Comments for Andrew Craig Mackenzie

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by abogard

abogard — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 23:26:45 +0000

Simply amazing, after practically years of trying to fix this game to work on XP finally somebody took the time and did what was needed, I really appreciate the work you did on bringing this solution to us. Cheers!

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Andrew Mackenzie

Andrew Mackenzie — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 05:04:43 +0000

I’m glad to hear you got a version of it working, though it is interesting that the other one didn’t work.

The age of a program shouldn’t have any baring on whether or not it can be debugged, as debugging functions are provided by the operating system. It may be possible that copy protection was creating problems or, as you said, a bad copy, but without seeing it for myself I can’t be sure.

Anyway, good luck, it’s a tough game!

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Erin

Erin — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 00:16:22 +0000

Hi Andrew — I gave it the college try but for some reason, the version of Riven I installed also managed to mess up OllyDbg. So I ended up paying for a pure download from gog.com and it’s been working great.

Maybe it was just a bad copy or so old that it couldn’t even be debugged?

Thanks so much for your help — I’m definitely using Ollydbg for other issues — including errant .dll files!

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Andrew Mackenzie

Andrew Mackenzie — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 13:27:13 +0000

Hi Erin,

Can you tell me if Sharepoint is installed and if you use it?

Sharepoint *may* be the cause, but I wouldn’t be too fast to blame it without a bit of investigation first.

If you’re up for a small challenge, I can direct you through a similar method to what I used to find my problem. I can’t, of course, guarantee we’ll find the solution.

1 ) Setup Riven to launch in Windows 95 Compatibility Mode.
2 ) Download OllyDbg 1.10 from http://www.ollydbg.de/download.htm
3 ) Launch OllyDbg.
4 ) Launch Riven and start a game.
5 ) Alt+tab to OllyDbg and click File>Attach; locate Riven in the list and click ‘Attach’.
6 ) Riven will be in a suspended debug state, so click Debug>Run or F9 to resume.
7 ) Riven may or may not automatically come back up, if it doesn’t, check that OllyDbg says “Running” in the lower right hand corner of the window and then proceed to switch back to Riven.
8 ) Riven may be upside-down, but you will need to navigate to File>Save.
9 ) At this point OllyDbg should pop back up or Riven will hang. If it hangs, press Alt+tab to get back to OllyDbg.
10 ) In the lower right corner it may say something like “Paused”, in the lower left it will say something like “Access Violation” followed by a code.
11 ) Look at the title bar and see what it says, we are looking for the module name, expect it to be in the following format “OllyDbg – riven.exe – [CPU – main thread, module ”
12 ) Click View> Executable modules, look through the names until you match the with a Path.

Lastly, reply to this post and let me know the path of the module.

Good luck and please let me know how you do.

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Erin

Erin — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 02:38:52 +0000

I came across your site and solution while trying to traipse down memory lane with my version of Riven (came in the anniversary pack I purchased back when I had a Vista computer). I’m having the same problem you were having and I’ve tried all of the solutions known to man (and found via Google), including the compatibility changes, folder changes, etc. I’d like to try your solution here, since it seems to work, but I have MS Office Professional 2010 and I’m running Windows 7 32-bit. There are no Groove files (actually there are legacy files but no .dll) because in this version of MS there isn’t a Groove as it has been permanently changed to Sharepoint.

Long-winded comment on a months-old post, I know, but yours was the most informative and actionable solution I’ve found — and I’m including all the “solutions” found on Ubisoft’s forums!

Any assistance you might be able to offer will be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Andrew Mackenzie

Andrew Mackenzie — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 08:02:23 +0000

No problem, glad it helped

Comment on Homemade Multi-zone Overspeed Alarm by Andrew Mackenzie

Andrew Mackenzie — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 07:38:18 +0000

Hi Adilo,

Sorry, I unfortunately don’t have the time and resources to produce these for sale. You can of course make one yourself but you will need either a PIC programmer or someone who has one.

The circuit is simple enough to make on vero/stripboard if you don’t have PCB manufacturing facilities.

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Sally

Sally — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 21:42:27 +0000

Thank you so much for your solution to this problem! I also have Microsoft Office 2007, and removing Groove worked like a charm!

Comment on Homemade Multi-zone Overspeed Alarm by Adilo

Adilo — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 16:57:36 +0000

do these I can buy?
if yes where I can get?

Comment on Riven crash on save/load by Andrew Mackenzie

Andrew Mackenzie — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 06:17:41 +0000

Hi Marianne,

Which version of Windows are you running?

Are you able to play the game at all? (can you load it and start playing?)

When the game is running, what happens when you press ctrl+[space] ? Usually this combination needs to be pressed to get the menu bar to show.

Are you running the game in compatibility mode? (if you are unsure, that is ok).

I have found you need to do the following things to get Riven working correctly:
1) Have the correct version of Quicktime installed.
2) Use compatibility mode (if you need instructions, let me know).
3) Remove MSO Groove.

I will do my best to help.