Arcanum after unofficial patch won't launch from steam.

[TheGuitArcher]

It was clearly stated in the read me for the unofficial patch that after installing, the game would not be playable through steam. Just wanted to know if anyone knows why that is? Plays just fine from the desktop icon, which is what I intend to do now, but curious why there is an issue at all. Any insights or solutions are appreciated, thanks. Loving all these somewhat broken but brilliant Troika games!

[SouP]

It's due to the ddraw (DirectDraw) dll that fixes a lot of the artifacts and issues from various patches for Arcanum not being compatible with the Steam Overlay.

I extensively troubleshooted this, you can in fact launch the game from Steam IF- you rename/delete the file that is used to hook the overlay into games. It only lasts until you restart or log out, as Steam will regenerate the file if it notices it's missing when starting. Disabling the overlay in the game options unfortunately does not work, as there's still an attempt at a hook even if it disengages afterwards.

[TheGuitArcher]

Ok, that answers my question and saves a lot of wasted time trying to trouble shoot this, much appreciated!

[Vireys]

Short, factual and to the point conversations like this restores my faith in humanity.

Thanks soup for info and thanks for guitarguy for asking :D