Dungeon Siege 1 - Extreme Graphics Issues with Windows 8.1/nVidia Graphics Card (Sort of Solved)

[akoufaki]

Whenever I boot up Dungeon Siege 1, I can get all the way through the menu and actually start a game. I can technically even "play" it, as the game functions (when I click my character moves, sounds/music all work appropriately, etc). My issue is that whenever I'm in the actual game (including the first cutscene) the graphics glitch out like crazy, including huge triangles and squares of a bunch of different sizes and textures and colors popping in and out and flitting across the screen. I can sometimes see characters and environments in short flashes but it's quickly replaced with a bunch of nonsense.

I've tried pretty much every solution I've found for this and similar issues on the internet, including enabling DirectPlay, messing with vsync and resolution, using DSConfig, messing with the .ini's, running in every available compatibility mode, running in windowed mode, updating my drivers, and changing the system_detail.gas file. I ran through every tutorial on the Steam Community Hub for how to get it to work on Windows 8, including the Legends of Aranna + Extras tutorial. This seems to be a pretty isolated case, as I've only seen one or two other people with this exact issue around the internet and there's no help.

From what I can tell, it's got something to do with my graphics card as apparently this game is not too friendly with newer nVidia cards (I have a GeForce GTX 860M). I had a similar issue with Dungeon Siege 2 but I've since gotten it to work just fine with a few minor tweaks. However I cannot for the life of me figure out what to do about this one, especially because I really like this game and I spent money on it. If anyone could help me figure this out (without repeating any of the solutions I tried listed above, please) that would be great!

EDIT:
I made some progress by double checking the .ini's and I realized I hadn't changed the one in Dungeon Siege LOA's folder. After matching up all the .ini's with the DSConfig, the game runs "better." The environments are more clear and more things are visible, and there are no more giant strangely colored or warped textures everywhere. However, a lot of the ground shows up as just grey, some things flicker in and out, and the screen is blocked on and off by grey shapes. It's an improvement, but still nowhere close to playable. I also made sure the game was using the right card and changed some settings through the nVidia Control Panel, but still no luck. Help still needed...

Here are some pics of what the game looks like for me as of this edit:
http://imgur.com/a/i9GBR#0

EDIT #2:
Wow... I can barely believe it. So I caved in and updated to Windows 10, and after installing all my drivers (make SURE to get all your drivers, everything was running horribly or not at all for me before I did), sure enough Dungeon Siege 1 is working flawlessly. I don't know why but there it is, holy crap. I hope this helps and it isn't too much to upgrade, because so far it seems pretty worth it.

[Cadmar]

Hello, there is a mod that implements dungeon siege 1 content in to dungeon siege 2 http://siegetheday.org/?q=node/1607 i havent tryed it myself yet but it sounds more fun than playing actual dungeon siege 1. Or you could try geting a virtual mashine like VirtualBox or smthing like that then installing windows XP on it and trying to run the game but it if you have video card problem as u said doubt that will help.
Hope this helps a bit.

[akoufaki]

I was thinking about that mod as well, but I'm really kind of holding that as a last resort. I've looked into it a bit and, while it looks interesting, it seems strange to me. There seems to be a lot of mixing of DS1 and DS2 models and assets, which might be nit-picky but it doesn't "feel" right to me. Plus it seems to be in some sort of Beta stage so I'm not sure how good it really is (If someone who has used it can vouch for it, that'd be great). I'd really just prefer to play the original, and I have a right to considering I spent money on it (no matter how cheap it was...).

[akoufaki]

Still waiting for some help here...

[Galaxatron the Supreme Ruler]

Someone please help I have this same issue. I played this game all the time when I was little along with diablo 2 so I really want to get it working. I've tried everything I came accross

[martini.klein]

Same Problem here...

[Burgunder]

tray to sett the game too runn on ann older sytem like widows 4 or 5 (xp or vista)

[akoufaki]

I've already tried running it in every compatibility mode, like I stated above, and that hasn't helped (thanks for the suggestion though!).

[OddsBodskins]

Having this same problem as well. The mod for DS2 does NOT work as advertised. It puts everything in the game, but you have major limitations. If you don't want to be a melee class but still want to advance the story? Tough ♥♥♥♥, Gyorn won't join your party unless you are a warrior. Somehow the devs seem to think this is a minor issue at this time, and are focusing on other things. This is just frustrating. I'll check back in as I have tried Killahs mod and it didn't work either, same graphical issues. I'll let you guys know if anything changes for me.

[akoufaki]

Thanks for the reply. Hopefully someone can find a solution soon...

[smiksterman]

if your ATI disable catalyst ai to stop the flicker

[FaTjara]

I am having the same problem you described and it may be obvious but i noticed these shapes and textures that appear do so when the camera's "line of sight" touches other objects such as trees, mountains or even the snowflakes. I thought that maybe a solution for this would be an in-game command that disables snowing or at least the trees and the closest for that would be +xrayvision but then you don´t get to see any textures. I would like to know what changes you made to the LoAs .ini to check any improvements and if you get to a solution, you could post it please.Thanks

[akoufaki]

Go to the folder where your DungeonSiege.exe is located, and you'll find a program called DSVideoCongfig.exe. Open it and select your preferred video card with just "Hardware" at the end, NOT "TNL." If you're like me, it won't show the name of your preferred graphics card, just "Primary Display Driver - Hardware," which should be fine. Then choose resolution and click ok. You'll see in the same folder the two exe's were in there's also a DungeonSiege.ini file. Open that, and you'll notice the first four lines have the settings you just entered in the Config. Copy those first four lines, and go to your Documents. If you got Dungeon Siege LoA from that tutorial in the community section, you should see both a Dungeon Siege and a Dungeon Siege LOA folder in Documents. Inside each you'll find a DungeonSiege.ini file. Make sure both (just to be safe) have the same first four lines as the one in the main .exe folder, the same four lines you copied so just paste them over the old lines. While this didn't fix the issue for me it cleared it up quite a bit.

[BayneRav]

Originally posted by AwesomeOpossumXD:

Go to the folder where your DungeonSiege.exe is located, and you'll find a program called DSVideoCongfig.exe. Open it and select your preferred video card with just "Hardware" at the end, NOT "TNL." If you're like me, it won't show the name of your preferred graphics card, just "Primary Display Driver - Hardware," which should be fine. Then choose resolution and click ok. You'll see in the same folder the two exe's were in there's also a DungeonSiege.ini file. Open that, and you'll notice the first four lines have the settings you just entered in the Config. Copy those first four lines, and go to your Documents. If you got Dungeon Siege LoA from that tutorial in the community section, you should see both a Dungeon Siege and a Dungeon Siege LOA folder in Documents. Inside each you'll find a DungeonSiege.ini file. Make sure both (just to be safe) have the same first four lines as the one in the main .exe folder, the same four lines you copied so just paste them over the old lines. While this didn't fix the issue for me it cleared it up quite a bit.

Thanks that TnL was default to DS, yet when got the community Guide for LOA it had the TnL still defaulted.

Edit: well before the LOA+Extras patch was able to get DS LoE to not have any conflict with graphics, might have to run thru the Nvidia video card preferances and disable parameters there.

Its not the OS that is at fault, its using an overly advanced Video card for a somewhat inferior version with codex either missing or unable to recognize( regardless ill update if get it to run smoother as the graphics are atrocious and entirely unplayable

[Tomibouzu]

Originally posted by BayneRav:

Its not the OS that is at fault, its using an overly advanced Video card for a somewhat inferior version with codex either missing or unable to recognize( regardless ill update if get it to run smoother as the graphics are atrocious and entirely unplayable

i feel like it has something to do with 8.1, before i was forced to update to 8.1 the game ran fine and i managed to get into the game some, after 8.1 however it along with a few other games refuse to run correctly.

[akoufaki]

I think 8.1 might have something to do with it too, as I was able to run Dungeon Siege 1 and 2 just fine on my old Windows 7 laptop. However, that laptop only had an Intel HD Graphics card where my current one has GeForce, so perhaps it is a graphics card issue or a combination of the graphics card and OS.