This "howto" was written in the hope that it'll help everyone sort out problems with getting the game to run. I try to cover problems with a game which used to run freezing or crashing on startup, also problems with getting it to run for the first time on Windows XP, or what to do when your CD is cracked or lost and the game is asking for it in the drive. Problems with Babyz freezing when it starts, although it used to work fine. =========================================================================== A. The problem: ------------ 1. I was playing the game and then closed it to put in some downloaded clothes, toyz, babyz etc. Then I opened it, and it froze while the yellow bar was loading. 2. I'd taken some downloaded clothes etc _out_ of the game, then I opened the game one morning and it crashed with some kind of error message. The answer: ----------- First of all, take all your babyz out of the Adopted folder and put them somewhere safe. Then take all downloaded or hexed items out of the game -- if you've been hexing the BabyzRez.dll then put the original, untouched one back into place -- and then hold down the Ctrl and Shift keys while you open the game. If it starts up okay, then there is something wrong with one of the items that you've just now removed from the game. If it doesn't, then go on to Problem B. Right, if it started up okay with everything non-original removed, you can find what the culprit was by closing the game, putting some stuff back, and re-opening and if it still works, closing and putting more stuff back etc. Do this with the clothes, toyz, playscenes etc first, although those with problem "2" will probably find that those are okay. If there is a problem with one of those items, keep it out of the game until it is fixed. Next put your babyz back in, preferably making sure that most are in Grandmother's House and that you have one baby only in the Adopted folder. If the game freezes even with them at Grandmother's, then you'll have to do it the hard way, closing the game, putting only one or two babyz in, then opening it to change babyz. When the freeze or crash occurs, then you know you've found the problem child. But problem 2 will probably be solved thusly: make sure that the baby which is in the Adopted folder was definitely wearing clothes that you _know_ are in your game right now and are working okay. Now keep swapping the babyz around from Grandmother's House into the game. If there is no crash when all your babyz have been into the game, then you've sorted out your problem. If there is a crash at any time, then you have found your problem baby and it will need to be fixed. Don't throw the little thing away -- if it is not corrupted and you send it to me, I should be able to fix it up for you, but I cannot tell you exactly how to fix it without looking inside the .baby file myself and doing an individual diagnosis. These things vary, you see. B.The problem: ------------ "One day I opened the game and the yellow bar loaded up to a certain point and then the entire thing froze. I've tried Everything to fix it! I've removed all hexed clothes and toyz, put the babyz somewhere else, made sure that nothing other than the game originals are in place, restarted babyz with ctrl and shift, rebooted the computer, uninstalled and reinstalled the whole game and NOTHING WORKS!" The answer: ----------- I know you say you've uninstalled and reinstalled, but have you actually cleaned out the Registry? It sounds as if something is getting left behind. I expect it's done the same way in Win 2000 as in Win 95, Win ME, Win 98 or Win XP -- open Regedit.exe, navigate by clicking on the crosses in the left pane till you get to My Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\PF.Magic\Babyz then choose Edit Delete from the main menu. Reboot and open the game again. C.The problem: -------------- Is there a way to fix it so you can play babyz on XP with the sound on? My game won't run with it on. Sorry no -- if you've got a compatible sound card and updated drivers, the only thing I can suggest is that you try to run Babyz under the "compatibility mode" feature that XP has. Right click on the Babyz icon and choose Properties, click on the Compatibility tab, and check the "run this program in compatibility mode for:" box, choosing an OS such as Windows 98 from the drop-down menu. If you've tried that and still find that the game freezes with the sound enabled, I'm afraid your XP/sound problem is probably unfixable. Is it so bad, though, running the game silently? I could have sound if I wanted on my Win 95 setup, but always have it turned off as I play in our only non-bed, non-kitchen, non-bathroom in the house. Problems with Babyz freezing after first installation ===================================================== The Problem: ------------ The game nstalled okay on my Windows NT (or Windows 2000, or Windows XP) system, but it locks-up at the Babyz adoption screen; after typing in the serial number, the game freezes. The answer: ----------- Windows XP wasn't around when this game was made, so there are some big compatibility problems. But there are some things that can be done to make it work, although it may still freeze from time to time and run too fast. 1. Windows XP has a built-in feature to emulate older operating systems -- compatibility mode -- so this might work: right click on the Babyz icon and choose Properties, Click on the Compatibility tab, and check the "run this program in compatibility mode for:" box, choosing an OS such as Windows 98 from the drop-down menu. if that one doesn't work, try another. This might work for some people. 2. This one won't help people who want to hex new babyz, but it will get the game started so that you can disable the sounds thing, after which the game should run reasonably normally. Either download a baby from the Internet or use My Computer or Windows Explorer to find, off the game's main directory on your own hard drive, this directory: \Resource\Online\Local In there you'll see a load of .exe files with names like this: run_me-1176-qcNa-aaav-mbd.exe Each of those is a packaged baby. Choose one and double-click on it, then follow the instructions and put the baby into your game's Adopted directory. Next time the game should start. When it does, you may need to disable the sound or it may soon crash or freeze. 3. A lot of the freezes can be avoided by disabling / un-checking "Babyz Sounds On" in the general options menu. Problem: The game asks for the CD -- I've lost or broken mine =================================================================== The answer: ----------- Just start the game with Ctrl and Shift pressed; that will reset the registry and a little "counter" that's in there. It will of course set everything in the game (toyz etc) back to the defaults. If this doesn't work for you, then you need to "clean out" the Registry as shown above in the answer to Problem B above in this Howto. I hope this helps all of you to get your game running and let you keep playing with your babyz! Cheers Carolyn