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Solved Engine.exe crash

antonyzac

antonyzac

Professional questioner
Hey there!

I've been looking at this forum for fixes for this "engine.exe" crash since December and have found some stuff really useful. However, I haven't found a problem similar to mine on here to do with the crash. I have found that it ONLY happens when I moor, battle or enter port in the day (not morning, evening or night). Has anyone else found this?

Also, I'd just like an update on the situation; are there any other new mods or fixes that I'm missing? Sorry, you guys are probably fed up with these engine.exe questions but any help would be greatly appreciated! So far, I've tried:

- Safe mode in sounds
- Swiftshader 2.0 (works a charm but still crashes during the day as mentioned above)
- Closing unnecessary programs

(P.S. I have an intel graphics card annoyingly). Thanks!
 
To get he latest mod version, download Build 14 beta 2.1 Full and Build 14 Beta 2.3 Light from this site: http://www.moddb.com/mods/new-horizons/downloads
Install 2.1 Full over your base game, and then 2.3 Light to the same place, making sure you choose the Intel Fix during installation.
That allows the game to run on Intel graphics, faster than with SwiftShader, but compromises the sea quality.

Just to clarify: was the game only crashing during the day with or without SwiftShader installed? I just tried loading a port at night, without the fix on my Intel laptop, and it still crashed.
 
Indeed you should do as Armada suggests and use our alternate Intel fix and not the SwiftShader one.
 
Thank you! I'll try it out.

"Just to clarify: was the game only crashing during the day with or without SwiftShader installed? I just tried loading a port at night, without the fix on my Intel laptop, and it still crashed."

Without SwiftShader, the game wouldn't even load for me. With SwiftShader, it just crashes during the day at ports or at sea. It's never crashed at night for me, and that's the same for my brother too who uses a different computer.
 
Two more questions:
1) Where did you manage to get SwiftShader from? I can't find the V2.0 demo anywhere now, and I tried the latest version instead, but it seems to have dropped DX8 support, so doesn't work for PotC.
2) What was the performance like with SwiftShader? We've always heard it slows the game down quite drastically.
 
Armada said:
Two more questions:
1) Where did you manage to get SwiftShader from? I can't find the V2.0 demo anywhere now, and I tried the latest version instead, but it seems to have dropped DX8 support, so doesn't work for PotC.
2) What was the performance like with SwiftShader? We've always heard it slows the game down quite drastically.
Click to expand...

1) I can't seem to find where I got it from now. This was back in December but I'm pretty sure it was from transgaming.com/swiftshader‎. There are a few 2.0 downloads floating around on Google though from what I've just searched.

2) It was very slow, but then I changed the settings to this:

; SwiftShader 2.0 Configuration File​
​
[Capabilities]​
PixelShaderVersion=21​
VertexShaderVersion=21​
TextureMemory=512​
​
[Caches]​
VertexRoutineCacheSize=1024​
PixelRoutineCacheSize=1024​
SetupRoutineCacheSize=1024​
VertexCacheSize=64​
​
[Quality]​
TextureSampleQuality=0​
MipmapQuality=0​
PerspectiveQuality=1​
TranscendentalPrecision=0​
​
[Processor]​
ThreadCount=0​
EnableSSE2=1​
EnableSSE3=1​
EnableSSSE3=1​
​
[Testing]​
DisableServer=0​
KeepSystemCursor=1​
ForceWindowed=0​
DisableTexturing=0​
ComplementaryDepthBuffer=0​
QuadLayoutDepthBuffer=0​
PostBlendSRGB=0​
​

and now it works fairly smoothly.
 
OK thank you! I'm currently downloading the full and light for 14 so I'll let you know if I come across any problems :) I'm not very tech-savvy...
 
You shouldn't need to be. Just make sure you deinstall SwiftShader first otherwise the new fix isn't going to help.
And read the instructions in the installer program for some additional pointers. They're kind-of important. ;)
 
Pieter Boelen said:
I think I removed SwiftShader from our ModDB profiles when we got the newer fix:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/potc-build-mod/downloads/intel-graphics-fix
That one is for when you DON'T use Build 14. If you do use Build 14, the correct version is included in the Beta 2.3 Light installer.
Click to expand...

I used the Intel fix (not using build 14) on a copy of the game and I still got the engine.exe crash error during the day at Redmond...I'm still using swiftshader. Is there something I'm doing wrong?
 
As Pieter said, you should uninstall SwiftShader if you're using the Intel fix.
If that doesn't help, it might be worth posting your error logs here to see if they contain any clues about why the game is crashing. See the FAQ for information about error logging. ;)
 
Armada said:
As Pieter said, you should uninstall SwiftShader if you're using the Intel fix.
If that doesn't help, it might be worth posting your error logs here to see if they contain any clues about why the game is crashing. See the FAQ for information about error logging. ;)
Click to expand...

Doh, silly me! Thanks. I'll try it without Swiftshader! :)

EDIT: I guess there's no fix to stop the sea looking like it's covered in oil? It's bearable though. Thanks so much; the graphics and the speed are just unbelievably...stable now! Amazing work.
 
antonyzac said:
EDIT: I guess there's no fix to stop the sea looking like it's covered in oil? It's bearable though. Thanks so much; the graphics and the speed are just unbelievably...stable now! Amazing work.
Click to expand...
We haven't found a fix for that yet, no. It's always a trade-off trying to get the game to run on an Intel GFX card.
Either you get slow FPS and an unstable game with SwiftShader or you get a smoother and stabler game but an ugly sea.
We've been fighting that particular issue for, what, 10 years now? :facepalm
 
Pieter Boelen said:
We haven't found a fix for that yet, no. It's always a trade-off trying to get the game to run on an Intel GFX card.
Either you get slow FPS and an unstable game with SwiftShader or you get a smoother and stabler game but an ugly sea.
We've been fighting that particular issue for, what, 10 years now? :facepalm
Click to expand...

Aha! Well you guys have done an awesome job either way!
 
antonyzac said:
EDIT: I guess there's no fix to stop the sea looking like it's covered in oil? It's bearable though. Thanks so much; the graphics and the speed are just unbelievably...stable now! Amazing work.
Click to expand...
It's an ongoing investigation. There is hope that, ultimately, one of our coders might be able to rewrite some of the ocean shaders that are causing the crashes on Intel graphics.
We've determined that the game is trying to use the ATI shaders, because Intel is not natively supported by the game, and because said shaders are so complex, they won't work with Intel's graphics drivers.

In the meantime, the best workaround I've found for the oily sea is a tweak detailed in this post: http://www.piratesahoy.net/threads/intel-graphics-fix.19297/page-6#post-447975
I've basically tried to get the game to use the Nvidia shaders instead, which doesn't seem to work, but it does at least disable the reflections on the sea altogether, so no weird oil slicks.
Because the sea colour is largely dependent on reflections from the sky, the lack of reflections means the sea is now a constant deep blue (ironically, thanks to changes I made some time ago to make it more realistic :rolleyes:).
I should be able to undo my original changes so the sea at least changes colour again depending on the weather conditions and time of day.
 
Thanks Armada! I'll check it out when I'm on my computer tomorrow. I'd much rather have a non reflecting sea than one that looks like the Gulf of Mexico from 2010 (although fittingly close to the Caribbean!). I don't know what I would've done without the help from you guys today! Much appreciated.
 
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