Alien Crossfire Help

[Beo]

I've been trying for a while to get Alien Crossfire to work well on my computer, but I've been having problems with it. I'm using a window minimizer to get it to run at all, since my computer doesn't like to do the resolutions of the type that the game demands, and that doesn't seem to be affecting the way it runs, as Alpha Centauri by itself works fine. Alien Crossfire loads and lets me go to the main menu, and does some stuff, like letting me load games or use the Quick Start option, but when I try to start a new game with any options set, the game lets me choose the options and then I get a "Terranx.icd has stopped working" message whenever I'm launching my new game. Has anyone had a similar error?

 

[yeehi]

I don;t know, but a post at civ.org had this to say regarding the matter:

I figured it out... I had to move the folder to the root directory.
i.e.- c:/Alpha Centauri

I had forgotten that some of the old games won't work if you put them in a subfolder like "Program Files".

I still get the cpu error but, with the fixes listed above, it runs.

Thanks for helping me figure that out.

Good luck! The game is more than well worth getting going!

 

[Beo]

I've already given that a try, to no avail. I suppose I should mention that I'm running a Vista PC and that I've tried the SMAC compatability update and the SMACX update, each by itself as well as both together with no success.

 

[yeehi]

Hmmmm! Did you edit the AlphaCentauri.ini file to change the number from 0 to 1 (or vice versa? Can't remember offhand.) That is an issue with vista sometimes, I think.

Have you tried right clicking terranx.exe and setting it to be run as administrator? Or setting it to run in XP compatability?

 

[Beo]

I fixed the voxel setting, yeah, and I can't do anything with compatibility since the issue is with terranx.icd, not terranx.exe.

 

[Petek]

This specific problem with SMAX has been reported a few times over the years. I only found one solution that worked: Simply uninstall and reinstall the game (both SMAC and SMAX}. See this thread on Apolyton for details. If you get SMAX to work, you probably can fix your resolution problems by editing the Alpha Centauri.ini file to change the entry

directdraw=1

to

directdraw=0

If this line doesn't already exist, add it to the [Alpha Centauri] section of the .ini file. However, you'll have to change the 0 back to a 1 to play SMAC.

HTH

Petek

 

[Beo]

I'll try un- and reinstalling and see if that does anything.

Edit: Thanks a lot, uninstalling it and reinstalling it fixed the problem. I feel dumb now for not trying it earlier, heh.

Edit 2: I did a bit of investigating; I installed all the patches from the website, and after that the game stopped working. I'll try to figure out which causes the problem, though I suspect it's the compatibility update.

Edit 3: It was the XP compatibility patch ruining stuff. SMACX is running perfectly now.