Becoming angry with Ubisoft now...

[Jay]

okay, very calmly before I get mad again; I've been playing HoF since it was released... same disc every time. I've put up with the bugs, the poor patches, everything that's come down the pike but this, grrr....

Why all of the sudden, after months and months of playing off the same damn disc, will the game not load? I'm sure someone's dealt with this before, it's the "Please use the original disc instead of a backup," error message... explain now, someone who knows how to fix this easily. Not interested in another patch, not interested in updating my computer. I want to know why all of the sudden I have a $40 paperweight in a glitzed up box...

Been doing this for two days now. Restarting, loading from disc instead of from the icon, nothing works...

[winterfate]

I have NO idea, Jay. Could it be the CD went bad? The same thing happened to me a while back with my Starcraft CD, so it's not necessarily that it's old; it could just be a faulty CD.

Btw, I've been angry at Ubival for quite some time now.
They are incredibly frustrating!

[Jay]

I appreciate the advice, I really do. But if this is a faulty CD, then this is the third one I've gotten between trips to EB and Best Buy (not just for HoF, but the original HV as well). I went to the Website listed and said something about finding the "Device Manager" in my system... I hit a search run and couldn't find anything.

I need one more person's take on this. If such is the case and I've gotten poorly made that is craps out after a few months, I'm throwing HV and HoF in the trash, chocking it up as experience and I'm getting HIV back from my friend thusly washing my hands of UbiSoft and their POS products.

Idiocy is defined by doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result.

[Jay]

Alrighty then, that's that. Uninstalled HoF while saving my games, resinstalled it with no problems and lo and behold, when it tries to load all of the sudden I've got a backup copy in the drive...

One too many issues with these clowns guys, sorry. Both games are in the trash now and I'm not wasting any more money on those who practive Nivalism.

See you in the HIV forum...

[arturchix]

Do you happen to use Daemon Tools that mounts a CD image in the background? That would explain the behavior of SecuROM.

[PhoenixReborn]

I've never ever had a disk go bad (after long term use), though I did once have bad disk so I couldn't install a game. A simple exchange fixed that.

As arturchix suggests something on your computer must have changed, it's unlikely that the composition of the disc suddenly altered.

I often get that message when I click on the original homm exe instead of the hof exe.

You could at least sell the game or send it to me if you are going to throw it out.

[MistWeaver]

Even when I buy legal copy of game, I download "no-cd" for it.

[vhilhu]

my smart older bro (and he is REALLY smart, like among 600 top biologists, informaticists and chemists in the world from international olympics) heard that peanut butter may cure a bad cd. i gave him 1 of my bad cds.

it still didnt work, but...

the number of bad sectors ACTUALLY DECREASED!

you might try that ill never make fun of any cd-curing metods ever again.

[Pol]

Just shortly, because everything is loading for me now so slow. Regarding if you did something or not your computer probably did it "behind" you.

This problem happens when disc cannot be verified, alas it's damaged disc or disc checking system. (Or you re using bad program to launch it.)

First one can be easily checked by cdcheck, second is a bigger threat and I suppose that it will be your case. Such it can happens after installing new game, new software for working with cd/dvd or after you added/removed hardware. (Some of these things can system do automatically without telling you...)

Solution is to reinstall game, but foremost you will obviously need to remove the actual installation completely along with the used checking mechanism. You may try to look for it on google. And, maybe that it would help just to repair registry - location of your cd drive.

[Caradoc]

Sounds suspiciously like the kind of problems that come from DRM infections.

[vhilhu]

Sounds suspiciously like the kind of problems that come from DRM infections.

have you not heard the words of the prophet?

DRM is the future.

[ThunderTitan]

No, not DRM:
http://www.betanews.com/article/HBO_Sto ... 1178918089

[vhilhu]

suggesting that customers might accept the concept of digital rights management if it were named something else.

yea i think theyre right this time. its all about the name, really. DRM sounds frightening... just like Ballmer.

[Jay]

Okay, even my courageous attempt at defiance didn't work. My girlfriend got mad that I threw almost $100 worth of gaming in the dump box with my other has-been, ready for the landfill discs so now she's mad that I didn't spend the money on her and so, I have to make it work...

Let's go back to that M-Daemon thing... at first yes, when I put the CD in, there's an automatic background image of those dwarves brawling with renegade Haven troops... this has happened before but hasn't resulted in recurrent error messages. Understand this guys, it's not like I've been playing this for a week. Aside the first three botched attempts at getting a functional HV or HoF, this one's been playing for awhile. November of last year I believe?

Maybe my system has "updated" itself and isn't running accordingly, but here's the kicker... was playing no problem three days ago. Cut it off at 8:30, came back to it at 10 and all of the sudden nada.

I'm mad, I hate what these people have done to the functional credibility of this franchise but as much as I would like, I can't throw it out... help me please...

[winterfate]

Hmm...could it be your CD drive?

My CD drive did the same thing with the HoF disc...now that I recall. Maybe Securom has some sort of conflict with the drive...

That's all I can come up with at the moment.

[Jay]

Alright, there's apparently no way to solve this problem aside completely retooling my operating system or buying yet ANOTHER friggin' copy of this game, neither one of which I'm going to do.

I bought this computer last September and yes, it meets and/ or exceeds all of the specified requirements that HoF and HV need... after two tries, I finally got a bugged out copy of the game that worked and it's worked ever since so much as it could with such poor development. I just don't understand why now, almost five months after the fact, suddenly something, Securom, whatever, seems to think I'm working with a copy of either HV or HoF. For god's sake my HIII game still works right more than seven years after I bought it, yet this one won't? I've reinstalled them, found the device manager and switched everything over to DMA that I could and still nothing. I'm so angry right now I can't see straight.

These games were developed by novices with no appreciation for the fan base or patience to do the game without even system-crashing bugs that result in what's just happened to me. There's no level of accountability with these people and it thoroughly disgusts me.

I'm sick of feeling like I just bought a Cadillac and I'm being told by the dealer that it's such an awesome ride that I should feel priviledged to have to jump start it everytime I want to drive somewhere. After three attemps at buying something of quality and then having it prove itself worthless after a few months when its predecessors have lasted almost a decade, I'm convinced now that the Heroes franchise is almost dead. I'm sure I'm not the only one this has happened to and after dealing with all the problems these people have thrown at us this is the last straw. Irealize I've just dared to blaspheme Ubival and as such this post will probably be stricken so I bid all of you a fond farewell and thank you for your attempts to help, they were much appreciated.

[winterfate]

Irealize I've just dared to blaspheme Ubival and as such this post will probably be stricken so I bid all of you a fond farewell and thank you for your attempts to help, they were much appreciated.

You're welcome!
That's what we're here for.

And as for the Ubival blaspheming...I do that a lot too, and so do many others. You should see a thread I have over at the Campfire subforum...where I write story-like interviews in my spare time and see all the Nival bashing I do over there...

I keep telling myself I won't do it...but they keep pushing me with all of the stupid stuff they do...

[Pol]

I think that I had found solution on your problem. It's having somewhat of opposite approach though so I will try to poke you in the right direction. Look here.

Else you will need program (seek over google) to remove the securom and install the game once again. Something to it here.

Indeed problem is that your installation of securom get damaged and also it's not going to be uninstalled along with the game reinstallation. So you must do it manually instead of the installator.

Blame Ubival for that but most game companies are using similar methods to protect their games. Stardock not ...