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Dnomyar96

Dec 30, 2014 @ 3:07am

Not starting (FIXED)

I just installed GTA Vice City, but now I'm not able to launch. It doesn't even say launching game or something. Just nothing happens. Anybod got a solution (tried compatiblity modes)

Last edited by Dnomyar96; Dec 30, 2014 @ 7:37am

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Showing 1-9 of 9 comments

Dnomyar96

Dec 30, 2014 @ 7:36am

I fixed it! This video helped me out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44EJgmWMfgw

jcs8313

Jan 1, 2015 @ 5:59pm

Just worked for me too. Running Windows 7.

OzzMule

Dec 4, 2016 @ 5:34pm

Just tried this but game still will not start. Still does the same as before :( Running Windows 10.

berserkr

Dec 9, 2016 @ 2:31pm

game takes forever to launch but it launches for me after about 2 min on Windows 10

Aug 26, 2020 @ 9:16am

Vice City initially ran without issue. I have experienced waiting a VERY LONG TIME for it to start as another contributor, but eventually even this did not work.

The suggested fix has worked for me too. Game launched with the graphics settings that were current when the game was last played.... 1920x1080 at 32-bit colour. This was 3 years ago.

I guess that driver updates to my Radeon R9 290 graphics card over time broke compatibility with the game in some manner. The 3D-Analyze utility has made the game accessible again.

I am running with..
Windows 7 Home Premium
16 Gb RAM
i7 3770K @ 3.5 GHz plus a mild overclock.
Radeon R9 290 driving two displays. One at 1920x1080 and another 1280x1024 both at 60 Hertz. Driver is Radeon 16.9.1

Azkaellon

Aug 26, 2020 @ 9:48am

It launched for me intially, i tried change the fps limiter to off and the resolution settings then it crashed and won't start up again, tried the patches, compatibitily, uninstalling and reinstalling, just have no idea.

Aug 26, 2020 @ 12:05pm

The reason for this fixed being needed is that a video driver update has probably broken compatibility with the game. This "fix" does not require you change the graphics driver on your system. Windows 10 forces updates on you and may break things along the way. I have Windows 7 and choose to manually update my system as I feel necessary.

There are three parts to the fix.

1. Limiting DEP (Data Execution Protection) only to Windows components. This is trading some system security to allow better compatibility with the the software you are running.

2. Forcing Windows to appear as an older version of Windows to the game when you run it. Again this is trying to make it compatible.

3. The real fix is the 3D Analyser utility putting back some settings that the newer video drivers do not support or do in a different way.

I have applied this fix to another old game called Total Annihilation which is even older than GTA Vice City and this has allowed that game to work again too.

I suggest you restart your PC and then work through the steps again. Try deleting two files in the directory of where the game is installed first...

config_DX.ini
config_GL.ini

These are created by 3D Analyse when you hit the run button on the utility. Have not tested this premise, but given my own experience it will ensure you are not getting stuffed by pre-existing configuration files.

Donatsu Jan 15, 2022 @ 11:29am

Thank you, everyone, I saw that most of you run the game on Windows 7. I've set the compatibility to WIndows 7 and set the game to run as administrator. That's works fine.