Help Getting Shattered Union to Run

[Commodore]

As the title suggests, I cannot get the game Shattered Union to run on my Windows 8.1 laptop. The game works fine on my old Windows 7 laptop, but that laptop is kaput so playing it on that isn't an option.

When I attempt to run the game it crashes to desktop immediately with this error message: OpenPIMipmapChain:Unable to locate a valid DDS, JPG, or TGA file for 'SolidColors'

The common fix I have found for this problem online is limiting your sytem's RAM usage to 2GB through msconfig. Apparently this is the only known fix for the issue but it is not working for me. So is there anyone here who might have some additional ideas on how to resolve this issue? I really love this game and would love to play it again.

 

[Commodore]

So....no ideas then?

 

[timtofly]

Have you tried to run the game under Windows 7 "mode"? This is normally done by right clicking and going to the properties of the icon on the desktop. The tab in the middle should say "compatibility". It will let you choose a version of windows you feel is better at running the game or any software for that matter.

 

[Commodore]

Have you tried to run the game under Windows 7 "mode"? This is normally done by right clicking and going to the properties of the icon on the desktop. The tab in the middle should say "compatibility". It will let you choose a version of windows you feel is better at running the game or any software for that matter.

Yeah I've tried compatibility mode both with and without the "2GB" fix I found online and it still doesn't run.

Although when I ran it in Windows XP compatibility mode I did get a little more information about the possible problem:

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: ShatteredUnion.exe
Application Version: 1.0.0.1
Application Timestamp: 43331e13
Fault Module Name: nvd3dum.dll
Fault Module Version: 9.18.13.4052
Fault Module Timestamp: 53b444b1
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 00504b10
OS Version: 6.3.9600.2.0.0.768.101
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: 7dc3
Additional Information 2: 7dc37791fa496585ac3090f07a9b23b7
Additional Information 3: 195b
Additional Information 4: 195b87aea87082eaaef1ac7a26d61d2

So it looks like it might be a problem with my graphics card. But my driver is up to date so I don't know what other action I can take to resolve this. I guess I could try rolling back to an earlier version, but I really don't want to do that.

Anybody got any suggestions with this new information?

 

[Zelig]

Boot to Linux, play in Wine: https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=6299

Alternatively, you could run Windows XP in a VM, but VirtualBox is bad at 3D acceleration. (Though you could still try it.) Parallels and VMWare Fusion are both good at 3D acceleration, but Mac OS only. VMWare workstation is good at 3D acceleration, but costs $250.

 

[Commodore]

Boot to Linux, play in Wine: https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=6299

Alternatively, you could run Windows XP in a VM, but VirtualBox is bad at 3D acceleration. (Though you could still try it.) Parallels and VMWare Fusion are both good at 3D acceleration, but Mac OS only. VMWare workstation is good at 3D acceleration, but costs $250.

When you say VirtualBox is bad at 3D acceleration, how bad are we talking? Do you think it would make the game unplayable?

In the mean time I will try it out in Wine and see how that works out.

 

[Zelig]

When you say VirtualBox is bad at 3D acceleration, how bad are we talking? Do you think it would make the game unplayable?

Couldn't say, depends on the game and your system. You'd have to try it.

 

[Commodore]

I give up. I have been trying for a whole day now to trying to install both wine and openSUSE with absolutely no luck at all. I have followed the installation instructions to the letter and the installation starts just fine, but then just stops without an error message and returns to the installation menu.

 

[mharmless]

I know this is a few months old, but I found this thread via Google and ended up solving it.

I got the game to run under VirtualBox, with 3d acceleration. Made a new VM, installed windows XP using an old product code from a dead machine of mine, loaded the guest additions, updated the OS, installed steam, installed Shattered Union. I'm playing it right now, acceptable framerates with lower quality models. Dunno if it will be worth the effort, but there you go.

 

[Commodore]

Ok so I found a solution that worked for me, so maybe it will work for anyone else who has this game and can't get it to work.

Go to this link and download the Blurry Textures Fix. Then take the d3d8.dll and place it in the directory that has the Shattered Union .exe. After that, the game should run. If it still crashes, try running the game as an administrator since that's what I had to do.

This is a much simpler solution that trying to get it to run on a virtual machine. Best of all, with this fix, you don't have to do the limiting your RAM to 2GB fix for this game that other people use.