I'm having the same problem. Anyone found a solution for this?

What version of DirectX are you using?

The latest version 9.0b

Just got this reply from Interplay Support:

Dear Gamer, […]
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Dear Gamer,

Thanks for your interest in Interplay Entertainment Corp. Unfortunately, that is maximum resolution available when playing the game under Windows 2000/XP with the compatibility switch. Please let me know if you have any other questions. Thanks.

Sincerely,
Homer Parker IV
Interplay Technical Support

So looks like we are SOL.

use zazenacks (wrong spelling i know) and run the game in glide i am using 1280x1024

http://www.zeckensack.de/glide/

I got through a big chunk of the game using DirectX at 1600x1200 using ONLY the " -i " command line argument, which gets rid of the intro logos. However, the game often will not exit correctly, and I find that the only way to get it to start in DirectX even with the " -i " command line is to load it in safemode when it asks, then exit and restart it using the normal mode. I had to do this almost every time I started the game. Also, it doesn't seem to save your video settings most of the time, so you'll have to remember to reset them to where you want them every time.

Using zeckensack's glide wrapper for 3DFX, the game works but I get some weird graphical distortion on objects in the distance; the textures become really trippy and multicolored.

Right now I'm at a point in the game where it simply won't work no matter what I try, even in safe mode. The game runs for a couple of minutes on average, then exits back to the desktop without warning. I'd be interested to hear what other people have tried.

nothing works for me :'( i got glide wrapper and it doesn't work. maybe if i mess with it more it'll do something, but for now i got nothin'.

EDIT: nope. crashes right after the first cutscene (the one where he says "i'm a cop..." while the other guy's just sitting there being amazed. just in case it wasn't clear). the video doesn't even play (but that may have to do with missing codecs) but the sound is there.

This would be a major PITA but you could try the game in Windows 98. I intend to do this for games with problems or that do not work at all in Windows 2000/XP to see if it's actually an OS problem or a hardware problem. I'm not guaranteeing anything since I haven't tried Messiah under 98 but it might work. IIRC, back in the day when Messiah first came out I believe I was running it under Windows 2000 just fine but I can't be sure.

I used to play Messiah on XP both on DirectX and Zeckensack's wrapper but I met some problems.
I used +! command line parameter but the game run in 640x480, so I changed resolution to 1024x768, exited the game and launched it again - the resolution was 1024x768. 😀 So I could play it, but next time I run the game it just crashed, so I had to repeat the procedure with changing resolutions every time I wanted to play.