Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX will not run

[Gram123]

Hi guys.
I cannot get the game to start.
My PC exceeds all of the system requirements and I have tried the help available in the readme file, to no avail.
When I click the game icon, the screen momentarily goes black, as if the game is trying to start, but then reverts to the desktop.
When I run the CD, and click Play, a small "DemoShield" box momentarily appears.

I have DirectX 8.1 installed and working properly (I can play other ganes without a problem).

Normally, I'd guess at this being something to do with old graphics card drivers, but I installed the latest ones for my card about 2 weeks ago.

Any ideas?

Gram

 

[eddie5659]

Hiya

Is this the full version or the demo? I have read that when DemoShield comes up, it may have some kind of user intereraction. Have you tried moving the mouse or clicking somewhere?

Do you have DemoShield on your PC at the moment? I know this sounds weird, but its what I'm picking up from the helpdesk.
Also, is there any words in the box that comes up?

Regards

eddie

 

[Gram123]

Hi Eddie, how's it going?

It's the full version of the game - I just bought it yesterday.
The DemoShield box is a about an inch tall by 2 inches wide, white with the "DemoShield" text being the biggest visible. It's like a mini splash screen. I think it also says something about InstallShield on there (probably "brought to you by...").

I would copy it, but it's really not up for long enough to do the screen-grab.

And this little fella only appears when I try and start the game from the disc. If I try to run it from it's installed position on the HD, I just get a second of blackness (the whole screen except for the taskbar).

Gram

 

[Gram123]

Okay, this is the DemoShield window I was on about:

<img src="http://forums.techguy.org/attachment.php?postid=319032">

Gram

 

[Gram123]

I have tried installing it on my brother's PC, but it won't run on there either.
My machine is running Win98, my brother's is running WinXP.
Both have a nVidia GeForce2 MX400 (64Mb) graphics card.
Other games run fine.

I've sent a query to Activision, but haven't had a reply as yet.

Gram

 

[eddie5659]

Hiya

Is Activision the maker of the game? If so, I believe that they don't have much of an online support, according to other users on the web.

Now, this Demoshield. This is about it:

http://www.installshield.com/ds/

and it seems that if its not installed correctly on the software, then the software won't load. Have you tried taking it back and replacing it?

This is the forums for the product:

http://community.installshield.com/

So, you may want to post there, but I think it may be a software problem.

Regards

eddie

 

[Gram123]

We finally got the DUN to work on my brother's XP machine last night, so I took this as a green light to install my copy of XP on my machine (ha ha, silly me, forgot about getting the XP modem drivers first for my machine first, so now he has internet access and I don't!!).

When I'd done so, I tried Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX, and it worked perfectly.
However, when I tried to run Return to Castle Wolfenstein, I got the OpenGL subsystem error that my brother's machine had had previously - see here for details.

So, on my machine, I have Mat Hoffman's working, but not Wolfenstein.
On my brother's machine, he has Wolfenstein running, but not Mat Hoffman's.

Installing Windows XP must have done something (on my machine) with the installed drivers which subsequently allowed Mat Hoffman's to run, but my brother has bypassed / cancelled this change on hios machine by reinstalling the original nVidia drivers, followed by some more recent ones (but not the latest ones). This got Wolfenstein working a treat BTW.

There is an Activision support 'forum', and I've submitted a question there. I guess my next step is to try and install the latest nVidia drivers on my machine (or various combinations!) to see if I can get both to work.

Any input / explanations would be appreciated.

Gram

 

[brianF]

winxp doesn't have opengl support, that's why it's necessary to install the drivers for your video card to get the icd opengl drivers installed. And I am assuming that the other game runs in D3D which microsoft does support.

 

[Gram123]

Quite right you are Brian.

Both games are now working on my machine. Activision suggested I may have to install each relevant set of drivers every time I wanted to switch games, but fortunately this isn't necessary.
I still haven't got Matt Hofman's to work on my brother's machine. He has the 'intermediate' nVidia drivers, and Wolfenstein works, so I'll give the newest drivers a go next to see if that fixes it.

The odd thing here is that installing WinXP on my machine is what allowed Matt Hoffman's to run, but at the same time, it stopped Wolfenstein from running.
On my brother's machine, he installed XP first, got Wolfenstein to work with the drivers and then installed Matt Hoffman's, which subsequently didn't work.
I guess the order of installation must be a factor.
Or if not, my brother's D3D (or whatever) is not operating correctly.

Anyway, it is not essential that we get both running on my brother's machine - they're my games after all...

Gram