What about playing it in a win xp virtual machine running inside the win 10 64 bit?

 

[pctinker]

15 people viewed my post but no reply? Does that mean no one plays civ 3 on a 64 bit pc or in a virtual machine?

 

[tjs282]

15 people viewed my post but no reply? Does that mean no one plays civ 3 on a 64 bit pc or in a virtual machine?

Maybe people need more detail...?

FWIW, I'm playing Civ3Conquests1.22 on a 64bit Win8.1 machine and experiencing no problems, so I've never needed to try messing about with virtual machines. That said, I'm not using a CD-based installation. Although I do have Vanilla1.07 and Conquests1.15 CDs, both use the SecuROM/SafeDisk anti-piracy tech which Microsoft deliberately disabled in late 2015, for all Windows-versions after WinXP (XP-support ended in 2014), so I never even tried to install the game from them on this machine: instead (like many people these days) I'm now using a fully-patched download-version (mine's from GamersGate, but C3C's also available via Steam and now GoG).

I did deliberately install the game outside the default C:\ProgramFiles(x86)\ location, to avoid problems with the VirtualStore, and I have given the C3C executable Admin privileges, although I can't honestly remember if I set it to run in any kind of compatibility mode. But even though I'm not the most tech-savvy of computer-users, whatever I did, it works. And the CivAssist app (I have v.2.0.5083) also works mostly glitch-free for me, though several CFC-users have reported that they were having difficulty getting it to work for them.

Hope you find a solution.

 

[Nathiri]

Yeah when I ran windows 10 for a short time, I ran it on 64bit and civ3 (via steam) ran fine.

Be more specific but why you mean, "cannot be played at all". Does it crash in the menu?, does it not launch? etc

I do know it does need to be ran in compatibility mode.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

I do know it does need to be ran in compatibility mode.

I've never had to do this in either 64-bit Win8.1 or Win10. I wonder, is it maybe only necessary for certain CD-based installations?

 

[Nathiri]

I've never had to do this in either 64-bit Win8.1 or Win10. I wonder, is it maybe only necessary for certain CD-based installations?

I meant mainly for Windows 10, not 64bit in general. I never got my CD to work on Windows 10, as others did for a time, but I know some did eventually get success.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

@Nathiri I was just questioning your statement of the game "needing" to be run in Compatibility Mode, which isn't necessarily the case. I do wonder, however, under what conditions/installations it might need to be though. Which is why I mentioned CD installations in reference to the OP, as that is the one most people have issues with.

 

[Nathiri]

@Nathiri I was just questioning your statement of the game "needing" to be run in Compatibility Mode, which isn't necessarily the case. I do wonder, however, under what conditions/installations it might need to be though. Which is why I mentioned CD installations in reference to the OP, as that is the one most people have issues with.

Yes I know. Many of the people on Steam seemed to need it, only a few did not.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

Interesting. So some Steam digital installations required Compatibility Mode and some didn't. That's really strange. It'd be interesting to note how the two groups differed in their OS and game installation set-ups.

 

[Nathiri]

Interesting. So some Steam digital installations required Compatibility Mode and some didn't. That's really strange. It'd be interesting to note how the two groups differed in their OS and game installation set-ups.

Unless I'm merging a few different issues, from what I remember, what would happen is, some couldnt even launch the game, others had problems once in game and compatibility mode and some settings in conquests.ini solved it.

 

[pctinker]

I noticed two main things mentioned in this thread - steam and compatibility.

I do not have steam which is why I didn't mention it in my original post at the top.
As for compatibility - I may have changed the compatibility in the properties one or two times, I really couldn't remember. All I know is that starting with Win10 32 bit I had no problems installing the original civ3 from the cd's and running the game. Each time I had to reinstall windows for some other reason the civ3 game still had no problems being installed except that once or twice I may have made it compatible with an earlier version of windows (using the game properties) to get it to run. Still I always had no problem playing the game in win10 32 bit.
It's just that now I have changed the OS to 64bit I couldn't get the game to start at all. I even tried to play it in winxp within a virtual machine - still no luck, just a black screen when I tried to start the game. I went further and installed Ubuntu (dualboot) on my machine with a virtual machine running win xp inside it - same problem with the game, it only shows a black screen inside win xp.

I really would like to get the game working. The only option would be to return the OS to 32 bit which I don't want to as the 64bit makes better use of more RAM. I'm running out of ways to get the game to run. Use WINE in Ubuntu??

 

[Laurana Kanan]

I do not have steam which is why I didn't mention it in my original post at the top.

Sorry, that was Nathiri and I talking about an issue that wasn't necessarily related to your problem.

If I follow you correctly, you can install the game fine, correct? It's only when you launch it you get a black screen - no error or CTD? What do your Windows Logs say, anything? Also where are you installing Civ III on your system?

 

[pctinker]

I haven't looked in windows logs as I'm trying it on Ubuntu now. Where I installed it - in Ubuntu I loaded virtualbox to create a virtual machine with win xp as guest os. Inside the winxp guest os I installed civ 3. When I try to load civ3 inside the guest OS that's when the screen goes black.
Is there something I missed out in the virtual machine guest os?

 

[pctinker]

Forgot to say I installed civ 3 inside the virtual machine using the win xp guest os.

Went back to trying civ 3 in virtualbox in win10. Same problem - starting civ 3 brings up a black screen in the virtual machine. Tried to copy bink32.dll into windows/system32 folder in win xp (the guest os inside win 10) - no black screen now but shows the civ 3 splash screen then nothing after that. What's next??

 

[Nathiri]

Forgot to say I installed civ 3 inside the virtual machine using the win xp guest os.

Went back to trying civ 3 in virtualbox in win10. Same problem - starting civ 3 brings up a black screen in the virtual machine. Tried to copy bink32.dll into windows/system32 folder in win xp (the guest os inside win 10) - no black screen now but shows the civ 3 splash screen then nothing after that. What's next??

Maybe try disabling the intro. I think that's what tries to play and its not for you. Some people have this issue. I have never had it as far as I know.

 

[pctinker]

How do you disable the intro?

 

[Laurana Kanan]

Go into your Conquests main folder and open the conquests.ini configuration settings file in Notepad. Add the line PlayIntro=0 and save. The game will then skip the Intro.

 

[pctinker]

I have disabled the intro but it makes no difference. Splash screen comes on then it goes back to the desktop so the game doesn't start.
It looks like no one has played civ3 inside virtual box so I have to give up trying to run civ3 inside virtual box. Looks like I'll have to install win xp and dual boot with win10 - that way I'll be able to play civ3 in win xp as normal.

 

[Lanzelot]

I've played C3C in Win7 64bit and Win10 64bit without problems. But you need the (legal!) no-CD executable published by Firaxis a couple of years ago. The CD no longer works, because in Win10 Microsoft disabled the driver that Firaxis used for the "copy protection check". I wonder why no one mentioned this in this thread here yet?! It was discussed in all details for several weeks, when that Windows patch came out two years ago. See for example here:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-3-windows-update-kb3086255-safedisc.552308/

In addition to PlayIntro=0, I would also recommend KeepRes=1, so that Civ doesn't try to change the screen resolution to the old 768x1024. (That could be causing crashes as well.)
Ah yes, as others have already said: do not install inside C:\Program Files(x86). Create a new folder for it, as Program Files(x86) is a protected system folder now (since Vista), and it causes various trouble, if you try to start the game from there...

I always use "Backward Compatibility Mode" as well as "Run as Administrator", though I'm not completely sure, whether it is really necessary. Can't hurt though...

 

[Laurana Kanan]

@Lanzelot tjs282 mentioned SecuROM in post #3 above and then we got sidetracked discussing compatibility mode. But, you're right it certainly could be the issue, I just think pctinker got themselves bogged down in virtual OS installations, etc.

Some newer CD installations did appear to work for some reason - I think tjs282 did some investigating on that.

Generally, there's not an issue running a program as an administrator or in compatibility mode, but sometimes weird things can happen. Like with Civ3FlcEdit, I needed to run it in compatibility mode to even get it working, but some of the functionality is missing and there are occasional graphical glitches. Or, like when I do coding in Notepad++ as an administrator I get annoying UAC popups when starting it.