If you can't find the answer to your question here, you can check out the Claw Forum, and you can also e-mail Dan if necessary.
Windows Won't Load Without Claw in Drive
WPCI/Disable Audio and Game Runs/Yamaha OPL3-SA
How can I not install the Direct X from the CD?
Do you have Internet Explorer 4? If so, Creative Labs has found that Internet Explorer 4 could be the cause of the crashes. IE4 installs ActiveMovie, which in turn installs a newer version of the quartz.dll that end up messing with the MCI commands when claw tries to open and play a VOB file. The best thing to do is to un-install IE4 and then your game should be fine. If you don't want to do that, Creative has new drivers (click here) for you to install that should fix the problem!
If that doesn't work, try these things and see if any of them help.
-There could be something wrong with the MIDI setup of your sound card. I'd suggest that you go over your sound card and make sure that all the settings are correct. Then, check your Multimedia Properties in your Control Panel and make sure that your sound card is the preferred device selected for MIDI and AUDIO playback, then try running Claw again. You may need to select a different device for playback than what you have now.
-Run the ClawAdv.EXE program (its located in the Misc folder when you Explore the Claw CD) and then check the box that says, "Disable Direct Video Access" and try running the game again.
-Run the ClawAdv.EXE program and then check the box that says, "Disable Sound Fonts" and try running the game again.
-Make sure you have the latest video drivers, DVD drivers, and/or sound drivers for all your different hardware.
-If that doesn't help, then try downloading DirectX 6.1 from: http://www.microsoft.com/directx/download.asp
-Try this little fix sent in by Claw fan, Shawn C Lee. If you are running Windows 98 and have the PC-DVD Encore from Creative Labs, go into system devices, check the settings on the drive and uncheck the use DMA option. For some reason, Windows 98 enables this by default. Your DVD Videos should continue to work after you do this, so this shouldn't affect watching DVD movies.
-Try re-setting your screen display to fix the problem. Right-click anywhere on your computer desktop. Choose PROPERTIES then click on the SETTINGS tab. Now try changing your display to 640x480 at 256 colors. Click OK and then re-start your computer (if you have to) to make the change. Now, re-run the Creative DVD setup program so that it can automatically configure for the different video modes. Install it again, over your previous installation. Once you are able to view the movies or play the game, you can change your display back to what you had before!
Also, you can add a new string key to your registry to be able to play the regular movies for Claw. Run the REGEDIT program from the Start menu. Find the Claw entry in the registry. Try looking in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, MONOLITH PRODUCTIONS, CLAW, 1.0. This is where I found the registry settings on my machine. Add a new DWORD key called "Disable DVD Movies". Then, set the value of that string to 1. Now, you should be able to view the regular movies for Claw.
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Try these things and see if any of them help!
-There could be something wrong with the MIDI setup of your sound card. I'd suggest that you go over your sound card and make sure that all the settings are correct. Then, check your Multimedia Properties in your Control Panel and make sure that your sound card is the preferred device selected for MIDI and AUDIO playback, then try running Claw again. You may need to select a different device for playback than what you have now.
-Run the ClawAdv.EXE program (its located in the Misc folder when you Explore the Claw CD) and then check the box that says, "Disable Direct Video Access" and try running the game again.
-Run the ClawAdv.EXE program and then check the box that says, "Disable Sound Fonts" and try running the game again.
-If that doesn't help, then try downloading the newest version of DirectX from: http://www.microsoft.com/directx/download.asp
-Finally, make sure you have the latest video drivers, DVD drivers, and/or sound drivers for all your different hardware.
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Go to http://www.captainclaw.com and download the new Claw 1.2 patch.
Try copying this new Claw.exe over your old .exe and then start Claw and see if it helps. Make sure that you have the latest version of DirectX 6.1 installed, or it won't work!
You need to make a change in your Registry to solve this problem. Run the REGEDIT program from the Start menu. Find the Claw entry in the registry. To find the Claw entry, perform a search for "Monolith", "Claw", "1.0" in your registry. Try looking in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, MONOLITH PRODUCTIONS, CLAW, 1.0. This is where I found the registry settings on my machine. Add a new string key called "CDROM Drive" to the Claw\1.0 directory. Then, set the value of that string to whatever drive letter your DVD/CD drive is. You only need to put the letter of the drive, (i.e. E or G) for the value of the new string key you created.
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If you are receiving an error message that says, "Microsoft Visual C++ Runtime Library, runtime library error, abnormal program termination, (directory)", you have a bad CD. Something on the CD disc is corrupted or damaged. Have you tried installing the game on another computer? If so and you still get the error, I'd recommend that you return the game to the store where you bought it and swap it for a new Claw game. That should solve your problem!
If you don't get the error on the second computer, there would have to be something weird with your computer setup. Make sure that you have DirectX6 and all the latest drivers installed for your computer and then re-install the game again and try again.
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To install the patch, you first need to double-click on the file that you have. Then click on Extract and type in the Claw directory on your hard drive, or locate the Claw directory in the small window. Then once the Claw directory is highlighted, you click Extract again and the file is copied into your Claw directory. The program will ask you if you want to overwrite the current file and you say "Yes to All".
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If your game will not save, it's probably because you or someone else has used a cheat code while playing the game. If any cheat codes are used, Claw will not allow the save function to work. Try creating a new player and then play a new game of claw with the new player and see if that helps.
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To find the Claw manual, look in your Claw directory on your hard drive for a file called CLAW.HLP. Double-click on this file to open the manual.
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Go into your Control Panel and open the Multimedia setup. Make sure that the primary wave device and MIDI device selected is your sound card, and give Claw another try.
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I believe that there is a cable connecting the DVD drive with your sound card. Can you make sure that your cable is connected correctly? The cable is used to transfer the audio signal from the drive to the sound card. If it's not hooked-up, you won't hear sound when the movies play.
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To order Claw, you need to go to http://store.lith.com.
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Windows Won't Load Without Claw in Drive
You need to copy the two sound font files (CLAW.SF2 and CLAW4.SF2) from your Claw CD Music directory to the Claw directory on your hard drive to solve your problem. Now, run Claw so the game knows where to look for the new location of the sound fonts and you should be fine. If that doesn't work, you may need to load a new sound font into your sound card and try again. Read your documentation for details on how to load a new sound font.
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WPCI/Disable Audio and Game Runs/Yamaha OPL3-SA
Run the ClawAdv.EXE program and then check the box that says, "Disable Sound Fonts" and try running the game again.
Some people have reported problems with certain PCI sound cards. The only way that we've been able to get the card to work, is by re-setting your card to use the ISA port instead of the PCI port. Nothing else worked except switching the card to the ISA port. Try this and see if it works for you. I know it defeats the purpose of having a PCI sound card, but there isn't anything else I can suggest, except getting another sound card, like the AWE32 from Creative. Contact your sound card company if you do not know how to switch over your sound card.
Open the Claw advanced options menu and check off the box that says Disable All Audio and then run Claw. Now, try and close Claw and see what happens. If the game closes without any problems, then you may have a sound card conflict somewhere.
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You need to make a change in your Registry to solve this problem. Run the REGEDIT program from the Start menu. Try looking in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, MONOLITH PRODUCTIONS, CLAW, 1.0. This is where I found the registry settings on my machine. Add a new DWORD key called "Disable DVD Movies" to the Claw\1.0 directory (with the 1.0 directory open, select EDIT, NEW, KEY). Then, set the DWORD value (highlight "Disable DVD Movies" then select EDIT, NEW, DWORD Value) of that string to "1".
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How can I not install the Direct X from the CD?
You can bypass the DirectX installation by choosing the "Custom" install at the beginning.
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Run the ClawAdv.EXE program (its located in the Misc folder when you Explore the Claw CD) and then check the box that says, "Disable Joystick Calibration Test" and try running the game again.
Make sure your joystick/gamepad is calibrated for use with Windows by running the Windows calibration test found in My Computer/Control Panel. If you have a Microsoft Sidewinder Gamepad, download the latest version 3.02 drivers at: http://www.microsoft.com/msdownload/sidewinder/down.htm
I believe the joystick needs to be device 0. Try and recalibrate your joystick and verify (using the "Test" tab in the control panel applet) that it is working properly.
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This is a driver related problem. There are two things you can do about this problem.
-One, re-install the old drivers that came with the card.
-Two, open the Advanced Options menu and disable the Direct Video Access.
Either of these two things should solve your problem
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Claw might not run correctly on Windows NT. Windows NT only supports up to Direct X3 (DirectX 5 with SP4) and Claw needs at least Direct X5 to run properly. The best thing to do is play Claw under Win95 or Win98 if at all possible, as Claw was not designed, or tested, to run in NT.
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To change the file association properties, try this:
1. Open up My Computer and click on View, Folder Options.
2. Click the File Types tab and in the middle white box, scroll down to WinZip File. In the bottom box, it should say WinZip32 in the "Opens With" category. If not, then we need to change the "opens with" property.
3. With that WinZip File still highlighted, click Edit, then in the next box, click Edit again. Once that's done, the middle box will be highlighted and you have to put in a new path to WinZip.
4. Click Browse and go to the patch where WinZip is. If you didn't change where you installed WinZip to, it's C:\PROGRA~1\WINZIP\winzip32.exe "%1"
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You need to have your PC rigged for IPX connections. That's the internal LAN option. To do this, do the following:
1. Right click on Network Neighborhood and choose Properties.
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2. Click Add, then click Protocol.
3. Windows then builds a driver database, then you have to choose your Manufacturer and Network Protocol.
4. Choose Microsoft as the Manufacturer, then choose IPX/SPX-compatible Protocol and click OK to add it in.