Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic won't launch [ Edited ]

[Magika89]

Hello,

I searched the forum for a similar thread, but I didn't find any. In case I missed an obvious answer to my dumb question, please have mercy on me.

So, yesterday I bought Kotor 1 on Origin, downloaded it, started it aaaand... nothing happened. I checked on the task manager and the process disappears after a fre seconds. 

Now, I played Kotor a while back and I remember having issues back then as well (damn you win7), so I searched for and applied all the usual fixes you find on the net: ran it as WinXP compatibile, with admin privileges, turn off movies... nothing works.

Then as I ran the config tool I noticed something weird: in the graphic options, the "resolution" part is blank. I clicked on it, and there's no options to choose from. My laptop has a dual graphic card, an Intel HD graphics 4600 for desktop and a Nvidia GTX860M for gaming. So I ran the "scan hardware" tool, and as I thought I got a fail on the graphics, but this is what I got as a message:

[Video]
Video Card Name=RDPDD Chained DD
Video Memory=2048
Desktop Resolution=0x0x0
DirectX=DirectX (9.0+) (4.09.00.0904)
OpenGL Version=4.6.0 NVIDIA 431.60
OpenGL Vendor=NVIDIA Corporation
OpenGL Renderer=GeForce GTX 860M/PCIe/SSE2
NVidia Driver=(null)
Vid Card Status=Warning
Vid Card Driver Status=Fail
GL Status=Pass
DX Status=Pass

So... can anyone tell me what's wrong? Is Kotor ignoring the video drivers I have?

The game also prompted me to download a new driver from the Nvidia website, but it's a driver for TITAN series cards, and does not support my GTX860M.

...I just wanted to play Kotor ;__;

----------

So, if needed, here's my laptop's specs

------------------
System Information
------------------

Operating System: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 (7601.win7sp1_ldr_escrow.190729-1700)

BIOS: InsydeH2O Version 03.73.069ECN31WW(V1.14)
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4710HQ CPU @ 2.50GHz (8 CPUs), ~2.5GHz
Memory: 12288MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 12204MB RAM

DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: 173 DPI (180 percent)
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Enabled
DxDiag Version: 6.01.7601.17514 32bit Unicode

[EA_Darko]

Hey @Magika89 there's a  couple of things that you can try in relation to fixing this issue.

For starters let's try downloading and installing DirectX 9. More recent DirectX updates may have removed elements that KOTOR needs to run: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/confirmation.aspx?id=8109

If your laptop has an integrated card can you ensure that the game is not launching on it: 

• Open "Nvidia Control Panel".
• Select "Manage 3D Settings" under 3D Settings.
• Click on "Program Settings" tab and then select the program you want to run.
• Select "Preferred graphics processor" in drop-down menu and then select use the dedicated graphics card, select High-performance Nvidia processor.

Still not working, can you go ahead and open the Nvidia Control Panel and select Manage 3D settings. In there you need to select Program Settings and then the Add button. Find your SWKOTOT short cut and add it there. Once done can you go ahead and ensure that Threaded Optimization is set to off.

Can you also try the following to see if it helps:

• Open the "swkotor.ini" file 
• Under [Graphics Options] change "Fullscreen=1" to "Fullscreen=0".
• After that, add the following line under [Graphics Options]:AllowWindowedMode=1
• Save, close it down and then launch the game.

Let me know how you get on.

Darko

[Magika89]

Thanks for the reply!

I tried it all, and it didn't work. Nothing changed, still no response and then the process disappears.

The thing is, the problem has to be with the video card, because of the message I posted in the OP: Video Card Name=RDPDD Chained DD

As I said, I have two cards, but Kotor somehow does not find them (even after I used the Nvidia control panel to set every exe in the folder to run with the GTX card). Instead, it uses RDPDD Chained DD as a video card, and from what I gathered from a quick google search, that's the mirror you use for remote or multiple monitors.

Any other fix won't help (I think), because until it finds the correct card it won't be able to set a resolution to run Kotor with, and it cannot launch like that.

I'm attaching the screenshot of the scan in case it helps.