Moogie on 2/9/2005 at 17:07
Greetings folks,
I recently installed Thief3 and am having a bit of trouble. I've installed the 1.1 Patch, and also a number of texture-replacement mods by John P. (You're all probably using them too, considering how awesome they look. :) )
On loading the game and skipping the intro movies, the main menu comes into view for a fraction of a second, before it suddenly begins playing the intro movie. When I skip the movie, the menu comes back into view, but again, quickly jumps back into the movie- ad infinitum. This happens too quickly for me to click any buttons or load/start a game.
I'd like to know whether this is a known issue caused by the patch, or whether it could be caused by the texture replacement mods. Installing it all took some time, and if someone recognises what is happening, it will save me alot of hassle. :)
If the cause is unknown, perhaps there is a variable in one of the .ini files somewhere that controls the delay of the intro movie being played. I figure this has, somehow, been changed to a tiny amount. Hopefully then I can change it back without uninstalling anything.
Thanks for any help. Nice place you have here, by the way. ;)
~Moogie
Edit: Thought I should include some system information.
AMD64 X2 Dual Core 4400+
2GB RAM
GeForce 7800GTX
WindowsXP (32bit)
Moogie on 2/9/2005 at 17:44
I snooped around a bit and discovered the code that controls the delay/timeout-to-intro speed. Unfortunately, this doesn't appear to be causing the problem I'm experiencing. If I comment out the video so it has nothing to play, it will still continue the behavour and instead display the 'intro quote' (which is not a movie file). If I comment out the quote aswell, the game simply crashes on load.
For those who may be interested, the two blocks of code calling the movie and intro quote are at the bottom of your T3UI.ini file. The line that calls the intro after a set duration is also in this file- search for Attract_Mode_Intro_Timeout .
Please help if you can. :)
242 on 3/9/2005 at 09:44
Moogie, it's not a common problem and I can say it's not a problem of the game or the 1.1 patch.
Most probably you messed up something in a config file either yourself or by a mod. Try re-install the game and install the mods one by one this time to see what happens. The intro should play only after a minute or so of idleness.
Moogie on 3/9/2005 at 14:31
Thanks. I did reinstall the game, test, install the patch, test again, and then apply 1 mod at a time, testing in between each. None of them had caused the problem. The behavour fixed itself after a reboot.
However, I've started experiencing other strange things going on during gameplay. In certain places, or with particular camera angles, Garret decides to jump by himself. Continuously. Like a maniac. Not the best thing to do when you're trying to wall-sneak past some armed guards. :)
I checked my keyboard and mouse wires and made sure everything was plugged in correctly, which it was. Neither my keyboard or mouse are wireless, so I doubt it may be interferance. When I pressed esc, the game froze on the menu screen. Now it often freezes on any menu screen with those blue swirly things in the background or when reading letters.
I'm suspicious that this may be being caused by overheating. My computer is an Alienware- a powerhouse of heat generation. Though it has 3 fans and a special 'air intake' system, it wouldn't suprise me if the atmosphere in this part of the house is just too hot. However, I would expect my entire system to freeze if that was the case. As it is, just the game dies; everything in the background continues running smoothly.
It's not looking too great, eh... oh well. I'll stay optimistic that this may be a problem which I can fix. If not, I guess I'll have to bring out the industrial-sized electric fan and point it at the Alien's roasting tummy contents. :P
GlasWolf on 3/9/2005 at 21:47
Stuck controls are usually caused by USB controllers of some kind - gamepads, wheels etc. Try unplugging them.
Moogie on 4/9/2005 at 20:37
It wasn't stuck controls, they were just firing randomly. I don't have any game controllers attached anyway; just the keyboard and mouse.
I recently came across this: (
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=27&threadid=1662743)
I'm going to try it and see how things go. If it works I'll come back and let you know. :)
Moogie on 5/9/2005 at 15:26
Hurrah! It seems to have done the trick. :) I'd recommend anyone with dual-core processors to disable one of their cores if any of their games or programs start doing strange things.
Moogie on 8/9/2005 at 16:14
I think I spoke too soon. >< I'm still getting every weird crash, even with one core disabled. The intro movie still infinitely loops sometimes on startup. The game still crashes sometimes when going into a menu or reading a scroll. Garret still thinks it's funny sometimes to make as much noise as he can just as a guard turns to walk away. Argh.
I'm pretty sure my comp is clean of mal/spyware, as I scan every day with XoftSpy, McAfee VirusScan, and AdAware. Dxdiag shows no conflicts or errors in any devices. Device Manager shows everything running smoothly also. I didn't get these problems on my old comp... maybe this one is just too gawd-darn powerful for the game. :/
Don't give up hope for me... please help if you can. :(
242 on 9/9/2005 at 00:26
You may want to turn on the second core back, TDS works with hyperthreading, it causes problem only for T1/2.
Try temporarily replace the keyboard and mouse with some different ones if you can, try to disconnect the mouse at all to see if it helps.
Try to disable soundcard, try different drivers for your videocard (though I doubt the latter can help in this case). Maybe try to open case of your comp, maybe the CPU (or other subsystem) overheats and causes the problems.
Ginsane on 16/9/2005 at 02:43
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4200+
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Series GPU 256MB
And I'm having the same problem with the video looping, and not being able to access the game. Installed 1.1, with no other texture packs. Just the patch.
Reset several times now, but to no avail. The video will continue to loop. If I hold down Esc Key I can get the Menu to appear enough for me to click on New Game, but that only causes the entire computer to freeze up.
Hmmmm.
