THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => CLIKC => Topic started by: Vendetagainst on 03 Jan 2010, 21:44
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I recently downloaded a PC video game from a torrent sharing site. I have never downloaded a game before and I don't really know what I'm doing. I have files labeled CD1, CD2, CD3, (it's a three-disc game) and Nocd. Contained in them are MDS and MDF files (don't know what those are) and a .dll file (dunno what that is either). I've been experimenting for hours trying to make them work, but I'm not getting any results. I've downloaded a program called MagicISO because I saw it mentioned in a comment under the torrent download, and have created a few UIF files with it, but I don't know what those are either (Oh, incompetence) and am not sure if they're helping. When I try to open the .exe file I get the message "failed to load the launcher DLL: The specified module could not be found". I am really frustrated but don't understand what questions to ask or where to find them, and am hoping that my trusty forum can help me.
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The MDS/MDF files are images of CDs. You will need to mount them, or burn them to a disk. Here is a quick guide to mounting them.
I don't know anything about MagicISO (maybe you could use it for this? I dunno), but I'd recommend you download Daemontools. Install that, open it up, go to Virtual CD/DVD-ROM > Device O [Empty] > Mount image.
Navigate to the folder containing the MDS and MDF files select the MDS file you want (CD1 seems the logical place to start), click open. From there on in it will be just like you have the CD in your CD drive.
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What game is it? NoCD cracks tend to be really shaky, in my experience.
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Thanks, Spluff. I downloaded Daemontools and was able to mount the three CDs, but when I click on "Install" I get the message:
(http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q232/scapocy/Error.jpg)
And @KvP
The game is Vampire: the Masquerade -- Bloodlines
Shaky how?
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What OS are you using? If it's vista, you may need to right click and select 'run as admin'.
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It's Windows XP.
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Are you running XP from the administrator account?
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yessir.
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Alright try going to the task manager, the processes tab, and checking if there are any processes called Msiexec.exe. If there are, end them.
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And @KvP
The game is Vampire: the Masquerade -- Bloodlines
Shaky how?
Hey, brainwave connection. I downloaded that same torrent today and was messing with it up until an hour ago, at which point I just bought it on Steam.
Maybe it'll work for you, but the type of security that V:TMB uses prevents you from using a mounted / burned disc as validation. I tried using the NoCD crack. There was the usual "Insert Disc 1" message but when you clicked out of that it started up the game anyway. However when I got to the main menu I couldn't see any of the buttons. Maybe you'll have more luck than I.
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@Spluff
Nothing with that name in processes. What is Msiexec.exe?
@KvP
haha, that's a pretty weird coincidence.
I'm going to try to download it, at least. I'll buy it if Spluff loses patience with my internet incompetence or runs out of ideas.
(Thank you both!)
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Actually I've been doing some tinkering and I think the problems I had with the cracked version might have had more to do with my swapping out music files than anything else. The game gets touchy if you go out of a certain ballpark, length- and filesize-wise.
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As long as its this game we're talking about and troubleshooting, I'm guessing you guys will be wanting all the user-created patches/extra stuff. This stuff is awesome/fixes the game a lot from its terrible crackwhore buggy infected self, but I can't remember how to install most of them.
Also I've use the cd crack before with my legitimate copy and it worked just fine, if I recall correctly.
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What is Msiexec.exe?
That's the windows installer process, I was just checking if there were any duplicates of the installer already running. You should probably also check for any by these names, too: setup.exe, isetup.exe, ikernel.exe, idriver.exe, IsUninst.exe, IsUn16.exe, Uninst.exe, Uninst16.exe
Also, are there any invalid characters in the path to the install file? Any non-alphanumeric characters?
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I've downloaded a program called MagicISO because I saw it mentioned in a comment under the torrent download, and have created a few UIF files with it, but I don't know what those are either (Oh, incompetence) and am not sure if they're helping. When I try to open the .exe file I get the message "failed to load the launcher DLL: The specified module could not be found". I am really frustrated but don't understand what questions to ask or where to find them, and am hoping that my trusty forum can help me.
This may be irrelevant to the previous posts above but to mount stuff with MagicISO you also have to dload MagicDisc, which is basically the mounting add-on to the program. After which you don't actually need to run MagicISO, which I suppose is stupid and a waste of space.
MagicISO is just an ISO creating/burning program by itself.
Also, MagicDisc uses the MDF files I think.
I think.
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There is pretty much no reason I can think of not to use Virtual Clone Drive (http://www.elby.ch/products/clone_dvd/download.html) for mounting anything.
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So Installshield is definitely the problem. I've tried various dumb things trying to get it to work, which brings me to my next question...
What do you do when you delete Installshield from the registry key without having made a backup?