NationStates Jolt Archive

I wanted to go buy Halo 2 on sunday, but the game said it required Windows Vista, and I have XP. I don't plan on changing operating systems anytime soon, at least until the bugs get worked out of Vista. Is there any way around this "Vista only" restriction?

Yeah -- buy a different game.

I hear there are cracks.

One does not simply crack into Halo 2...

There'll probably be a vista emulator around somewhere, most OSs have at least one emulator, even DOS, so there should be one (or at least, there should be in a while, they might not have managed it yet... I don't know)

There'll probably be a vista emulator around somewhere, most OSs have at least one emulator, even DOS, so there should be one (or at least, there should be in a while, they might not have managed it yet... I don't know)

None available yet, I've looked.

Just don't buy Halo 2 or 3. Once they realise they're losing money, things'll change.

None available yet, I've looked.

Just don't buy Halo 2 or 3. Once they realise they're losing money, things'll change.

Hehe, I'm lucky I prefer oldies games *thumbs*
But for one important point... I really don't want to have to buy vista to make new games work - each newer OS just makes older games stop working, my favourite game (in the whole WIDE WORLD) doesn't work on XP because of XP's stupid security setup "omg! the user is trying to run something!!! *blocks*... oh look a little wooden horsie, how adorable ^^ *brings it in*"

Yeah, fuck Vista and all the games that are Vista-only.

I would've said fuck Bioshock as well for having DRM bullshit put right there on the software, but I went sailing for a bit and cracked that shit off.

I don't even give a crap about Halo 3, honestly.

Yeah, it sucks when Microsoft makes their own games for Vista only for no reason other than to force people to upgrade to a new OS, but moving to Vista will be required eventually anyway.

Windows Vista is installed on almost every new computer that is sold, and Microsoft will stop supporting XP with patches, what, next year? Staying with XP at that point is not recommended. Also, game developers don't want to support more platforms than they have to, which means that eventually every game will require Vista, or at least not officially be supported on anything but that. It's only a matter of time.

And why is it so important to play Halo 2? It's not an especially good game. Halo 1 is far superior in every way except multiplayer. It was always better suited for consoles anyway, since it relies heavily on movement and WASD is not very good at this compared to a thumbstick. Aiming was always secondary to movement in Halo, so a mouse really isn't that much of a help. I suggest you try to get hold of an Xbox to play it on.

Yeah, it sucks when Microsoft makes their own games for Vista only for no reason other than to force people to upgrade to a new OS, but moving to Vista will be required eventually anyway.

Windows Vista is installed on almost every new computer that is sold, and Microsoft will stop supporting XP with patches, what, next year? Staying with XP at that point is not recommended. Also, game developers don't want to support more platforms than they have to, which means that eventually every game will require Vista, or at least not officially be supported on anything but that. It's only a matter of time.

And why is it so important to play Halo 2? It's not an especially good game. Halo 1 is far superior in every way except multiplayer. It was always better suited for consoles anyway, since it relies heavily on movement and WASD is not very good at this compared to a thumbstick. Aiming was always secondary to movement in Halo, so a mouse really isn't that much of a help. I suggest you try to get hold of an Xbox to play it on.

Well A: I'm not getting Vista. Ever. Maybe there'll be a Vista Millenium Edition, in which they fix the terrible resourcehogginess and general crap that comes along with it, and I might maybe consider sailing the seas on that shit, but that's iffy. I'd have to re-configure all of my games and there's no guarantee half of them would even still work.

B: We're talking about Halo 3, not Halo 2. You'd need an XBOX 360.

Well A: I'm not getting Vista. Ever. Maybe there'll be a Vista Millenium Edition, in which they fix the terrible resourcehogginess and general crap that comes along with it, and I might maybe consider sailing the seas on that shit, but that's iffy. I'd have to re-configure all of my games and there's no guarantee half of them would even still work.

B: We're talking about Halo 3, not Halo 2. You'd need an XBOX 360.

The SP1 beta seems to fix some of the worst crap in Vista, but it's clear that it's never going to be as lean as XP. Expecting that is unreasonable as the OS does a whole lot more than XP does. If you don't want to upgrade to a new OS from Microsoft, fine, but you can't expect to play new games on XP forever. That's all I'm saying.

And yes, we are talking about Halo 2 in this thread. It's Halo 2 that was recently released for Vista, and it's this game that the OP wants to play without buying Vista.

Read the side of the box. If it requires DirectX 10, you're out of luck. If it requires only DirectX 9.0c, there are workarounds that will allow the game to run under XP.

Microsoft is doing the to encourage Vista adoption. Vienna isn't too far down the road, though, so if you can wait a couple of years you should be able to skip Vista entirely.

The SP1 beta seems to fix some of the worst crap in Vista, but it's clear that it's never going to be as lean as XP. Expecting that is unreasonable as the OS does a whole lot more than XP does. If you don't want to upgrade to a new OS from Microsoft, fine, but you can't expect to play new games on XP forever. That's all I'm saying.

And yes, we are talking about Halo 2 in this thread. It's Halo 2 that was recently released for Vista, and it's this game that the OP wants to play without buying Vista.

I assumed it was a typo - Halo 3 was released like two days ago, so why would they bother releasing Halo 2 for Vista? I was fairly certain Halo 2 was already out for XP.

Read the side of the box. If it requires DirectX 10, you're out of luck. If it requires only DirectX 9.0c, there are workarounds that will allow the game to run under XP.

Microsoft is doing the to encourage Vista adoption. Vienna isn't too far down the road, though, so if you can wait a couple of years you should be able to skip Vista entirely.

What is this Vienna you speak of? Are there sausages involved?

Microsoft is doing the to encourage Vista adoption. Vienna isn't too far down the road, though, so if you can wait a couple of years you should be able to skip Vista entirely.
But it's back tracking on that a little by releasing more of Windows XP; at least giving people the option when they buy from Dell or something like that.

As for an emulator, Microsoft makes its own emulator, which should run Vista nicely if you don't want to create a duel-boot system.

i was just talking about it with my mom (i know it would sound weird ... eheh) 2 minutes ago ...
why do stupidVista needs a far more powerful personal computer to run slower than the first windows release on a 1980s IBM?!
'cause people think that they can't chose, or maybe that they "don't have time to lose" searching for an alternative ...
i'm writing from my Ubuntu geared laptop and i can play my diablo II and civ III (legally owned) with a simple application (they're not slower or whatever) ...
i just saw the trailer of halo3 and i was quite impressed ... i've never played those games (i've got a home to build and furniture tu buy) but i think that if you want to enjoy your fully featured game, you need a console (even though i'm better with a keyboard than with a joypad) ... so ... don't give money to people who don't deserve it ... support the ones who help you ...

The SP1 beta seems to fix some of the worst crap in Vista, but it's clear that it's never going to be as lean as XP.
Does Vista still disable hardware sound acceleration? And can we write the the root directory, yet?

What, do you want it to be Linux? :p

Functional would be nice...

Does Vista still disable hardware sound acceleration? And can we write the the root directory, yet?

What, do you want it to be Linux? :p

What, do you want it to be Linux? :p
I'd settle for any of the previous operating systems that actually let me use my computer.

Both MS-DOS and PC-DOS were competent operating systems. OS/2 was really nice and highly customisable. Even the middle-era of Windows (Windows 3.1, 3.11, 95, 98, and 98SE) offered fully functional operating systems.

But then it really started to go to hell.

I wanted to go buy Halo 2 on sunday, but the game said it required Windows Vista, and I have XP. I don't plan on changing operating systems anytime soon, at least until the bugs get worked out of Vista. Is there any way around this "Vista only" restriction?

I read a review of Halo 2 for the PC and it said (roughly) its not worth upgrading for. As for getting around the restrictions I've no idea, I'm afraid.

I read a review of Halo 2 for the PC and it said (roughly) its not worth upgrading for. As for getting around the restrictions I've no idea, I'm afraid.
Halo doesn't seem to work that well on the PC, anyway. That's often true of console shooters.

The controls on a PC are far more precise than on a console, so the game becomes significantly easier when played with a keyboard and mouse rather than one of those giant XBox controllers.

Does Vista still disable hardware sound acceleration? And can we write the the root directory, yet?

I'm a Linux user. I don't have any personal experience with Vista, I just repeat what I've heard others say, and what they've said to me is that it makes Vista less slow. SP1 doesn't bring any new features, it just reduces some of the bloat, bugs and general weirdness.

But why would you want to write to your root directory!? Sure, I think it should be possible to do it, but actually doing it would be stupid. Your user has its own directory for a reason. Use it.

There is a 3rd party patch for playing Halo 2 on XP SP2, but I haven't been following on Halo 3 so I can't give any information on that. My recommendation is that you don't buy Halo 2, the game is much too short to be worth paying for. I'm only an above-average gamer and I finished Halo 2 in about 2 days.

You can't play new games unless you upgrade, and when you do, less old games work! I've noticed that Deus Ex has some issues while playing on my current computer...

You can't play new games unless you upgrade, and when you do, less old games work! I've noticed that Deus Ex has some issues while playing on my current computer...

Deus Ex runs... mostly... fine on my XP comp. As does DX2.

Deus Ex runs... mostly... fine on my XP comp. As does DX2.

DX mostly runs fine on my computer, just sometimes it slows down for a few seconds for no apparent reason (the hardware isn't struggling) and I'm pretty sure the sky shouldn't be green.

It might be a hardware thing rather than XP. Some games are incompatible with Windows though, like the original DOOM and Quake.

Vista's just a scam anyway. Microsoft plans to release their REAL next gen OS in 2009 - I MIGHT get that.

But I'm not going to buy Vista. It's worth neither my time nor my trouble.

I wanted to go buy Halo 2 on sunday, but the game said it required Windows Vista, and I have XP. I don't plan on changing operating systems anytime soon, at least until the bugs get worked out of Vista. Is there any way around this "Vista only" restriction?Halo 2 is Vista only because it requires DirectX 10. You could get around this by reverse engineering DX10. This would make it run on any OS that your implementation will compile on. I will warn you, people have been reverse engineering DX9 for a few years now and are still nowheres near complete.

You should have looked at the Halo 2 PC version specs - it was known to be Vista only.

But it's back tracking on that a little by releasing more of Windows XP; at least giving people the option when they buy from Dell or something like that.
Actually, that is Dell doing that against MS's wishes. Dell can ship whatever OS it pleases, provided it is done in a legal manner. MS has actually had to change its "Get the Facts" FUD campaign to target XP instead of Linux.
As for an emulator, Microsoft makes its own emulator, which should run Vista nicely if you don't want to create a duel-boot system.
I don't think what you speak of will work. What is needed is a compatibility layer that will make all of the stuff that makes Vista Vista available on XP.


That said, I am probably one of the six people (excluding MS employees of course) that actually likes Vista better than XP.

That said, I am probably one of the six people (excluding MS employees of course) that actually likes Vista better than XP.

I prefer Vista to XP. Then again, I never liked XP. I tried it when it first came out and was not pleased. Compared to 2000, all the settings are hidden and since there was no advantage over 2000, I never switched. Now there are a few XP only games and pieces of software, but there wasn't anything I was particularly interested in. I also don't like the Fisher Price interface, though that can be disabled.

DirectX10 is Vista only, which was a pretty good reason for me to get it, especially since I was able to do so for free through MSDN. I don't like how many of the settings are hidden, but for regular use it is fine. I also like the Aero Glass interface. Yes, some older software and games don't work properly. The same thing happened when I switched from 98 to 2000, that's just what happens.

One expects there to be issues due to removal of ancient code and because those are old software, no longer supported. Many of people's compatibility issues with Vista are because the software and hardware vendors refuse to provide Vista support. For example, as nVidia got its arse in gear my 3DMark2005 score improved ~15%. It went from safely below to safely above the Windows2000 score.

If I could figure out what points I had made, this is where I would point them out.

It's a simple concept. Microsoft markets the game, Microsoft makes the OS. Microsoft builds the game to work only with the latest so as to force people to want to upgrade. The people figure out some way around it, crack the game, put the crack out as a torrent, and the market stabilizes itself.

Hey, try this!
http://news.softpedia.com/news/DirectX-10-Available-Outside-of-Windows-Vista-53066.shtml

Play Torus Trooper instead.

Also Microsoft tries to make money and doesn't give a shit about it's customers... that's old news.

Hey, try this!
http://news.softpedia.com/news/DirectX-10-Available-Outside-of-Windows-Vista-53066.shtml

It says right on the site that it does not support enough of DX10 to play a game, or even have an installer.

None available yet, I've looked.

Just don't buy Halo 2 or 3. Once they realise they're losing money, things'll change.

Not sure, at the univ we are over 60 percent vista registered computers right now

Does anyone know if I can crack System Shock 2 because I don't want to switch to 2000/XP until they get the bugs worked out.

Does anyone know if I can crack System Shock 2 because I don't want to switch to 2000/XP until they get the bugs worked out.They never managed to. They just kept adding more.

They never managed to. They just kept adding more.

Point proven. Conclusion: Buy Vista. Assimilate or die!

Point proven. Conclusion: Buy Vista. Assimilate or die!Die, please.

Die, please.

Bad joke, bad delivery. Apologies.