Hi all,
I'm new to this forum - just registered 'cause I wanted to share my experiences on installing / patching, etc. Hopefully - it will be helpful to some others out there who are still having problems updating HOMM.
I've collected advice from others as well as my own findings and I'll try and consolidate everything in a relatively short post on here...
Firstly...as we all know - there seems to be a lot of people having problems installing the patch and one of the main issues is this localization issue. One curious point, I bought the UK Collectors edition - which I now see comes under Europe. HOWEVER, I got confused because when I first tried to install my patch - it didn't really work - I also had some problems installing - I'll cover those later. Anyway - on right clicking the HOMM.EXE - and looking at the various infos - I saw language English (US) and maybe though - oh ok - it might be that I actually a US version. This is NOT the case - and thanks to the advice of others on this forum - by using REGEDIT and looking at the keys - you can easily find out where your version is actually from.
So anyway.... having found that I had the RIGHT patch - I still couldn't get it to work, NOR could I uninstall the program - something I've seen a few other people have problems with.
After a lot of messing about I found a process that has successfully allowed me to install the program properly AND update the patch to 1.1 - I'll try and be as clear as I can here :
n.b. Just for reference - I also had the HOMM demo installed which I DID uninstall previously - not sure what difference it made - but here goes.. my process of fixing HOMM.
1. Since I couldn't uninstall the program itself - I physically threw the whole HOMM folder into the garbage and deleted it.
2. I then went to the START menu and under programs - found Ubisoft and then went to the Heroes folder - right clicked and threw that away too.
3. Then I went to RUN and started REGEDT and did a search for "HEROES" and basically - everything that came up associated with HOMM5 I deleted - now bear in mind - I'm not a computer expert here so I was kinda uncertain about deleting all this - however....I thought what harm can I REALLY do? It's not like it's essential system software - as long as I was clear it was HOMM keys I was deleting - I should be OK.
4. Then I found the Installshield Uninstall Information Folder in the PROGRAMS folder - if you can't see this, it's because you have it set so you CAN'T see invisible files and folders - so you have to set it so you can see invisible files and folders. I actually can't remember offhand how to 'cause it's so long ago I set this - but it's pretty easy if I remember rightly. Anyway - I then found the folder - sadly it's not named so you can't easily find it - however, if you organise by most recently modified - it's a good chance it's the most recent one if that's the most recent program you've installed - you can check this by going into the folder that's most recent and clicking on the .exe - if it IS HOMM - it'll show you that it wants to uninstall it, then I guess you can just cancel. Anyway - I also threw this folder out. Then - in My Documents > My Games - I found another HOMM5 folder and saved my SAVED GAMES folder onto the desktop, and then threw everything else away.
Basically - my intention here was to rid my computer of ANYTHING HOMM and start totally over again. If I could have done this by way of regular uninstalling - then of course I would have. But I couldn't even uninstall the program at all - it would start uninstalling - then go to the end - say it was successful and lo and behold - nothing had changed.
5. For total anality ( is that a word? ) I then used AUTORUNS ( a very handy utility ) and disabled all the Starforce drivers that were present as a result of other programs that had installed this - Splinter Cell, X3, etc. Now, again - I'm no expert and I don't know what difference this made if any - but I HAVE heard that it can and has caused problems - so just for the sake of completeness - I disabled anything STARFORCE - you have to scour through the list to find them - there are about 7 I think.
6. Then once I was sure EVERYTHING HOMM was off my computer, I then restarted and while booting held down F8 and entered into SAFE MODE. I'm not sure if it's automatic on some - but on mine - I have to actually select it. So... I boot up in SAFE MODE and then proceed to install the game.
It took a LOT longer - however, first big change...on completing the install. It DIDNT freeze like it did all the other times at the end on completion.
So far, so good...
Then - I applied the correct patch - and this time - it sailed through no problems at all.
Moment of truth..
I then rebooted back into proper Windows XP and loaded up HOMM and success, on the bottom left - it successfully showed version 1.1
Sorry if this post is a bit long or states a lot of obvious stuff - I wanted to try and make it as complete as possible for the less technically minded people like me out there.. but just to let you know - that from experiencing similar install and patching problems to a lot of other people out there - having now got it to work succesfully with this exact method - I hope maybe others can find similar success on their systems.
Good luck,
Michael
