Might and Magic Heroes SoD Dark Screen issue

[Magelord]

I have been a Heroes fan since the 90's and the days of the Astral Wizard. I only stopped playing because I refused to purchase Might and Magic Heroes VI outright for two reasons. First they got rid of Black Dragons (Absolutely unacceptable!) Secondly DRM and all the issues that came with it(Nuff Said!) However with the advent of Shades of Darkness I was willing to meet them half way with the DRM and unfortunately it simply was not meant to be.

So I purchased and downloaded a digital copy of Might and Magic Heroes Shades of Darkness. Let me point out that is all I own and I have no other version of Heroes VI on my PC. After figuring out how to actually access the Dungeon campaign by downloading the 2.1 patch imagine my disappointment when after a few minutes of enjoyable play my game went dark after I went through a subterranean gate! Not dark as in a total black screen no, the interface was fine but the actual gaming environment went completely dark except for those elements that are meant to glow.




So alas my attempt to meet Ubisoft halfway since they brought back my Black Dragons has failed. "Yay, they delivered the Dungeon Faction back and they look cooler than ever! Too bad you can't see the game to play it." For the record I have a trouble ticket opened with Ubisoft and I am sure one day they may even get back to me or better yet fix the issue but Starcraft 2, Halo 4, Skyrim, and plenty of other "functional" games will do fine until they get around to it.

Later peeps! See yah in a few months when the fix this....or in a few years with the next Heroes game if they don't.

Magelord Out

[ywhtptgtfo]

Shade of Darkness fails. With the development time given as well as the fact that it's only an expansion, Limbic actually managed to introduce several critical bugs into the game.

Bravo!

Can we have some decent development teams working on a Might and Magic title? We have tried Russians (Nival), Hungarians (Blackhole), and Germans (Limbic) already. Let's just pass the ball back to some North American studio.

[hellegennes]

Shade of Darkness fails. With the development time given as well as the fact that it's only an expansion, Limbic actually managed to introduce several critical bugs into the game.

Bravo!

Can we have some decent development teams working on a Might and Magic title? We have tried Russians (Nival), Hungarians (Blackhole), and Germans (Limbic) already. Let's just pass the ball back to some North American studio.

You're a racist.

It's not only that what is considered a failure is subjective, and I certainly don't agree that any of them failed at delivering, it's also that you don't care about the facts in order to make your case; Shades of Darkness was not developed by Limbic. It was developed by Virtuos, a Chinese software house.

[Kalah]

Yes, Limbic are working on MMX, so they're not to blame.

But "racism" aside, I'd welcome a North American studio for the development of Heroes VII, for variety's sake and because of the fact that most of our fans reside in the US.

[hellegennes]

3DO was North American.

[ywhtptgtfo]

Shade of Darkness fails. With the development time given as well as the fact that it's only an expansion, Limbic actually managed to introduce several critical bugs into the game.

Bravo!

Can we have some decent development teams working on a Might and Magic title? We have tried Russians (Nival), Hungarians (Blackhole), and Germans (Limbic) already. Let's just pass the ball back to some North American studio.

You're a racist.

It's not only that what is considered a failure is subjective, and I certainly don't agree that any of them failed at delivering, it's also that you don't care about the facts in order to make your case; Shades of Darkness was not developed by Limbic. It was developed by Virtuos, a Chinese software house.

It's only racist if you make something out of it. Choosing a Chinese studio is an even worse decision considering the fact that Chinese studios almost never produce anything of quality (I am a Chinese myself, by the way). As discriminatory as it sounds, the best games tend to be produced by North American (or Japanese) studios.

Heroes 6 and expansion are justifiably called a failure for many reasons. The butchering of complexity aside, it has a nigh non-functional A.I. and is stuck with a truck load of critical bugs for extended periods of time. If you disagree with that, that's fine, since it doesn't change the fact that it's terrible.

[Kristo]

I've become increasingly convinced that the path to long-term success in this industry is through developing games, or game engines, but not both. With the plethora of OS/driver/hardware combinations out there, the user's PC has become a hostile environment. Exhibit A: the black screen issue, and the devs' apparent inability to reproduce it on their end.

The computer world is different now than it was 20 years ago when H1 came out. I sincerely hope that for H7 (if there is one) Ubisoft works with a shop that will license a proven game engine instead of rolling their own. Focus on the game and the art, but leave the display details to the pros.

[mordredrs]

...The computer world is different now than it was 20 years ago when H1 came out. I sincerely hope that for H7 (if there is one) Ubisoft works with a shop that will license a proven game engine instead of rolling their own. Focus on the game and the art, but leave the display details to the pros.

I couldn't agree more. They could have used a much better engine. The actual AI and game balancing is sad...

Btw, is this dark screen related with the fog (outside areas)?

[Magelord]

......Sigh

6 days since I submitted a trouble ticket for the dark screen issue and all I hear from Ubisoft is the...

Sound of Silence.....

[asthrab]

after I finished the first dungeon campaign and when I choose to continue to the second one, I got black screen forever :/
does anyone has same problem?

[frozd]

after I finished the first dungeon campaign and when I choose to continue to the second one, I got black screen forever :/
does anyone has same problem?

Yeah I had that. I found a way around it though. Always save the game right before you finish the map/campaign level. When you get the scoreboard screen, click next... then the new level will open and you'll get that description and then you have 2 options.

If you press continue you get the black screen and music playing right?

Go for second option, go to quit and it will throw you into the main menu. Then quit to desktop, run the game again... Choose the campaign and click on the second level and enjoy.

[asthrab]

yea it works but somehow my raelag back to lvl 1 again (he was lvl 8 before first campaign end) is it normal?

[Naki]

In another forum I saw this solution:
To fix the issue with the game freezing when you start a new mission set your M&M exe's compatibility to Windows 7, or Windows XP SP3 respectively.
So you could try that too.

(I have not had the time to play 2.1 patch yet, although I have patched to it. And I don't have SoD yet.)

[Locksley]

Hello!

I saw the excessively dark shades in the Picture of the Day and signed in to tell how I managed to solve this problem.

This is a somewhat shorter version of my two posts in Heroes Community ( link ).

Background
Usually my game had the normal colours but in the campaign things became dark when some of the cut scenes or dialog boxes triggered, and when I changed between map levels (when Raelag said "The light! Ugh..." in first map everything became dark).

When the bug triggers the whole computer becomes corrupted. If it try to load a game that had normal colours when I saved it, it becomes dark. Outside H6 everything is gloomy, as if the Screen Brightness was reduced (and I have it on max). The effect last until I restart the computer.

I started to suspect that my graphic card - which is supposed to automatically start when it's needed to deal with advanced 3D (a battery saving function) - perhaps wasn't fast enough in turning itself on and off between different parts of the game and the story boxes.

When I changed the graphic card settings to Always On the game began to work as it should.


This is how I changed the settings:

Btw, I don't know what they call the menues in a computer using English and these are my translations from Swedish. I hope you can navigate through this anyway.


1. Open the control panel

2. Open the section about screens, printers, sound etc. The icon shows a printer and a speaker.

3. Open NVIDIA's control panel.

4. In the list in the part to the left you should click on a menu called Manage 3D Settings or something like that.

5. In the biggest part of the window there's now a smaller square. In the flap called Global Settings there's a list where you can Select graphics processor. When I click on it I have three alternatives:

- Automatic
- High prestanda NVIDIA processor
- Integrated Graphics

I used to have Automatic (which automatically changes between NVIDIA and Integrated graphics), but now my high prestanda NVIDIA processor is always on.

6. When you have selected High prestanda NVIDIA processor, push the use/apply/ok/done button at the bottom of the control panel.

7. Then I started the game and enjoyed the beautiful landscape.


Good luck!



How it used to be:

[parcaleste]

Nice to see the game's improving.

[Magelord]

Thanks Locksley

I really wish that would have worked for me as well but then I do not have an NVIDIA card only the Integrated Graphics card that came with my Laptop. This worked in the beginning but like you said when Raelag says "The light! Ugh..." in first map everything became dark. And for me stays that way.

Did Ubisoft ever mention that you need an NVIDIA card to play this game? Maybe I missed that?

[hellegennes]

Integrated cards are never recommended for gaming. I have an ATI card and I have no problems with the game, whatsoever. In fact, the game requirements states:

Minimum – NVidia GeForce 8600GTS, ATI Radeon HD 2600XT
Recommended – NVidia GeForce 8800GTX, ATI Radeon HD 3870

In more detail, Ubisoft Support clearly states this:

SUPPORTED VIDEO CARDS AT TIME OF RELEASE
NVIDIA GeForce® 8600 or higher
NVIDIA GeForce™ 9 Series
NVIDIA GeForce™ 200 Series
NVIDIA GeForce™ 400 Series
NVIDIA GeForce™ 500 Series

ATI® RADEON® HD 2600 or higher
ATI® RADEON® HD 3000 Series
ATI® RADEON® HD 4000 Series
ATI® RADEON® HD 5000 Series
ATI® RADEON® HD 6000 Series

Laptop versions of these cards may work but are NOT supported. These chipsets are the only ones that will run this game.

[Sir Alock]

So HoMM SOD doesn't support ATI/AMD's 7000 series? Really? That's just stupid! I think I'll pass on this expansion (my 1st ever) as I own every HoMM game including all of the add-ons since HoMM1.

[Pol]

Probably it will work. The game is from time when HD7000 or GT600 were only engineering drafts and nobody from Ubisoft updated compatibility list, ever.

[Blake]

EDIT: The darkness issue in the expansion & DLC content has FINALLY after all these years been FIXED for me thanks to DXVK.. More details in this post here:
viewtopic.php?p=390868#p390868

I've really gotta get a proper graphics card as I still get this stupid issue with my old Intel HD 4600 onboard graphics. As a result I've never played any of the addon content all these years as the moment I touch them it's super dark screens galore. :/

It's hard to find fan theories/fixes for the darkened screen issue as it often gets confused/mixed up with all the total black screen complaints others post. However the fixes I've seen are:
1. Turn V-Sync off and on again as that resets the graphics, however that never worked for me, stayed super dark.
2. Go into your dedicated graphics cards settings and tell it NOT to share duties with your onboard Intel graphics however that doesn't help people like me who ONLY have onboard Intel graphics lol.

Since the usual "update your drivers" and "activate compatibility mode" suggestions have no effect on this one the official Ubisoft response is of course the default "you don't meet the minimum requirements" so tough friggin luck one:
https://support.ubisoft.com/en-gb/Faqs/ ... ntent-MMH6

But honestly that seems like nothing more than an excuse/cop out for not fixing what is probably just some silly little problem as the rest of the game runs perfectly fine on Intel graphics chips so implying that certain addon pack missions have different system requirements to the rest of the game because they're somehow magically way more advanced despite being in the same engine is just a joke. When you think of the insane numbers of people using laptops with Intel graphics even in the early 2010s when this came out it's amazing they just 'locked them all out' of the addon content lol. I'm sure it wasn't deliberate, it was probably just an accident that didn't get fixed due to Ubi pulling the plug on funding. What I wouldn't give for a fan patch/mod that tinkered with this and all the other issues.