Civ 4 patching issues 1.74 (Trymedia)

[Learningciv]

Hello I am the owner of the digital version of Civilization 4 downloaded from Trymedia. The game comes patched to 1.6.1, however to install an expansion or play online I need 1.74. When I try to patch the game using the Trymedia 1.74 patch I get the following error:

"The Sid Meier's Civilization 4 Digital version is not installed on this machine".

I have tried uninstalling/reinstalling twice, tried to find different versions of the patch (I also tried Direct2Download version of the patch but that didn't work either), etc but nothing works. When I look in control panel in Programs and Features I find Civilization 4 installed (time stamp even shows it is my most recent install so I know it isn't an old version sitting there).

I have used the search feature only to find 1 other person with my issue and he/she seemed to find no answer.

EDIT: I am currently re-downloading Civilization 4 from Trymedia in the hope that the game comes patched to 1.74 but I really doubt it will.

 

[The_J]

Download-versions are not supported by the normal patches.
You have to look, if trymedia has a special patch for it.

 

[Learningciv]

Download-versions are not supported by the normal patches.
You have to look, if trymedia has a special patch for it.

That is in the first paragraph of what I wrote. "when I try to patch the game using the Trymedia 1.74 patch". The issue is the trymedia patch not recognising the install

 

[ori]

did you contact trymedia yet? maybe something is wrong with the registry key they use - but its difficult to troubleshoot not having such an install myself...

 

[Learningciv]

I am waiting to hear a reply from Trymedia as we speak.

As for registry I uninstalled then made sure no Civ folders were left inside. Then I reinstalled and looked in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE then SOFTWARE then FIRAXIS GAMES and I get 2 Civ folders inside there. "Sid Meier's Civilization 4" and "Sid Meier's Civilization IV".

Inside Sid Meier's Civilization 4 I have (Default) REG_SZ (Value not set), DEFAULT_LANGUAGE REG_DWORD 0X00000009 (9), and INSTALLDIR REG_SZ C:\Program Files\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization IV. I also have another sub folder named 1.61 which has a (Default) REG_SZ (Value not set) inside it.

Inside Sid Meier's Civilization IV I only have (Default) REG_SZ (Value not set). It has a single sub folder named 1.61.0000 which only has (Default) REG_SZ (Value not set) inside it.

I have also checked inside HKEY_CURRENT_USER then SOFTWARE and found no Firaxis folder. I only mention this because I see game companies (such as Blizzard, etc) with folders in there.

 

[Learningciv]

Still no response from Trymedia after 48 hours (contrary to their expected 24 hours for a reply)

 

[ori]

sorry for the delay in my response - I am currently having only intermittent internet access and this will be true for a week or two...

Civ4 (the retail version) has a cryptic registry key that is used for a lot of operations - is that present in your install?
CFBCE791-2D53-4FCE-B3FB-D6E01F4112E8
(it is in two places). If not trymedia likely uses a different code which would make things really difficult to troubleshoot without their help...

 

[Learningciv]

Ok here is a bit of a summary of the past few days. I finally hear from Trymedia and they have a special patch that you needed which is different from the Trymedia one I found (i.e. 2 different Trymedia patches but only 1 works. The non-working one is the easily available one).

I download that patch from the link in an email I recieved and this version is ACTIVEMARK which means I need to input a 32 digit code (which thankfully was also in the email). However the ACTIVEMARK says it works but does not..... which means I cannot play Civ at all.

I email them again and it turns out that Vista has security features that interfere with the patch and I fix that by running as administrator. I am now patched to 1.74. However BTW still wont install as it says "There is a newer version of Civ 4 available. Patching to latest version" then I get a "The patch failed to install!" error from that.

 

[ori]

there are quite a few known issues with BtS installs on digital versions (essentially if you got BtS from the same vendor as you got Civ4 you should be fine - if not chances are that it will not install).
That said: it looks for the civ4 registry key with the patch versions and expects an empty key called 1.74 - it is *possible* that this is the only problem - if you you might be lucky just try putting a new key 1.74 next to the one that is called 1.61...

 

[Learningciv]

Yea I originally tried to buy it from Trymedia but since I am Australian I get told We're sorry. Our Systems indicate you are outside the territory authorized for distribution by the software publisher of this title..

What happened is retail games in Australia go for near double the price of those in the US (i.e. a new game here costs $100+). That was never a problem with digital distrubution until our dollar briefly went very well against the greenback so the dollars were equal. Australians were buying games for $50-60 AUD. Game companies realised if they kept allowing aussies to buy games online with a good exchange rate that they would only be making half the money. A lot of game companies then banned games from being digitally distrubuted to Australia.

EDIT: Just tried to add a registry key, didn't work

EDIT: Found the fix!!!!!!!!!!! I have 2 Civilization registry things as mentioned earlier, one with 4 and with one IV. In the IV one I already had a 1.74.0000 key but then I added another 1.74 key and it fixed it.

WOOOOOO

 

[Learningciv]

Ohh damn. I got it installed, run the game. It loads up, goes through that python/xml thing, screen goes black for a bit, then the game just exits....

 

[ori]

after it crashes: is there an error message in the windows event manager? also try patching it to 3.17.