Older Civilization Game versions and Windows 10

[apenootjes]

Having played civilisation for almost 30 years from 1 to 5 , I must say that civ4 beyond the sword is by far the most interesting version. With civ5 I am very diappointed. The same happened when railroad tycoon 3 was followed by issue 4.
Civilisation 4 was deleted by the installation of windows 10.
Reinstalling from the disk did not work. Working direct from the disk I got the message that I must reInstall with administrator privilages. Thus done I could start autorun also with administrator privilages but after activation the start screen with the choice of reading or playing I was back wit the request to log in with administrator privilages and that proved to be not possoble. What now.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I've got Civ IV working fine with Windows 10, the upgrade should keep all your installed programs so not sure how it was deleted. Can you provide some more specific details:-

"Reinstalling from the disk did not work."

What were the precise error messages you got?

Working direct from the disk I got the message that I must reInstall with administrator privilages. Thus done I could start autorun also with administrator privilages but after activation the start screen with the choice of reading or playing I was back wit the request to log in with administrator privilages and that proved to be not possoble. What now.

I don't understand this - if you have successful reinstalled then why are you trying to run autorun?

Basically you need to install CivIV to your disk, find the shortcut, right click and change it to "run as Administrator" and "Run in Compatibility Mode - Windows 7". If I have time this weekend I will write up a guide with pictures.

 

[zenmaster]

Having played civilisation for almost 30 years from 1 to 5 , I must say that civ4 beyond the sword is by far the most interesting version. With civ5 I am very diappointed. The same happened when railroad tycoon 3 was followed by issue 4.
Civilisation 4 was deleted by the installation of windows 10.
Reinstalling from the disk did not work. Working direct from the disk I got the message that I must reInstall with administrator privilages. Thus done I could start autorun also with administrator privilages but after activation the start screen with the choice of reading or playing I was back wit the request to log in with administrator privilages and that proved to be not possoble. What now.

Ummm... your post is half editorial that belongs in an opinion thread, and half a Windows 10 upgrade issue that has its own thread in the general discussion of Civ 5 forums at least.

This thread is for server migration issues. Those of us Civ 1-5 veterans who think Civ 5 BNW pwns previous versions should not have to be subjected to Civ5 bashers here [emoji6]

I am sure someone in the Civ 4 forums can help. You would be best served checking there.

Moderator Action: In future, please report posts that offend you instead of answering and let staff handle the issue.

Sent from my SM-G9200 using Tapatalk

 

[leif erikson]

Moderator Action: Moved this to its own thread as the issue has nothing to do with the server migration.
Here is summary of the issue that posted in the Game of the Month forum:

Just to make sure everyone is aware....

Several people have upgraded to Windows 10 and found they are no longer able to play Vanilla or Warlords Civ4. Deckhand has uncovered this link which explains the problem in detail. However the crux of it is that people have found that Windows 10 is unable to read many copy-protected dvd's to verify they are genuine. This screws up Civ4 vanilla and Warlords, which use copy-protected discs (as well as a lot of other old games). BtS is not affected because it runs without checking that you have an original dvd in the drive. I haven't heard anything about Steam, but I'm guessing Steam users might not be affected by this problem if your Civ is downloaded from Steam and doesn't rely on a dvd.

This is not a problem that's within our ability to fix. So it looks like, until either Microsoft fix the problem, or someone comes up with a workaround, Windows 10 users will be unable to play vanilla or Warlords GOTMs (or for that matter, any vanilla or Warlords Civ games - with the possible exception of Steam users).

So the message obviously is - if you want to continue playing all GOTMs, you'll need to avoid upgrading to Windows 10. Or keep at least one computer that's running an earlier version of Windows.

If you have the STEAM version, then this does not apply as far as we know.

 

[Quintillus]

Out of curiosity, does anyone know why Microsoft removed the ability to read these older discs in Windows 10? Seems like since Windows 8.1 already supported it, the effort to include it in Windows 10 would if anything be less than the effort to remove it, and higher backwards compatibility is good. Of course it would be preferable if the DRM hadn't been there in the first place but removing support for it in Windows doesn't magically remove it from the games.

 

[zenmaster]

Ummm... your post is half editorial that belongs in an opinion thread, and half a Windows 10 upgrade issue that has its own thread in the general discussion of Civ 5 forums at least.

This thread is for server migration issues. Those of us Civ 1-5 veterans who think Civ 5 BNW pwns previous versions should not have to be subjected to Civ5 bashers here [emoji6]

I am sure someone in the Civ 4 forums can help. You would be best served checking there.

Moderator Action: In future, please report posts that offend you instead of answering and let staff handle the issue.

Sent from my SM-G9200 using Tapatalk

To the mods, a winking smiley generally denotes tongue planted firmly in cheek [emoji4] . My intent was to direct him someplace where he could better get help and suggest that it is not that hard to find a proper thread where relevant issues can be addressed

Sent from my SM-G9200 using Tapatalk

 

[zenmaster]

Out of curiosity, does anyone know why Microsoft removed the ability to read these older discs in Windows 10? Seems like since Windows 8.1 already supported it, the effort to include it in Windows 10 would if anything be less than the effort to remove it, and higher backwards compatibility is good. Of course it would be preferable if the DRM hadn't been there in the first place but removing support for it in Windows doesn't magically remove it from the games.

It might possibly be related to royalty payment issues. I was reading an article on why Windows Media Player is no longer part of Windows 10 and apparently, including Media Player would mean Microsoft would have to pay relatively high royalties to the creators of codecs, even ancient ones like mpeg2 etc.

Sent from my SM-G9200 using Tapatalk

 

[Quintillus]

It might possibly be related to royalty payment issues. I was reading an article on why Windows Media Player is no longer part of Windows 10 and apparently, including Media Player would mean Microsoft would have to pay relatively high royalties to the creators of codecs, even ancient ones like mpeg2 etc.

Sent from my SM-G9200 using Tapatalk

That could be; I think they did removed DVD playback from Windows 8 by default for that reason as well. And I think for Media Center with Win10 the case is if you had it in Win7 you get it, but you don't if you didn't or if you get Win10 fresh. It's a pity there isn't an option to download support for those who do want it, though. Seems like it'd be a decent compromise - if 30% of people want it, they can get it and be happy with Windows 10, whereas Microsoft would save 70% of the money.

Or go the French route and remove/heavily reduce software patents at the legal level - wouldn't solve it if they're licensing the code, but would if it's a patent issue. I don't really expect it to happen anytime soon, but would approve of it since IMO the threat of lawsuits stifles innovation more than the guarantee on exclusivity benefits it. But that's another topic.

 

[apenootjes]

I have CIV4 complete with warlords and beyond the sword but also civ4 as part of the chronicles but that does not include the two mentioned plays. Win 10 gave no error message but completely removed CIV4 including the saved games. Uninstalling (from the control centre) and reinstalling from the "complete" disc goes through the complete process but subsequently cannot be found on the C disk.
With explorer going to the original Firaxis disc and tapping "autorun" goes fine, but when the opening screen with the "play" or "read" choice, the play choice then asks for reinstalling wth administrator priviliges.
The explanation of a royalty conflict seems to make sense.
PS: installing the old Mastertronic Railroad Tycoon3 (also from Sid Meier) which is much older than CIV4, goes without a hitch.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

For those struggling with this Amazon has Civ IV Complete available for $6 on Digital Download.

 

[Quintillus]

Found the answer in the news today - SecuROM and SafeDisc are excluded due to concerns about causing security vulnerabilities, rather than due to royalty payments:

Full link

This issue was touched upon by Microsoft’s Boris Schneider-Johne at this year’s Gamescom. The video is in German, but in the segment at the timestamp linked above he says:

“Everything that ran in Windows 7 should also run in Windows 10. There are just two silly exceptions: antivirus software and stuff that’s deeply embedded into the system needs updating – but the developers are on it already – and then there are old games on CD-Rom that have DRM. This DRM stuff is also deeply embedded in your system, and that’s where Windows 10 says “sorry, we cannot allow that, because that would be a possible loophole for computer viruses.” That’s why there are a couple of games from 2003-2008 with Securom, etc. that simply don’t run without a no-CD patch or some such. We can just not support that if it’s a possible danger for our users. There are a couple of patches from developers already, and there is stuff like GOG where you’ll find versions of those games that work.”

It's a minor minus for me since I moved to Steam Civ4 years ago after losing one of my Vanilla install dics, and have a Steam copy of Civ3 in addition to my primary CD-based version. And even for old games like The Sims that would be affected, I'll have XP-based systems around for the forseeable future. But I can see how it could be an issue for those considering using 10 as their only version of Windows - particularly if the games they want to play aren't readily available in non-DRM-laden forms. Maybe this will encourage some of those publishers to make DRM-free versions available on sites such as GOG.

 

[Maniacal]

Wasn't the Civ4 Complete edition DRM free? I picked up a physical copy several years ago and it had no CD keys or any DRM I could see iirc. Regretful waste of money but that's another story.

T [emoji4] .

I know the CFC emotes aren't the prettiest, but they look far better than that one.

 

[zenmaster]

I know the CFC emotes aren't the prettiest, but they look far better than that one.

Tapatalk on my Samsung gives me that and a wink as my only quick emote options. Looks ok on my phone.

Sent from my SM-G9200 using Tapatalk

 

[Quintillus]

I almost started a "Bring back the old smilies!" thread after seeing those two in this thread. Fortunately I saw the old ones in another thread first. You can just type out the smilies on CFC. Some examples are below:









At least on my Nokia, those are pretty easy to type.