andre_6 wrote on 2023-05-01, 20:50:

Hello everyone, […]
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Hello everyone,

I have GTA III and Vice City installed on my PIII-S 1.4Ghz Tualatin build that I have for games between roughly 1998 to 2003/4.

I'd like to install San Andreas on it to complete that era's GTA games, but I couldn't even launch the installer for it on WinME.

The minimum requirements state Windows 2000/XP, but the hardware specs are well inside the Win9x era:

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Grand_Theft … em_requirements

So, did Rockstar purposely block San Andreas from being used on Win9x to push it forward? Seems like a strange limitation given that III, Vice City and San Andreas use the same engine, or at least it looks like that's the case.

Are there any known solutions that I couldn't find that would allow me to install San Andreas on WinME? Thanks as always for your help and replies

Probably the game devs had moved to using toolkits or compilers that had dependencies with Win2K or later libraries and features, DirectX and the like. For every OS you support, you add overhead for testing etc. etc., so probably at the time it was just an easy way out and no real malice.

If re3 and revc hadn't been shut down then a resa port likely would have happened and if so the source would have been available to look at to see if 9x was possible. Both re3 and revc work on xp so its not outside the realm of possibility. For SA you can try kernelex to see if that will work.

You'll need to post over on msfn to see if you can acquire the latest build.

DosFreak wrote on 2023-05-01, 21:18:

If re3 and revc hadn't been shut down then a resa port likely would have happened and if so the source would have been available to look at to see if 9x was possible. Both re3 and revc work on xp so its not outside the realm of possibility. For SA you can try kernelex to see if that will work.

You'll need to post over on msfn to see if you can acquire the latest build.

Somewhat of a noob here, is KernelEx uninstallable / reversible like any other program if it doesn't work?

It works just like the compatibility tab in 2000 and above. It's only used when you want to use it and it can be easily installed and uninstalled.
Really though if you are at the point of having to use kernelex then you should just go ahead and dual-boot 2000 or XP but if it's the case you want one or two games working and you really want to use the POS that is 9x for gaming then kernelex may work for the game.

sometimes games can be 'tricked' into working on earlier versions of windows, that's fun maybe but the game is also likely to be less stable

i'm ok with using the OS as listed in 'requirements' on the basis that it should at least work 😀

I have a zip of the install folder for GTASA, and have been moving that between machines for years. IIRC one font needs installing in %windir%\fonts (and that might be for SAMP), but otherwise the game is effectively "portable". Can you install on NT5+ and then copy the install folder to 9x?

Personally I started trying to leave 9x when 98 came out, and got onto NT4 (with a 98lite dual boot, for 9x only games), then 2000. I can understand if GTASA is coded to refuse to work on 9x, even though there might be no technical reason for it to not work.

gerry wrote on 2023-05-02, 07:36:

sometimes games can be 'tricked' into working on earlier versions of windows, that's fun maybe but the game is also likely to be less stable

i'm ok with using the OS as listed in 'requirements' on the basis that it should at least work 😀

gerry wrote on 2023-05-02, 07:36:

sometimes games can be 'tricked' into working on earlier versions of windows, that's fun maybe but the game is also likely to be less stable

i'm ok with using the OS as listed in 'requirements' on the basis that it should at least work 😀

progman.exe wrote on 2023-05-02, 07:56:

I have a zip of the install folder for GTASA, and have been moving that between machines for years. IIRC one font needs installing in %windir%\fonts (and that might be for SAMP), but otherwise the game is effectively "portable". Can you install on NT5+ and then copy the install folder to 9x?

Personally I started trying to leave 9x when 98 came out, and got onto NT4 (with a 98lite dual boot, for 9x only games), then 2000. I can understand if GTASA is coded to refuse to work on 9x, even though there might be no technical reason for it to not work.

This is the only game on this WinME build that I would want to finesse into working on the OS, I was curious if it would be possible to have all three of that era's GTAs on that PC.

I haven't yet had the chance but meanwhile a relative that has many retro builds was curious and tried it with KernelEx on Win98 and WinME, he was able to install it but then it wouldn't launch under any compatibility setting. He said the setup itself already had some minor graphical glitches, but ran normally.

I'm not hellbent on this as I already have a XP build. Since I recently installed a HDA (Auzentech) Mystique on the WinME PC, thus effectively crippling any DOS possibilities for the occasional game on it, I might as well just go the NT route and install Win2k on it, saving WinME for another build. Actually, in OS performance WinME actually surpasses Win98, Win2k and even XP on quite a few benchmarks, I was pleasantly surprised by that.

Win2k was the last OS my father had when he was alive and I had some memories from that, it will be a pain to re-configure everything but might as well, I would always remain curious if I don't

andre_6 wrote on 2023-05-02, 16:41:

This is the only game on this WinME build that I would want to finesse into working on the OS, I was curious if it would be poss […]
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gerry wrote on 2023-05-02, 07:36:

sometimes games can be 'tricked' into working on earlier versions of windows, that's fun maybe but the game is also likely to be less stable

i'm ok with using the OS as listed in 'requirements' on the basis that it should at least work 😀

gerry wrote on 2023-05-02, 07:36:

sometimes games can be 'tricked' into working on earlier versions of windows, that's fun maybe but the game is also likely to be less stable

i'm ok with using the OS as listed in 'requirements' on the basis that it should at least work 😀

progman.exe wrote on 2023-05-02, 07:56:

I have a zip of the install folder for GTASA, and have been moving that between machines for years. IIRC one font needs installing in %windir%\fonts (and that might be for SAMP), but otherwise the game is effectively "portable". Can you install on NT5+ and then copy the install folder to 9x?

Personally I started trying to leave 9x when 98 came out, and got onto NT4 (with a 98lite dual boot, for 9x only games), then 2000. I can understand if GTASA is coded to refuse to work on 9x, even though there might be no technical reason for it to not work.

This is the only game on this WinME build that I would want to finesse into working on the OS, I was curious if it would be possible to have all three of that era's GTAs on that PC.

I haven't yet had the chance but meanwhile a relative that has many retro builds was curious and tried it with KernelEx on Win98 and WinME, he was able to install it but then it wouldn't launch under any compatibility setting. He said the setup itself already had some minor graphical glitches, but ran normally.

I'm not hellbent on this as I already have a XP build. Since I recently installed a HDA (Auzentech) Mystique on the WinME PC, thus effectively crippling any DOS possibilities for the occasional game on it, I might as well just go the NT route and install Win2k on it, saving WinME for another build. Actually, in OS performance WinME actually surpasses Win98, Win2k and even XP on quite a few benchmarks, I was pleasantly surprised by that.

Win2k was the last OS my father had when he was alive and I had some memories from that, it will be a pain to re-configure everything but might as well, I would always remain curious if I don't

I can understand this rationale too. Sometimes you want to fix something or make it work "just because" or for the "fun of it".

My personal quest is WarCraft III, which I would love to get working on Windows 95 - but so far I haven't figured out what the level of dependency is. It can't be a lot because the game can run in OpenGL-mode and the hardware is more than capable. Same system with Windows 98 and the game runs beautifully...

leonardo wrote on 2023-05-02, 20:06:

I can understand this rationale too. Sometimes you want to fix something or make it work "just because" or for the "fun of it".

My personal quest is WarCraft III, which I would love to get working on Windows 95 - but so far I haven't figured out what the level of dependency is. It can't be a lot because the game can run in OpenGL-mode and the hardware is more than capable. Same system with Windows 98 and the game runs beautifully...

Well, not much, except that they linked Warcraft III to DirectX 8.1 at compile time. That is probably where the issues will be. Has anyone run DX8.1 on Win95? It was a deliberate breaking of compatibility in that DX version.

leonardo wrote on 2023-05-02, 20:06:

My personal quest is WarCraft III, which I would love to get working on Windows 95 - but so far I haven't figured out what the level of dependency is. It can't be a lot because the game can run in OpenGL-mode and the hardware is more than capable. Same system with Windows 98 and the game runs beautifully...

Could always be a sneaky Winsock2 dependency, and Winsock2 itself is fussy to install on Win95.

Depending on your video card I would attempt to dualboot XP. But if you are insistent on running SA on 98 (we all have our reasons) then KernelEx is where you'd want to look. It isn't a far stretch of the imagination either, games like Doki Doki Literature Club from 2017 have been coaxed into running on 98. Not the most technically impressive game but it's a point to make nonetheless.