game.dat error with LOTR: BFME

[ASTRALdragon]

Hi guys, I recently bought Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-earth because my brother showed me how cool BFME 2 was so I wanted to start from the first one. I installed and played it through like the 5th mission or so then I turned the game off. The next day, I tried to play it again but then the LOTR logo comes up (the first one only) and then it immediately gives me some game.dat error. I tried re-installing and patching to 1.03 but it would still crash. I've tried patching in order too (1.0>1.01>1.02>1.03), but it would still crash! I tried Googling this problem but everyone just said to update my drivers (which I tried also). You pros are my last resort.... then I'm gonna go grab an nVidia card or just stop playing LOTR: BFME...

my specs:
AMD Athlon XP 3000
2 GB RAM
Sapphire RADEON 9600XT (some people have said that EA games do not like ATI cards...)

 

[SpoogeMonkey]

Wish I could help. I've been playing using sli 6600gt's and have never seen that error with any of the patches. Maybe uninstall/reinstall......?

 

[D!Z]

Lots of people are having this problem. The load screen would hang there and when i closed it i would get the dat. error. Mine was fixed by just letting it run and it started after bout 3 mins. If you control alt delete and check your programs you will see the games exe running and that game dat. Only thing i can think of is it might be some kinda of copy protection. I have seen people talking on forums that have downloaded the game and people who actually have the game, have lots of probs. I would try starting the game dif ways too. from start programs or clicking on your cd icon. I had that game dat for a while till i got mine running. Also check the EA games main site has a forum with a lot of people having the same prob. Wish i could help more, maybe you could post this in the game forum too might get more feedback, might help. Good Luck.

 

[Slo Gun]

Maybe try disabling any virtual drives if you have them.

 

[SharpieFiend]

A lot of people have this problem, it seems to be a defect in the game. Hopefully EA can fix it without having to produce new media.

 

[luie]

I had that problem. I reinstalled and the problem is gone. *shrug*

 

[ASTRALdragon]

Wish I could help. I've been playing using sli 6600gt's and have never seen that error with any of the patches. Maybe uninstall/reinstall......?

Yea, a lot of people on various forums across Google have said that nVidia cards run perfect with the game. Well the game's box even recommends nVidia cards LOL. Actually, in order to play now, I have to uninstall and reinstall....

Lots of people are having this problem. The load screen would hang there and when i closed it i would get the dat. error. Mine was fixed by just letting it run and it started after bout 3 mins. If you control alt delete and check your programs you will see the games exe running and that game dat. Only thing i can think of is it might be some kinda of copy protection. I have seen people talking on forums that have downloaded the game and people who actually have the game, have lots of probs. I would try starting the game dif ways too. from start programs or clicking on your cd icon. I had that game dat for a while till i got mine running. Also check the EA games main site has a forum with a lot of people having the same prob. Wish i could help more, maybe you could post this in the game forum too might get more feedback, might help. Good Luck.

I bought the game last week so my copy is legit. I did try to start it different ways. I even tried to start it with different CDs in my CD drives. I will try that Task Manager thing though... Thanx!!

Maybe try disabling any virtual drives if you have them.

I tried that. The only virtual drives I got running are from Daemon Tools (I need them to run the other games I play without swapping CDs).

A lot of people have this problem, it seems to be a defect in the game. Hopefully EA can fix it without having to produce new media.

Yea, a lot of the forums I've visited do not like EA for the way they code their games. Sure the gameplay and ideas are good but the technical stuff sucks. To make it worse, they don't really try to patch it either.

Thanx for all your feedback guys. I really appreciate it.

 

[Orr]

Game.dat is just the error name given to any error in the game that interupts the program.

Apparantly its to do with machines with graphics cards that are not copatible like the lower end ones but many people which 7800's or x1x00 etc have been getting the problem to including myself.

Hopefully the devs will be able to find a fix for this in a future patch.