Can not connect!

[jack bilgebutler]

I have a connection issue that started around Jan. 30. I type my password and then click play and then the screen goes black and I received an error message that states"POTC has encountered a problem and needs to close." Submit error report. The game had always worked well for me until these new upgrades. Tech support as you know is useless. They responded by telling me to stop running two monitors. But the funny thing is that I only own one . I have tried changing to 9x on graphics tab at launch page. I have tried "game_options" text and I have tried unistall/reinstall and nothing works.Can anyone help ?

[Edward Edgemenace]

Is that an ATI graphics card? There should be an ATI thing in the system tray to force it into single-screen mode, instead of allowing it to enable both the regular screen and the external monitor port.

[jack bilgebutler]

Thanks! Could you possibly give me the step by step on that. I am willing to try anything at this point.

[Poison elf]

if you are having trouble with getting the game from opengl to directx9, you may be running into problems I had. For me the graphic option window has choices to change, but doesn't actually do anything, or better put, save it.

So you need to change it with some write in's. Going into the game_options file and changing to pandadx9, was also not saving for me. You have to also go into the game_api file and change it there.

If you are not getting past the log window to the character window, it may be hard to tell what you are running. You can look back in the game_options after trying to log in again and see if it converted back to pandagl.

[drwr]

If you are crashing after the "Connecting" panel appears, but before you see the dock with your pirate standing on it, try deleting your game_options.txt, last_working_options.txt, and p_working_options.txt files. Then start the game again and see what happens.

David

[Sarah]

step by step ATI fix:

ATI FIX

To specify Pirates Online to use DirectX 9 you will need to edit the "game_options.txt" file located in the PiratesOnline directory if you have ever saved settings in the Options Panel.

1) Go to Start | Programs | Accessories | Windows Explorer.
2) Navigate to C:\Program Files\Disney\Disney Online\PiratesOnline.
3) Double click on game_options.txt.
4) Make sure "state" has "working" on the line directly below it. If you see "attempted_working" change it to "working."
5) Under "api", please change the text from "default" to "pandadx9".
6) Save the file then launch the game.

If you don't have this file on your computer, you will need to create one in the PiratesOnline directory.

1) Go to Start | Run.
2) Type "Notepad" in the Open input box then click OK.
3) Add the following text precisely as you see it below:
state
working
api
pandadx9
4) Click File | Save As
5) Name the file "game_options.txt"
6) Save the file to C:\Program Files\Disney\Disney Online\PiratesOnline then launch the game.

These settings changes will instruct Pirates Online to only use DirectX 9 as the graphic API.

[drwr]

Actually, I don't think the above instructions are relevant since the new update. The api entry in the game_options.txt file no longer controls anything; the API to choose is now controlled through the only line in the game_api.txt file.

But, as far as I know, the button on the Launcher should change this file correctly. There were some bugs with the first test release where it didn't, but that bug was fixed early on, and I haven't heard of any more bugs like that.

In any case, there is a common problem with ATI and NVidia cards where it crashes on entry, right after the "Connecting" window pops up. This crash occurs regardless of the API setting. It will eventually clear itself, if you keep trying; or you can accelerate the process by removing the game_options.txt files.

David

[Poison elf]

Originally Posted by drwr

Actually, I don't think the above instructions are relevant since the new update. The api entry in the game_options.txt file no longer controls anything; the API to choose is now controlled through the only line in the game_api.txt file.

But, as far as I know, the button on the Launcher should change this file correctly. There were some bugs with the first test release where it didn't, but that bug was fixed early on, and I haven't heard of any more bugs like that.

In any case, there is a common problem with ATI and NVidia cards where it crashes on entry, right after the "Connecting" window pops up. This crash occurs regardless of the API setting. It will eventually clear itself, if you keep trying; or you can accelerate the process by removing the game_options.txt files.

David

There is still a bug on test as well as on live with the graphic options window. I for one can verify it that some of us have no way to save any change made on this panel. In other words we don't have the continue button to save the change. Though it was reported early on in test nothing was ever done about it.

As for the changes manually I agree, and have been posting that several places. Same path as these other directions, but the game_api file is where pandagl needs to be changed to pandadx9.

As if it is a ati or nvidia card issue, that is a good possibility, though it was never actually stated. In any case these things above should hopefully straighten some of these problems out for people.

[jack bilgebutler]

yeah I have tried these changes and many others and nothing works. I can't believe the game was playing fine day after day and then one day nothing. I am just stuck and having potc withdrawls. One week and counting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Walker Boh]

try changing texture compression to 0 (zero) and save as.

[Andrew]

OK this might sound simple....but send the error report. Microsoft should send something back to you saying why this happened. That's about all I can give you, Sarah said almost everything

Hope ye can get it fixed!

[Edward Edgemenace]

Did you say earlier that it is an ATI graphics card? Is it a laptop? Have you done the stuff at http://apps.pirates.go.com/pirates/v...s_drivers.html to upgrade drivers? (That helped my game's performance significantly in the past.)

Start --> Settings --> Control Panel --> Display --> Settings (tab) --> Advanced --> Displays (tab)

or something similar to that, should be where you set your monitor to work in default mode, instead of for multiple displays.

[jack bilgebutler]

No it is not a laptop and yes it is an ati card. The driver update is kind of confusing to navigate. I am not very good on computers so I am afraid to make this problem any worse.

[Edward Edgemenace]

Originally Posted by jack bilgebutler

No it is not a laptop and yes it is an ati card. The driver update is kind of confusing to navigate. I am not very good on computers so I am afraid to make this problem any worse.

While the ATI drivers update is confusing (it was for me, ugh) it is worth it in the long run. Again, I noticed a performance benefit from plodding all the way through that driver upgrade. When done, you may find the modes are easier to switch back to default (which POTCO is looking for when it starts.)

[jack bilgebutler]

Edward, thank you, thank you, thank you!!! Ok so i started to update my drivers, first by removing all of them. Let me tell you I was nervous not being computer savy. Then I tried to update with new but it wouldn't work. Now I thought I really messed it up . I got paranoid. I tried for an hour. I happened to find my download disk for ATI and re-installed it . Out of the blue I thought why not try and log on again and it worked. What a miracle!! The new updates for potc must have disabled something in drivers. So thanks again and hopefully this will help someone else. It did for me.