FF7: Video gets slower and slower untill it completely stops at Tutorials

[Salk]

Hello!

Now this is really weird stuff. Everytime I go to the Beginner's Hall and start the tutorial, the game video becomes slower after some lines (like if the CPU was being busy by some other program - but I closed down everything to make sure it is not so) and eventually just stop completely. The sound would still be heard in background but the screen would freeze.

Has anyone got an advice about this? At first I thought that it was Windows Update interfering in the background but I made several tests after it and the problem is still there.

It happens when I speak to the guy next to the dog. It's not always happening on exactly the same line of the tutorial but it is usually sometimes during the "How do I cure my party?" sort of question.

I know that on this computer I played the game before without such a hassle. The only thing I did was changing drivers to newer ones.

I have an Athlon64 3000 and a nVidia Geforce 7800GS and I run the game on Windows XP (tried with both and without W95-compatibility mode).

Game is updated to version 1.02.

[*:.Griever.:*]

The only thing I did was changing drivers to newer ones.

Can't you just try rolling back the drivers, see if maybe the updated drivers are at fault?

[Salk]

I got rather mad at the game after doing the same sequence of play for about four times and uninstalled it. In the future, I will try and use older video drivers to see if that makes a difference.

I had just hoped that, for once in my life, I didn't have to experiment with this sh*t and get to read of a specific solution to the specific problem.

Thanks anyway, Tidus_Lionheart.

[Terid__K]

Any driver newer than Forceware 163.75 causes this problem. In both FF7 and FF8 (Probably other old DirectX applications as well.) Also, it doesn't matter where you are in the game, it happens after playing for a while.

Even in the newest beta release (174.74) the problem still remains. So the sollution is pretty obvious. Use the 163.75 driver until this issue is fixed. This is a pretty solid driver release, so don't be afraid to downgrade (I have a Geforce 7 card and I use it).

EDIT: Fixed it. It's 163, not 193.

[Xelane]

i suppose i should consider myself lucky that my driver doesn't have this problem since i can't just go out and get a new....older driver to get around this problem

[Salk]

Well, Terid.

The driver I am using is 169.21.

I downloaded it as latest driver available for my configuration (Windows XP+Geforce 7800GS AGP).

193.75: what kind of release is that? Have you perhaps mistyped the number?

[Terid__K]

Yeah, I mistyped it. I meant 163.75. Here:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_163.75.html

Sorry.

[Salk]

I rolled much more backwards (91.31) and with those I have no problems.

In the future I might update again my drivers with the version you suggest but I was thinking there is not much point since my games are not so new.

[Terid__K]

The 90 series are good indeed. Though I would not recommend the one you are currently using. There's a problem with video playback in it, at least in my card (7600GS). It may be card-specific though, since they are all different.

If you want to stick with the 90 series for a while, 93.71 is the way to go. Alternatively, 94.24. These 90 drivers are actually much faster than the 163.75 one. I would keep them, if it wasn't for a profile problem the 90 series have with my card (this is definitely card-specific).

[Salk]

I can confirm that the issue disappeared after I rolled back to the 90 forceware series.

Thanks for your tips Terid_K!