BattleField Problem: Ive searched and tried all the so called "fixes"

SonOfDeath · #1 15-02-2003, 00:50

**WARNING THREAD MIGHT BE A LITTLE LONG :P**
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Im going to copy and paste what my manager said on the bfcentral forums:

I run an internet cafe in Sydney. We have 25 PC's and none of them have CDROMs. We buy bulk loads of games, and just use the keys and stash the disks. Unfortunately we have to crack the games to get them to run most of the time. Battlefield was patched to 1.2, cracked and running fine on the net but since 1.3 we cant get the bastard to run on any PCs that dont have CDROM. .. its patched to 1.3 and cracked and works fine on a PC that does have a cdrom (even though the disk isnt in the drive).
Goddamnit! we are losing customers because of this..
Im going to email EA but I doubt that it will help much, so I figured I'd try my luck here.
Im sure part of the reason Counter-Strike is so popular today is the massive internet cafe population that play it (especialy in Korea) and Battlefield could be set to be the new Half-Life engine... EA should be embracing the netcafe community!

Im yellin in the wind here... nvm me

Any ideas? .. anyone? ...

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Ok now, ive done a seach on this messageboard and i am gonig to list every way that i have attempted and failed. **Reminder: This is BF WITHOUT R2R**:

1. Install BF1942, Install v1.3 Patch, Install the .exe and the .dll cracks, install the playfix [Ive tried running it with and without the playfix to no avail]

2. Same as 1. + Change the AllowAllVideoRefreshRates to 1 [Seeing as these comps are running Win98 i knew it wouldnt work]

3. User: "corinb18" had the idea of creating a batch file which sadly didnt work

Before you say anything like "check if the files are corrupt and are the correct size", i did crc checks on the .rar and checked the sizes of the mod.dll to see if they were 3kb [which they were].

I noticed that the cracked exe is the exact same size as the original exe. Usually when you have a nocd crack for most games it cuts/increases the size of the file but this one didnt. hmm..

I also did a little bit of experimenting. I copied the cracked 1.2 exe and tried running BF1942 off that which worked but ofcourse you need 1.3 to play as it says 1.2

Now as soon as ive posted this im sending a PM to "Mplayer-WarLard" and asking for his fix

Thanks for ya help if you can respond.

RincewindTheWiz · #2 15-02-2003, 01:57

If it still doesn't work, you can always use Clonecd to make an image of cd1 on your hard disk, and mount that using Daemon Tools. Both are free, easy to use and WORK. I use this method to play myself, so it really works. The ONLY disadvantage is that it takes up 700Mb more diskspace, but at least I can safely install any future patch without having to look for a crack for it.

SonOfDeath · #3 15-02-2003, 23:06

Yeah, i would have to say that would be our "Last Resort" so to speak. Though we dont have much HDD space due to how many games we install on each computer AND how much HDD's cost here in our country [with the addition of how much profit we need Though i comming to a conclusion i would have to say that the BF 1.3 crack even though it does work hasnt been fully finished. If you look at 1.2 cracks they were perfectly fine you could play without the CD. I may not no much but from what ive looked at, that was become my conclusion. No offence to the makers of the crack or anything if i do. Im not a programmer myself so i cant really say much but atleast there IS a crack out :P

striderx2048 · #4 16-02-2003, 14:37

you think you could get your users to All Seeing Eye?
It works.

SonOfDeath · #5 16-02-2003, 15:56

The All Seeing Eye is a server search program. I dont see how that has anything to do with the problem i have. Anyhow my shop hosts 2 BF servers @ the isp that we're on.

striderx2048 · #6 16-02-2003, 16:07

if you applied the fltdox and imdox correctly then you should no so problems, EXPECT the inbrowser doesnt work CORRECTLY and does a CTD. So that why i use ASE

SonOfDeath · #7 16-02-2003, 18:21

If you actually read what i said above you would understand the problem. The patch+crack+playfix DO WORK on computers WITH CD-ROMS while the computers WITHOUT CD-ROMS the patch DOESNT WORK. Even if you setup a mapped network drive it wont work. The game wont even start up on the computers without CD-ROMS and i installed/patched them up exactly the same way as the computers that BF1942 does work on

striderx2048 · #8 16-02-2003, 18:33

then install daemon tool and have all the fake empty cdroms you can have

SonOfDeath · #9 16-02-2003, 22:12

Again read above you will notice i said something on daemon tools. That will be our "last resort" which we are currently disscussing now. Ive heard that someone else made a crack but i havnt found anything on it yet

ash2dust2 · #10 16-02-2003, 23:41

Quote:

Originally posted by striderx2048
then install daemon tool and have all the fake empty cdroms you can have

I agree, why not at least try this?

It will make CDROM-less computers appear no different from your computers with CDROM's. It costs you less than 1MB drive space.

Also, CDROM drives are extremely cheap in bulk these days...

krondike · #11 17-02-2003, 00:40

Just mount the god dame disc!
Its works!

RincewindTheWiz · #12 17-02-2003, 03:19

SonOfDeath : The Daemon Tools method (or alcohol120%) is the only one that really works 100% of the time at this moment. I just had an idea. In Daemon Tools you have to load the image, right ? But there's no reason that the 700Mb image has to be on the local hard disk if you've got a network. Just load the image over a network and since it only gets used to verify safedisc, I think the amount of network traffic will stay low and only at the beginning of a game. In this way you can have 20 daemon tools on 20 pcs that have all loaded the same image on one pc. I haven't tried this, but I cannot think of any reason why this would not work.

ash2dust2 · #13 17-02-2003, 11:31

Quote:

Originally posted by RincewindTheWiz
SonOfDeath : In Daemon Tools you have to load the image, right ? But there's no reason that the 700Mb image has to be on the local hard disk if you've got a network.

I read into it and as I think Strider that he doesnt have to have an image as he can play without inserting a CD. But you're right, he didnt like Striders answer and the next step would be to map and mount.

I wonder if they're "losing customers" because SonOFDeath came across snobbish on his three replies.

RincewindTheWiz · #14 17-02-2003, 15:13

Anyway, I think about everything we could do for him has been done, safe writing a new crack for 1.3 ourselves. Yes it's a shame that the current crack doesn't work 100% flawlessly, but as I and others in this thread have pointed out, there IS another method that always works. It's up to him whether he uses it or not.