All characters/NPC/Portraits not showing

v3g3tto

Hi,

I bought BGII:EE last night for my laptop via steam. Everything worked fine until the game started. The first scene where you are in the cage, showed all the characters as very glitchy, which then went to them with black backgrounds with the characters barely showing. This also occurred with portraits.

I changed a setting in graphics options to not scale to desktop? This removed the glitching but also any character or portrait. All I can see are the selection circles.

Basically seems an avatar animation issue ( not sure how this affects portrait though).

Im aware I'm on a laptop with a very poor gpu (sis mirage 3), but it runs GOG planescape modded fine, so I'm hoping I can fix this.

I have searched everything and I'm out of ideas, tried exe properties, windowed mode.

Many thanks,

Mark

Troodon80

@v3g3tto, I don't suppose you could upload a screenshot?

v3g3tto

Troodon80 said:

@v3g3tto, I don't suppose you could upload a screenshot?

Apologies, I should have, but at work. Although at moment it would not show anything. All characters just show their circles and the portrait is black - I saw spell effects ok it seems though.

If I put my technical hat on, its like if you made a custom character model/sprite and it was corrupt. When it showed a char with a black background as she walked, that's what they look like stock before being loaded into game.

I may have to try a reinstall.

v3g3tto

Screen attached. Anything such as portraits, characters or certain text looks like that (red), very static/ fuzzed out. I can only assume its a game issue, as this could run on a spectrum and my laptop is 4gb RAM and 2.4ghz dual core, so even the cpu could handle the graphics surely.

v3g3tto

Ahh, i don't think i can access those options on mine.

I would try and get a refund, but i will get a 'wait for patch' or something, it doesn't help it being steam either, i have zero control over any of the files, nor access to the .ini files.

Maybe i can play it in a couple of months on my next PC lol.

Isaya

Check the graphic options screen and report the OpenGL data displayed there. Since you say your graphic card is old, the OpenGL version might be a problem. EE versions now rely on that, not DirectX anymore (or more precisely, not directly). This might explain why you face problems you didn't have with older games.
For your information, the ini file should be outside the installation folder, in Documents\Baldur's Gate II - Enhanced Edition. This differs from old Infinity Engine games.

Illydth

@v3g3tto: The Enhanced Editions are a complete re-write of the old BG/BG2 code and engines. There is a night and day difference between the GOG versions of these games and the EE editions being produced by BeamDog at this point. You really DO need a "better than crap" system to run this stuff (not that I'm saying your system is crap, I'm saying that not everything that CAN run BG/BG2, can run BG:EE/BG2:EE).

I'll give you the required level one tech support BS:...blah blah blah reboot computer...blah blah blah update drivers...blah blah blah file check through Steam...

Ok, now that that's all done, the likelyhood here is your graphics card has a setting set on it that's causing a problem here. Go through the graphics options in the game and turn everything off/down and look at what @Isaya is saying, he's got some good advice there.

As to access to the ini files and control, everything is in your "Documents" folders under a folder dealing with the game name. (Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition or Baldur's Gate 2 Enhanced Edition). baldur.ini is there...though it's in SQL format (I think the original was in standard INI type format). Look through the options there and see if anything might help.

CrevsDaak

Illydth said:

I'm saying that not everything that CAN run BG/BG2, can run BG:EE/BG2:EE.

My dear computer,
Would you mind letting me change that damned Intel chipset GMA 950?

Computer: no way, I'm a Mac Book, not a custom PC!!

Oh dear >.< I can't run BG:EE at a rate higher than 2 FPS, and BG2:ToB runs at 25 FPS very well, good luck no one used that Mac Book Pro from 1783 (autographed by Napoleon) with a N-vidia a year older so I use it to run BG:EE (even at 65 FPS it works nice).

v3g3tto

Thanks for the comments guys.

Yeah I realised about the ini file after I posted that, however nothing seems to change the result ( unless needs PC restart, which seems unlikely). I tried 3D acceleration -0 invisible shadows -0 and another I can't remember.

I got the laptop on the cheap as I spend all day at a PC and i know I could play games like this on the first ever pentiums, so a 6 yo laptop I thought would cut it, as these games never required dedicated graphics.

Would appear my mistake is getting the EE version instead of the original, but I wanted to get the best experience. As before, Planescape runs great.

Open GL version is 1.5.0 I think, so seems there's the problem.

Ive checked cache, all graphics options, resolutions, windows, exe file compatibility all options...

Oh.well, its on steam for later use i suppose. Thanks for help guys.