Latest 8800 Geforce nvidia drivers break NWN1

[Ziroc]

Hey, if you have an 8800 GTX, and installed the latest Nvidia drivers (158.22), they DO NOT work with NWN 1. (Nvidia screwed them up). Go back to 97.94 or around that version number.

I installed the latest, and I go to load NWN1, and then I have a black screen. The menu is there, its just a driver screw up. So I went back to the earlier drivers, and all is well.
(Also, the latest nvidia drivers break the GPU temp monitor fan control--I max that setting)

This is happening to all Geforce 8 card owners when they install the latest drivers--its the DRIVERS that are the cause, not NWN. Send complaints to nvidia so they know to fix it--the more they get, the more they will fix it. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[robertthebard]

I come in well under that one, at 7600GT x 2, now...I really don't see much difference with the dual cards, so far, anyway.

[Zebodog]

Well, the 8800GTX is a DX10 card and completely overkill for NWN at DX8.1 I'm not sure if expecting them to spend a great deal of support on a 5yr old technology is reasonable.

At some point you need to throw out the old stuff, to make room for the new.

[Ziroc]

It's not the GAME that is screwed up, its the drivers Zebo [img]smile.gif[/img] . They also screwed up 2 other things with the current drivers. (Fan speed access)

And Neverwinter Nights 1 is a perfectly fine game still. I have updated the graphics, added my own 3D Models and tons of other stuff, so I still LOVE NWN1. It's NWN2 that is crappy [img]smile.gif[/img]

[robertthebard]

I think it behooves a company to cater to their customer base. How many DX 10 games are out now anyway? NWN2 came with 9.0C, so I'm not sure how relevant DX 10 really is at this juncture.

[SpiritWarrior]

It's old but yeah, I had tons more fun in NWN1. It doesn't look like 2 will ever be what the first was as far as features and replayability go. I sat with NWN1 for about two years just playing on servers and such. Not bad for $40 game. A console game would cost more and would be finished in about a week.

[Zebodog]

Originally posted by Ziroc: It's not the GAME that is screwed up, its the drivers Zebo [img]smile.gif[/img] . They also screwed up 2 other things with the current drivers. (Fan speed access) And Neverwinter Nights 1 is a perfectly fine game still. I have updated the graphics, added my own 3D Models and tons of other stuff, so I still LOVE NWN1. It's NWN2 that is crappy [img]smile.gif[/img]

All true statements. [img]smile.gif[/img]
Software developers at some point need to focus on the future and not the past. Take Windows Vista...dropped all support for DirectSound, but it's a good thing for future development.

I enjoyed NWN1 as much as the next person, but I recognize that at some point, it won't run on newer hardware, much the same as DOS based games (The original Bard's Tale, Starflight, etc...) won't run natively without an emulator. Heh, maybe one day we'll be playing NWN's on a Windows XP Emulator.

I'd rather nVidia spend time and resources on the future instead of looking at the past. If they can fix it with minimal effort and at no expense to DX10 functionality, then by all means go ahead. If not, maybe it's time to relegate that old 6800GS and XP3800 to "retro-gaming." [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Zebodog]

Originally posted by robertthebard: I think it behooves a company to cater to their customer base. How many DX 10 games are out now anyway? NWN2 came with 9.0C, so I'm not sure how relevant DX 10 really is at this juncture.

I would suspect that nVidia's target demographic for new GFX cards doesn't play NWN.

Which came first the driver or the game?
Are game developers going to waste resources programming for DX10 when there's no support? Probably not. However increase the functionality and availability of DX10 hardware and software and it become more lucritive to produce those titles.

You don't buy an 8800GTX to play a 5yr old title. Sorry. If you did, you've got more money than brains.

[robertthebard]

Nope, I bought a pair of 7600GT's...However, I bought them to play NWN2, finally...However, it's nice that I can still play my other games on this system, despite the fact that it's probably 10x what my last system was, or maybe it will be 10x what the other one was...However, I look at things like AMD doing a hotfix for dualcore processor support in games like NWN's, which needed it, most favorably. Makes me glad I chose their processor when I had this rig built, and, when I recommend a processor, I'll be recommending AMD. There are a couple of people that actually ask me for advice in system building. Just as this post will speak volumes for the support for older tech. People reading this will be surprised to know that AMD cares enough about the games it's customer base is playing right now to fix things. Looking to the future is good, but ignoring the present is shooting yourself in the foot.

[Ziroc]

Originally posted by Zebodog: quote: Originally posted by robertthebard: I think it behooves a company to cater to their customer base. How many DX 10 games are out now anyway? NWN2 came with 9.0C, so I'm not sure how relevant DX 10 really is at this juncture.

I would suspect that nVidia's target demographic for new GFX cards doesn't play NWN.

Which came first the driver or the game?
Are game developers going to waste resources programming for DX10 when there's no support? Probably not. However increase the functionality and availability of DX10 hardware and software and it become more lucrative to produce those titles.

You don't buy an 8800GTX to play a 5yr old title. Sorry. If you did, you've got more money than brains. [/QUOTE]People don't buy an 8800GTX for one game. That is a blanket statement, and is wrong. I know LOADS of people right now in the Bioware forums complaining about the issue. I mainly got the 8800GTX because I use high end 3D Modeling and video editing--and play all kinds of games! (and yep, 5 year old games, and even 20 year old games). Just because you own a fast video card doesn't make the owner only want to play the latest and greatest...

BTW, You keep talking about messing with DirectX 10 routines and stuff.. We are not talking about the hardware bios here, we are talking about drivers. Drivers that, in the previous version for the 8800 worked fine. They support NWN1. It's not something they have to rewrite, or spend time on, they simply need to correct a bug they made for this current driver set. I think you misread me.

They have done this in the past, broke NEW games, and had to fix it as well. So it's nothing major.

And how old a game is doesn't matter if it still kicks ass, and still have a very large following--or I wouldn't still be running my Mod 24/7 (since 2002). [img]smile.gif[/img]

Oh yeah, I use Mame to play Centipede too!!!! [img]graemlins/hehe.gif[/img]
But let me tell you, Battlefield 2142 is butter smooth. Can't wait till Quakewars and UT2007 is out!