Author Topic: Most fangames don't start.  (Read 2651 times)

PenguinOfLight

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Most fangames don't start.
« on: April 15, 2017, 05:05:29 AM »
It's as simple as I said in the title. About 60% of fangames fail to start. Affected games include the entire Kamilia series, I wanna Kill the Guy, I wanna find my destiny, and more. When starting certain games (including the Kamilia games), I receive the entirely unhelpful error message "Unexpected error occurred when running the game." and the game exits. With others (such as I wanna find my destiny), the game simply sits at a black screen while the music plays and slowly allocates more RAM while not responding. With the other 40% of games (including the original I wanna be the guy, I wanna be the Boshy, and I wanna sunspike), the games start up and behave exactly as expected.

I'm currently running Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit. With no useful error messages of any kind and standard methods of fixing similar errors (compatibility mode, administrator mode, etc.) not working, I'm not sure what the issue is or where to even begin on finding a solution. Any assistance is appreciated, and any necessary information for fixing the issue can be provided.
« Last Edit: April 15, 2017, 05:08:39 AM by PenguinOfLight »

Artardss

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #1 on: April 15, 2017, 06:05:03 AM »
It's as simple as I said in the title. About 60% of fangames fail to start. Affected games include the entire Kamilia series, I wanna Kill the Guy, I wanna find my destiny, and more. When starting certain games (including the Kamilia games), I receive the entirely unhelpful error message "Unexpected error occurred when running the game." and the game exits. With others (such as I wanna find my destiny), the game simply sits at a black screen while the music plays and slowly allocates more RAM while not responding. With the other 40% of games (including the original I wanna be the guy, I wanna be the Boshy, and I wanna sunspike), the games start up and behave exactly as expected.

I'm currently running Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit. With no useful error messages of any kind and standard methods of fixing similar errors (compatibility mode, administrator mode, etc.) not working, I'm not sure what the issue is or where to even begin on finding a solution. Any assistance is appreciated, and any necessary information for fixing the issue can be provided.

There is a chance that there is other software conflicting with those games. You could try to switch to a different (new) user account on your pc, or start windows in safe mode. If those games work after that then you'll have to check yourself what software (or maybe windows setting) is the culprit. I also assume your pc has enough RAM?

PenguinOfLight

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #2 on: April 15, 2017, 06:11:35 AM »
It's as simple as I said in the title. About 60% of fangames fail to start. Affected games include the entire Kamilia series, I wanna Kill the Guy, I wanna find my destiny, and more. When starting certain games (including the Kamilia games), I receive the entirely unhelpful error message "Unexpected error occurred when running the game." and the game exits. With others (such as I wanna find my destiny), the game simply sits at a black screen while the music plays and slowly allocates more RAM while not responding. With the other 40% of games (including the original I wanna be the guy, I wanna be the Boshy, and I wanna sunspike), the games start up and behave exactly as expected.

I'm currently running Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit. With no useful error messages of any kind and standard methods of fixing similar errors (compatibility mode, administrator mode, etc.) not working, I'm not sure what the issue is or where to even begin on finding a solution. Any assistance is appreciated, and any necessary information for fixing the issue can be provided.

There is a chance that there is other software conflicting with those games. You could try to switch to a different (new) user account on your pc, or start windows in safe mode. If those games work after that then you'll have to check yourself what software (or maybe windows setting) is the culprit. I also assume your pc has enough RAM?

I certainly hope I have enough RAM, I can't imagine fangames taking over a few hundred megabytes and I have 16GB. I'll try running in a sort of "minimalist" setup really quick and report back.

EDIT: Nope. Shut down everything but system processes and the game, still getting the same generic errors.
« Last Edit: April 15, 2017, 06:16:43 AM by PenguinOfLight »

Artardss

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #3 on: April 15, 2017, 06:38:29 AM »
Then I don't really know what's causing it. Hopefully someone else can help you out.

sunbla

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #4 on: April 15, 2017, 07:47:49 AM »
https://imgur.com/P6wZ5v5 try this to allow the game to use more ram. this is usually only a problem on windows 10 but still worth a try. for kamilia games you could maybe try to remove all japanese signs from folders/txt files. this can cause issues if you don't use japanese local
« Last Edit: April 15, 2017, 08:08:14 AM by sunbla »

PenguinOfLight

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #5 on: April 15, 2017, 09:53:49 AM »
https://imgur.com/P6wZ5v5 try this to allow the game to use more ram. this is usually only a problem on windows 10 but still worth a try. for kamilia games you could maybe try to remove all japanese signs from folders/txt files. this can cause issues if you don't use japanese local

No change, even while on Japanese applocale. This is especially strange because my 10 year old laptop can run fangames fine without downloading any tools or prerequisites, but this desktop can't.

EDIT:
The issue appears to be some sort of hardware incompatibility, since far weaker computers can play but this one cannot, even when both machines are on a fresh install of the operating system.
My hardware is as follows:
CPU: Intel i7 3770k OC @ 4.5GHz
GPU: AMD R9 390 8GB
RAM: 16GB DDR3 Kingston HyperX @ 1833MHz
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-Z77-D3H

It might just be a peripheral but I haven't a clue which one. I might have to test those as well.

EDIT 2: It appears Gamemaker is just being Gamemaker. However, by running a Virtual Machine with hardware acceleration enabled I can play fangames which don't work on my host machine, so at least I have that as a bandaid fix since nothing seems to work for native support on the host.
« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 05:40:26 AM by PenguinOfLight »

3-headed monkey

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #6 on: April 16, 2017, 02:55:33 PM »
You could try reinstalling/updating your grpahics and audio drivers? Sound sometimes seems to cause problems in fangames and video has to be worth trying as well.

PenguinOfLight

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #7 on: April 16, 2017, 07:07:32 PM »
You could try reinstalling/updating your grpahics and audio drivers? Sound sometimes seems to cause problems in fangames and video has to be worth trying as well.
Updated both, no change.

3-headed monkey

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #8 on: April 16, 2017, 07:31:20 PM »
damn.one more idea, try installing a much older video driver for your card, just a hunch sorry if it doesn't help...

PenguinOfLight

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Re: Most fangames don't start.
« Reply #9 on: April 16, 2017, 11:43:05 PM »
damn.one more idea, try installing a much older video driver for your card, just a hunch sorry if it doesn't help...
Unfortunately most older drivers aren't compatible with this card it seems. Guess a virtual machine will have to do.