For anyone having issues with DirectX....

[bfarnsy]

So i got a new laptop, bought some games, Pirates! being one of 'em. I loaded up the game, worked fine, but i wanted to adjust the resolution. This made the game crash and each subsequent time I've tried to run the game, I was getting the "Unable to initiate DirectX" error.

After a lot of searching and mucking around, I finally found a fix. A lot of other people say "edit the config file," which is what you should do, but don't pick your native resolution. You need to know the 4:3 aspect ration resolution that is native to your 16:9 resolution. On my laptop, the native resolution is 1366x768, so for Pirates!, the resolution needed is 1024x768.

Below is the config file that I used to get the game working, copy this into notepad, chuck your resolution in and you should be good. This even makes the game work in full screen, so you won't need to have it windowed.

[User Settings]
Gamma = 1.000000
KeypadStatus = 1
DisplayShadows = 1
TrilinearFiltering = 1
DisableShaders = 0
AdvancedLighting = 1
WindowWidth = 1024 <- [4:3 resolution here]
WindowHeight = 768 <- [4:3 resolution here]
WaterDetail = 3
WorldDetail = 5
ObjectDetail = 2
MasterVolume = 1.000000
MusicVolume = 1.000000
SFXVolume = 1.000000
DanceVolume = 1.000000
IsSlowMachine = 0
MyName = [your character name]
3DAudioDriver = Creative Labs EAX (TM)
CustomSail =
CustomFlag =

I really hope this helps someone because I spent ages trying to fix this.

[retro]

I tried this but it wouldn't work for me, does the 3D audio driver need to be changed at all? I had the same issue as you where I tried to fix my resolution and it got messed up

[bfarnsy]

I got rid of the audio driver because it wasn't the same as mine, I just left it blank and that worked, sorry about that, completely forgot about it.

[Aftertaste]

Thankyou, worked like a charm

[bfarnsy]

no problem

[Space Coward]

4:3 always works, but my problem turned out to be that when I upgraded to Windows 10, it erased my AMD drivers. I reinstalled these, of course, but there's a nice feature my R9 280 can use called Virtual Super Resolution, it lets me play games at higher resolutions than my screen can normally display. In my case, I was playing at 1440x1080 on a 1360x768 monitor.

When I reinstalled my AMD drivers, I forgot to turn this back on. Works now!

[Greywolf]

THANK YOU IMMA TRY THIS SOON I HOPE IT WORKS I GREW UP ON THIS GAME ON XBONE AND MISSED THE HELL OUTTA IT