Yikes. Ep. 2 won't start...

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StreetMedic - 18 Oct 2007 18:54 GMT

Anyone hear any chatter about a similar problem?...

When I first attempted to start Ep. 2, the game would go through its
usual startup gyrations (Steam starting up, etc.) but then it gets to
the "blurry menu" point (just before the image sharpens and the menu
appears). At this point, in minimizes to the task bar and re-maximizes
a couple of times in quick succession, then just chokes and vanishes
altogether.

I've done the usual drivers and etc. "housekeeping" but I was curious if
anyone had a similar experience, or if my searching has missed a related
thread online somewhere.

Any thoughts appreciated. (Your glowing reviews of a game I can't get
started are killing me!) ;-)

Thx,

S-M

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StreetMedic - 18 Oct 2007 18:58 GMT

> snip <

Whoops, a probably-relevant point I forgot to mention was that, in
tinkering under the hood, I discovered that the previously well-behaved
HL2 and HL2 Ep.1 installations have also become "broken" since
installing Ep.2.

So, more accurately, none of it runs any longer.

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Justin Thompson - 18 Oct 2007 19:36 GMT

>> snip <
>
[quoted text clipped - 4 lines]
>
>So, more accurately, none of it runs any longer.

Well fix it dear liza, dear liza, dear liza!!

I think if you right click on game in your games list, select
properties, select local files, select verfy integrity of game cache
it should check and offer to repair if there is a problem.

HTH

Cheers

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Stone Monkey - 18 Oct 2007 19:37 GMT

>> snip <
>
[quoted text clipped - 4 lines]
>
> So, more accurately, none of it runs any longer.

I'm sure I've had this problem before and I think a reinstall of steam
fixed it,I think it was just something had become corrupt but I'm not 100%
sure I'm afraid

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- - : R A T B o y : - - - 19 Oct 2007 02:24 GMT

A year or so ago, any new HL apps (mods or otherwise) would act similar to
your description.

I had to set my video card settings to 800x600 then I could run the game,
change it's video settings to a higher mode, exit the game and reset my
desktop video back to 1024x768.

Alternately, I could set the game launch settings to "run in a window" and
it would work fine long enough for me to make the in-game video setting
changes.

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StreetMedic - 23 Oct 2007 22:18 GMT

> A year or so ago, any new HL apps (mods or otherwise) would act similar
> to your description.
[quoted text clipped - 6 lines]
> and it would work fine long enough for me to make the in-game video
> setting changes.

    Hi, all,

    Yeah, I tried the tricks mentioned here, and a few others I found.

    My digging thus far seems to suggest is that the problem seems to swirl
around this new GameInterfaceUI.exe (or something like that) that showed
up relatively recently in a Steam update. You can't delete it because
Steam will just download another copy. Then, if you block Steam's
internet access, it'll refuse to run at all when it doesn't see the file
(or sees a "decoy", if you get tricky) and can't grab a new one.

    Anyway, this may all be a red herring, as I only found references to
problems similar to mine in forums with folks trying to get HL2/Steam to
run under Linux. I've got XP, but it's the best lead I've got so far.

    It seems (possibly, I have no first-hand knowledge of the technical
nitty-gritty) that GameInterfaceUI.exe steals the sound driver, doesn't
give it back when HL2 wants it, then the whole thing trips over itself
and shuts down.

    /shrug

    For now, I can only hope the folks at Valve cough up a fix soon, or
come up with a way to kill the GameInterfaceUI process without choking
the game.

    S-M

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