Signed up just to give you guys the official Activision fix for the game. It worked for me and I had the blackout screen at the menu with the original discs and Alcohol installed.
Quote:
This can happen when your monitor is not capable of displaying the refresh rate the game is attempting to display in.
You will need to manually set the refresh rate for the game on your system.
1) Click on the Start button > Run.
2) In the box type: dxdiag
3) Click the OK button.
4) DirectX Diagnostic Tool will open
5) Click on the "More Help" tab
6) Click on the Override button
7) Select "Override Value" and enter a value in the box that your monitor can support, then click ok
8) Exit the dxdiag via the exit button at the bottom or the x in the upper right hand corner
At this point the game will be launching with the refresh rate you specified. This change will affect all direct3d games on your system, so you may wish to revert the override option back to "default" in between game sessions.
This can also happen if your computer does not support the default resolution the game is attempting to launch in. You will need to manually set the resolution for the game to one of the resolutions supported by your monitor.
The game supports the following resolutions:
800x600
1024x768
1280x1024
1600x1200
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My Monitor only goes up to 85Hertz (don't know about my LCD but considerring it's new it shouldn't have the problem) and I set the override to 75. No screen blackout. The game boots up in 800x600 so you shouldn't have a problem there. Haven't gone past the character creation screen yet, but at least I can see it. Strange how this game is so dodgy, yet I can play Half Life 2 with max settings just fine.