04.06.09
Jade Empire on Windows 7
Note: This probably works on Vista as well.
Having purchased Jade Empire from Steam for the cool price of $15, I was having all sorts of trouble trying to get it to run. Basically the configuration program would crash every time I attempted to run the application, and it refused to run the actual application without running the configuration program.
Searching on the net proved pretty much worthless – turned out quite a few people were having the problem, but no one seemed to know any way to fix it. Other people were saying it ran fine if you just skipped the config program but the issue is you can’t skip the config program on the “first run”. That was the trick – how to convince the game it was no longer the first run.
First stop, good old post-moretem debugging with Windbg. Sadly, this told me that it was crashing trying to free a block of memory that had either not been allocated or had already been freed (the call stack was inside HeapFree, and through a few compatibility layers Win7 had tossed in for me). No help there, and telling it to ignore the exception didn’t make matters any better – even to get it through the “first run” stage.
Next stop, Process Monitor (one of those evil apps that daft DRM companies like SecuRom decide shouldn’t be allowed because they may actually help you fix their games for them I guess?). The last file it tried to access before crashing was SystemInformation.xml in the game’s data directory. Turned out that file didn’t exist, and so was a big clue about what the game used to determine whether the config had run or not.
Nothing to lose – create a blank file with Notepad and save it as SystemInformation.xml in C:\Program Files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\jade empire\data. Attempt to run the config program and it still crashes. Next, attempt to run the main game and it skips the config and actually starts and plays without issue (at least to character creation so far).
Cool – not a waste of $15 after all!
Edit: As pointed out in the comments, make sure you run Notepad as Administrator to create the file or it won’t do what you think. Thanks to Blog Kindle for the tip.
Ethan Said:
April 15, 2009 at 11:07 pm
ok ok kool only one problem
were the hell do i save it too
i’ve got visa
AND ITS DRIVING ME NUTS
Please someone email me
Ethan Said:
April 15, 2009 at 11:07 pm
ethan808@hotmail.com
mic Said:
May 8, 2009 at 11:36 pm
TheOD gives the answer here – http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=852466
jw Said:
May 9, 2009 at 12:03 am
Nice solution – simpler than mine.
QJ Said:
June 24, 2009 at 4:43 am
Yes, this game gave me heart ache on vista. I loved it on xbox. Now, I can play it again.
Jim Said:
October 29, 2009 at 2:52 am
In Windows 7, beta (build 7100), all I had to do was create the SystemInformation.xml file in the game’s data directory and the config utility ran just fine.
Thanks for the help!
casey Said:
October 30, 2009 at 8:01 am
I hadn’t downloaded Jade Empire with Steam, but I still got the same problem: “Configuration Utility has stopped working”, and the game never ran. I ended up having to run the .exe directly, which worked but got annoying. Eventually I found this site, and saved the .xml file into C:\Program Files\Jade Empire\data. That’s all there is to it. Thanks so much for the help!
Blog Kindle Said:
October 30, 2009 at 12:19 pm
I’m running Windows 7 Ultimate X64. Creating an empty file at the location that you’ve mentioned did the trick and the configuration utility ran just fine.
One thing to keep in mind is that you need to run notepad.exe as administrator. If you don’t the file will not be really saved in c:\program files (x86)\… but rather in the temporary location and the game will not be able to load it.
It is windows’s way of dealing with bad software engineers who don’t know any better but to write dynamic data into “program files” directory.
TriggerLappy Said:
November 29, 2009 at 4:03 pm
Thank you very much for this valuable piece of help – I’ve trying to figure out a way to get my Steam game going on Windows 7 and found the same initial result you did – a lot of people had a similar issue, but none had a way to get around it.
Just creating that one blank txt file fixed everything! Thanks again!
Sky Said:
January 7, 2010 at 1:10 am
thanks for the help! Worked great!
Yamiki the Pirate Said:
January 19, 2010 at 1:57 pm
Windows 7 Ulti Beta build 7100. Did exactly as posted and it works.
Thanks mate
Darcy Said:
January 28, 2010 at 9:15 pm
I followed the first post and it lead me to success although with a little variation. I bought Jade Empire through Steam too. However when I tried to run the config or start the game each time it then said that steam was not found. After that I deleted that notepad, tried opening config again and it worked. I saved the config settings and ran the game and it works perfectly
Oh I forgot to run it as admin so maybe that’s why mine ran slightly differently but it still worked as I describe anyways
Make sure to change settings in game too as there are even more video tweaks in game than in the config tool.
I currently have Windows 7 RC 7100 64 Bit running on a Core i7 socket 1156 2.8GHZ cpu with ASUS Maximus 3 Gene. Not sure if hardware or anything has a place in this
Thanks original poster!
johnonebon Said:
March 8, 2010 at 9:53 am
Many thanks . Been trying for hours . Works like new again
Matt Said:
March 24, 2010 at 9:31 pm
Thanks mate, the boxed version now works perfectly under Win7 Home Premium 32.
Ryan Said:
March 30, 2010 at 6:42 am
Just tried it and it worked. All I did was launch it, though, I haven’t tried to play it yet. We’ll see what happens…
Btw, I have Vista.