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Trying to start any of these games -- from their original CDs! -- stopped working when I upgraded to Windows 10. I get a black screen and can't even get the desktop back except by hitting CTRL-ALT-DEL, starting Task Manager, having it log me out, and then logging back in again.

  • Heroes of Might and Magic II and III
  • You Don't Know Jack 1, 2, and 3
  • History of the World

The only clue I've found is a mention in TechDirt, which says they've disabled some kinds of copy protection and that patches exist (but not a word about where to get them).

Any help to get these games to work again would be appreciated. If there isn't any I may have to roll the system back to Windows 7, if I still can.

jdgalt
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4 Answers4

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Well, it's true that you aren't able to play some games at the moment on Windows 10.

You have three possibilities what to do:

  1. Wait for updates that make the games work again.
  2. use a virtual machine on your win10 system to emulate win7
  3. downgrade to win 7
2

Try running the games in Compatibility Mode it tricks the game into thinking it is running on the older version of the operating system, it also turns on some built in emulation options to make the system "behave" more like the old OS versions too.

See this SU question for more information on how it works.

1

Windows 10 no longer includes the SecuROM driver, so old games that include this copy protection don't any longer in Windows 10.

Google for No-CD cracks to be still able to play them.

0

While I fully understand if you don't want to re-purchase your games, games obtained through http://gog.com have no DRM, and all of them that I've tried so far work perfectly on Win10. They have the Heroes of Might and Magic series (currently 1 through 5, I believe), although I don't think they have the others you mention (yet).

The reason you won't see actual links to things like (unofficial) NoCD patches and the like on official publications in the USA (or on things that are published in the USA) is because it's technically illegal - the Digital Millennium Copyright Act makes it illegal to circumvent DRM, even for completely legitimate reasons like running software that you have legally purchased - and linking to the sources of such illegal content could get the publication sued.

CBHacking
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