Max 1: The *new* Ultimate Max Payne 1 Vista / Windows7 issues and fixes post.

[DarkjeThe2nd]

Hi,

When installing Max Payne 1 on Vista and Windows7 several issues can come up. This post will try and address these.

• Install issues, non working cd, shortcut problems.
• Sound issues, no sound on the cut scenes and many other places.

Install from original CD:
-------------------------
There are some known problems installing the original CD game (on Vista/Windows7 (x64)). The installer on the CD pre-dates Vista and x64 and does not know how to deal with UAC, so it just uses a directory in the 'Program files(x86)' where UAC protection applies when installed in the default location, causing some of the problems.

You could encounter any of the following problems:

(A) You insert the CD and run the installer and get an error: "The version of this file is not compatible with the version of windows you're running..."
Solution: Go to Computer/CD-Drive and open it, open the folder 'Disk1' and click setup(.exe).
Cause: The install.exe pre-dates x64 and does not work, CD autorun will start this file too.

(B) When you run setup.exe a warning pops up saying "You don't have enough memory to run the game."
Solution: Just ignore and click through. Twice!!!
Cause: It happened to me with 8GB of memory.

Now the rest of the install should go okay. Pick the full install option. After install there is an other minor problem:

(C) If you chose 'create shortcut on desktop' during install, and you installed in the default location, the created shortcut will not work when clicked. This also applies to the shortcut in the startmenu. You receive an error; "Max Payne has stopped working" followed by an other error when closing the first one.
Solution: Use 'right click: run as admin' or you can also use 'right click/properties/compatibility/run this program as admin' to permanently change it and just click it next time.
Cause: UAC protected default directory, the setup could never have known about that at the time.

You also need to install the v1.05 Max Payne update, available here; http://www.3drealms.com/max/downloads.html

Install from Steam:
-------------------
It should be simple, just go to the Steam store, buy the game and install it. If it does not show up in the Steam store, it is probably not availble in your country/region. You don't have to install the 1.05 update, it's already included in the steam version.

Sound Issue (CD and Steam):
------------------------------
I'm sorry to say, after you installed the game successfully on Vista or Windows7, you will notice massive sound issues when running the game, or mainly you will notice the lack of sound. The issue here seems to be that the maxpayne engine somehow does not want to play certain sounds in vista/windows7. But wait... don't panic! There is a fix!

Download the sound-fix here: http://www.filedropper.com/maxpaynesoundpatch10

Installing the sound-fix:
----------------------
After you installed the game and downloaded the fix, basically all you have to do is:

• Place the files included in the fix in your game directory.
• Click the fix's main file: MaxBatch.
• Use the ([C] - Convert game.) option and wait a few minutes for it to finish.
• Use the ([L] - Launch game.) option and play.

That's really all there is to it. When you want to play again you don't have to convert again of course, just launch the game like you normally would or use MaxBatch again, it should appear in 'start/all programs'.

If any of the installing the sound-fix steps pose a problem, please read on.
The main object here is extracting the contents of the patch, locating the game directory and copying the files there.

To extract the contents of the patch you need an unpacker that supports RAR files, like Winrar or 7zip. If you downloaded the patch and it does not open when you click it, that's a sure sign you need one. Just use google to find Winrar or 7zip, download and install it.

Once you are able to open the patch you should do:

CD Install:
Create an empty folder on your desktop, hit the 'Extract to' button and browse to the empty folder you just created. Hit the OK button to complete the unpacking.
Now open the windows explorer and go to your game directory. If you did not change the default install path, it is probably located in 'C:\Program Files\MaxPayne\' or 'C:\Program Files (x86)\MaxPayne\'. Open a second windows explorer on the location where you just extracted the patch. Move or copy all files from the patch folder to your game directory, by selecting all of them and dragging them to the game directory. If you get messages saying you need permission, please allow them.

Steam Install:
Hit the 'Extract to' button and browse to your game directory. With the steam game this is probably: 'C:\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\max payne' or 'C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\max payne' depending on your version of vista(32 or 64bit). Hit the OK button to complete the unpacking. Then open the windows explorer and go to your game directory, the location where you just extracted the patch.

After that it's the same for both CD and Steam installs.
In your explorer window on the game directory locate MaxBatch and click it. Then it's easy. Just press [C] to [C]onvert. It can take several minutes to convert all found files, mainly depending on the speed of the drives and the cpu. After conversion use [L] the game should [L]aunch. A settings window should pop, and launch the game for you.

Settings:
----------
Once you launched the game you will be presented with the main settings screen. Here you can pick a resolution and select the mod you want to play if you got mods installed. Max looks best at 4:3 resolutions with 32bit colors, when using a widescreen resolution Max will look stretched fat, there is a console command circulating trying to fix it by tweaking the fov., but it does not really work, I'm sorry. Pushing the options... button will take you to the advanced options. Most current PC's should have no problem at all running the game with every setting maxed out, so go for the best here, use the aniso, 32bit textures, some AA and the sliders to high for the best possible display. It may also be possible to use the control panel of your graphics card to set an even higher quality.


That should do it for most folks I guess, but if anything comes up go to the links below and post it there.

Best of luck, and may the Payne be with you,

Darkje


Patch and Write-up history:
--------------------------
The sound patch started a few years ago in the 3dreals forums, and then was further developed in the alan-wake forums, it can convert mods too, see the readme included. You can also go here for the complete story:
http://forums.3drealms.com/vb/showthread.php?t=27985
http://www.alanwake.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1729
http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=848215

[DarkjeThe2nd]

deleted... my bad

[Otto]

Thanks a bunch. I just got the itch to fire this up off the CD today. Couldn't have done it without ya.

[abz48]

Hey Darkje, I joined just to say thanks for your work on this! The game just wouldn't be the same without the music

[D1SnakeEyes]

Darkje I just wanted to say thanks fro making this mod.... I contacted Rockstar Support and they appearantly have no clue about anything. They could have at least directed me to these forums. Glad I found this and thanks again. Only joined to tell this.

[DarkjeThe2nd]

I've released an updated version of my patch with better handling of mods, bringing the version number to v1.1

If you already used 1.0 there is no need to upgrade, it's only really needed if you want to convert mods.

If you still have to convert the game and did not use 1.0 yet, ofcourse you're best served by using the latest version.

you can read more about the update in the alanwake/maxpayne forum: http://forum.alanwake.com/showpost.p...1&postcount=53

Download it from filedropper:
v1.1 download removed.

now you can download v1.11
http://www.filedropper.com/maxpaynesoundpatchv111

[kvanje]

I had some trouble with both versions of the patch under Win7. File permissions messed up the batch script, as well as made rasmaker.exe crash. I did the following to resolve it:

1. Set rasmaker.exe to run as administrator
2. Set maxbatch.bat to run as administrator
3. Edit maxbatch.bat to make it cd to the game directory first, since running it as administrator made it start in C:\Windows\System

These steps made it work. Step 3 could be replaced by making a shortcut that gives the game directory as an argument, if one wanted a less hacky solution.

[DarkjeThe2nd]

Originally Posted by kvanje

I had some trouble with both versions of the patch under Win7. File permissions messed up the batch script, as well as made rasmaker.exe crash. I did the following to resolve it:

1. Set rasmaker.exe to run as administrator
2. Set maxbatch.bat to run as administrator
3. Edit maxbatch.bat to make it cd to the game directory first, since running it as administrator made it start in C:\Windows\System

These steps made it work. Step 3 could be replaced by making a shortcut that gives the game directory as an argument, if one wanted a less hacky solution.

Did you actually place the script in the game directory? If you used any version after 0.85, the script should have elevated itself if it was in an uac protected directory requiring admin level.

edit:
just retested it in w7x64 ult, to make sure it was working, and it did. here's a pic showing what happens when it's in an uac protected directory: pic

you should not have to take the steps you suggest, so I'm wandering how you got that situation?

[Ghast]

Just wanted to add my two cents - I stopped modding for MP2 when my new PC wouldnt run the game or edit files (and I had hoped to finally have decent lighting for my mods lol)
two years later I discovered by accident that it was the new monitor that the game refused to recognized and that by installing an older monitor i could do everything again

[malthus4]

I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciate this patch! In fact, I signed up to this board so that I could do so.

Thanks again!

[meni32]

Originally Posted by malthus4

I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciate this patch! In fact, I signed up to this board so that I could do so.

Thanks again!

same here.
just signed up to say how much I appreciate the patch.
max payne is the best game ever and it's should be play flawlessly on any os. thanks!

[DarkjeThe2nd]

A minor problem came up with CD game versions other than English and v1.11 of the script.

It will not recognize a valid game, because I presumed the x_data.ras file would always be same size over all languages and was using that fact to determine what state the game was in, but I've discovered this is not the case. It will be fixed in an upcomming release.

for now you can temporarily 'hotfix' it yourself if you are using a different language version by editting MaxBatch.bat at line 873 where it says:
if %1==x_data.ras if not "%~z1" == "134236027" set flag_FreshGame=0

add rem in front so it reads:
rem if %1==x_data.ras if not "%~z1" == "134236027" set flag_FreshGame=0

save it and you are ready to convert

[ruffy]

Hey DarkjeThe2nd,

I've got a big issue by running Max Payne properly.
When I start the game and skip the intro, the progress bar reaches the middle and the game closes.. (it happens even when I run the intro)

My system: Intel Dual Core 1,6 // 3gb RAM
Windows 7 Ultimate 32Bit


I tried to change the compatibility mode, but it didn't help so far..

Thanks in advance for you help!

ruffy

[DarkjeThe2nd]

did you install the 1.05 patch?

[ruffy]

ha I'm such a douche :P

anyway.. good work so far, keep it up!

thanks ruffy

[DarkjeThe2nd]

update 21-Feb-2010: Release 1.12
http://www.filedropper.com/maxpaynesoundpatchv112_1


New in v1.12:
It fixes a few issues that came up:
- On the game conversion the size of the result is now checked, if conversion failed backups are restored (if only one fails, all game files are restored, so it's fresh afterwards).
- Large working and finished messages on the game conversion section, for some people missed the fact the script was still working after the first file, where three files had to be done.
- Fixes need for edit if converting cd install of languages other than english.
- Detection and removal of previously failed conversion attempts is done. ie. tmp removed and backups synced.
- If tmp is not properly emptied between conversion of files, - sometimes it happens the os reported file in use- , the script will alert and retry until the files are released.

[Pickles]

Joined in just to say thank you. Really Appreciate it.

[waxer]

Like the others above, I joined this forum specifically to say: Thank-you DarkjeThe2nd, you are a genius
First time I tried the sound fix, it didn't work and the report said some files were missing, on a red background. So I tried it again, this time the background was green, and everything went like clockwork.
I guess the download must have been interrupted first time. But the impressive thing was how smart and business-like your fix was throughout.
It's great to have the sound back, Max just isn't the same without it

[DarkjeThe2nd]

Tnx it's good to hear it worked for you, and nice to receive some kudos once in a while.

My hope and goal is to keep Max going as long as I can, because I feel it's a major classic and it would be a shame if it just died out with xp, where it still has the power to captivate today's players and show of how an exiting atmosphere is created in a game that's a very well done blend between action and storytelling. Many current games could learn from that.

Have fun playing, Darkje

[PsychoGoatee]

Thanks for the Vista sound fix, I'm replaying Max Payne right now. 'Bout time I got back to the Payne.

[Philotomy]

For some reason, the fix isn't working for me. I've done everything correctly, but there's still no music or voice-over (the batch file detects the converted game). Could it be because the game folder is on my E: drive?

I have the Steam version (v1.05) and I'm running Windows 7.

Thanks so much for the help... it's great to know that people are still playing these amazing games!

[DarkjeThe2nd]

please make a screenshot of the patch in debug mode 1, maybe I can see from that what's going on.

[Philotomy]

It all looks good. I don't get it, but thanks for your help, Darkje!

[DarkjeThe2nd]

Mmm only thing I can think of is trying the last version, as it looks you are still using 1.0 from the opening post. Maybe somehow it messed up.

The current version is 1.12 (21-Feb.-2010) and can be obtained from this link: http://www.filedropper.com/maxpaynesoundpatchv112_1

You can just update the patchfiles and retry conversion(restore backup and convert again). If it does not work there is probably some files in the game directory that should not be there or the backup was damaged. In that case please uninstall the game, make sure the target directory is empty before reinstalling, and then convert using the latest version.

If you sure the conversion part did work and there's still no sound, maybe something else is going on...

[Tefoonez]

Hi DarkjeThe2nd
Firstly, thanks for doing these fine posts to help people out; sadly I seem unable to get this workaround to work for me, despite having followed the steps mentioned. I am running Windows 7 Ultimate 64 for info. Any thoughts or help much appreciated!
Cheers
Tefoonez

[DarkjeThe2nd]

sorry I noticed your post a little late,

If the initial screen is red, there is probably missing files. Usually when that happens some files included with the patch where not copied to the Max directory.

In case of trouble make a screenshot of the patch at debug level 1, this will try to determine if all files needed are found.

If that seems to be all okay and still it fails, please describe what happens when, ie. at what point does it error, what exactly did you do...

[Poorna]

Its works fine! Thank you very much

[aditya]

I want to thank you for the sound fix! It's almost 10 years since I played the game on win 98 and now on win 7.
I'm a computer engineering student and have been learning languages like C and C++ (and few basic commands in MS-DOS) for 4 years now since 11th grade. But I've never been able to put this knowledge to any practical use and so i'm curious as to how u put together this fix. I mean how exactly do you convert .ras file to a form that is compatible with modern hardware? Or did Remedy provide a tool and u just made a user-friendly frontend utility?

[DarkjeThe2nd]

For the packing and unpacking of the ras files I used rasmaker, a commandline tool by remedy included on the original cd, I suppose for mod making. The conversion is also done by a existing tool that just loops trough the unpacked files and converts all .wav to a single format. There is also an embedded vbscript section for elevating the commandprompt and then running the batch file from there. That came from some example by ms, I just wrapped it up in batchfile, so it's really like shell for a couple of helper apps, doing many conditional checks to determine the state of the found files.

It started out when vista was released and max1's sound stopped working. I used a windows tool called goldsound on the unpacked game to try different formats and when I found the right format I did a batch conversion. This was awkward but worked and proved the concept.

Then I started looking for tools that could do the needed conversion from the commandline, so it could be like a one step fix, and found sox, a freeware sound conversion toolkit that worked from the commandline just like rasmaker. At that point the fix just left the game in unpacked state, as I had not yet found out how to repack it. The problem with leaving it unpacked was that mods no longer worked properly and it was harder keeping track of all the files.
There where other problems too with the original patch code, the paths where fixed so the game had to be in a certain non standard location, on the original path uac issues prevented my batchfile from writing, and batchfiles can't elevate themselves. And ofcourse when the game got released at steam, a whole new bunch of issue's came up, like other paths and steam being able to 'verify' integrity and re-download the patched files. Had to find a way to detect that too. Meanwhile I also found out about localized versions of max1 where released on cd and used different filenames.

So after a while I decided to do a proper rewrite, that would kind of smash all frequently occurring problems in one go, work in any path, elevate itself if needed, detect & convert all languages, detect any file or install probs, detect and fix remains of old or failed conversions or damaged installs, fix the problem with the mods and even convert them too. So a couple of revs after that I managed to get it pretty solid and iron most of the bugs out, although there are some known issues with the current one too ... only occurring in very specific conditions.

You can open the batch file in a text editor and review it any time if you want to see how it's doing things. It grew from just a few lines to what is pro'lly one of the most extensive batch files ever seen
batch is not really nice for programming but one can do quite a lot with it...

anyhow... glad you fixed your game with it! have fun playing.

[aditya]

Thank you so much for your reply. I am now more appreciative of what you've done. Good thing Remedy included the modding tools.

[iycgtptyarvg]

I came to this forum to check on progress of Max Payne 3 and saw this topic. To promote the OP and others to keep supporting MP1 and MP2, I registered to say:

xxxxx  x   x    x    x   x  x   x   xxxx
  x    x   x   x x   xx  x  x xx   x    
  x    xxxxx  xxxxx  x x x  xx      xx
  x    x   x  x   x  x  xx  x xx       x
  x    x   x  x   x  x   x  x   x  xxxx

[DarkjeThe2nd]

You're welcome, thank you for thanking everyone still active here

I came here to post some news about the patch. An update is coming, I'm currently testing a new beta. The object of this new revision is to make it direct2drive compatible, the old one did work on it most of the time, but seemed to crash for some D2D users. I've contacted D2D and found them very cooperative, and then started looking for the problem. I could not recreate the crash condition, but did find some problems and fix those along with some other issues that came up the past year or so...
the work was mainly done in the file detection part, making it more robust, so it won't fail on unexpected stuff. This makes it necessary to re-test every scenario, and there are quite a few.

My target is to release it in 6-8 weeks from now.

Darkje

[Comreak]

I used the current version of the fix(1.2) on the Steam version in Windows 7, and it was immediately apparent what I was missing without it. Everything was very easy to use. Thanks!

[Dunedain]

DarkjeThe2nd: I tried downloading the MaxPayneSoundPatchv1.12.rar file from filedropper, but the file seems corrupted, as it is only 371 bytes in size when I downloaded it and I can't open it with winrar or 7zip. Can you please re-upload a new copy? Thanks.

[DarkjeThe2nd]

Can't edit the OP anymore but the downloads are still up at:

Main download: (updated 04-Apr-2012, Release 1.12)
Max Payne Soundpatch v1.12

alternate1:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/r94w7x

alternate2:
http://www.filedropper.com/maxpaynesoundpatchv112

for more info go to the steam max payne forums, that one is still alive (http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=848215)