Yeah, if WMP isn't listed I don't think there is much you can do as there doesn't seem to be an exteral installer available for it anywhere. You could try running a registry cleaner and sfc /scannow and see if that fixes anything if you haven't already, but apart from that I can't think of anything else to do.

If you lack WMP on Win10 you have to install the Media Feature Pack.

Download link: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/mediafeaturepack

More details here: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-start/how-to-locate-and-open-windows-media-player-in/7d0f31a1-2999-4597-9c43-b48b075c5e57?auth=1

I hope this can be to any help.

I'm running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit, and it installed and ran fine. I never uninstalled WMP or Explorer (just don't use them).

Right. Not sure why he doesn't have WMP. I just did a fresh Win10 install and it still includes WMP. Just go to Cortana and search for Windows Media Player. It's still there even tho Win10 defaults to Groove Music.

Windows 7 Pro upgrade to Windows 10. This setup worked perfectly with this game. I just rebuilt my system and reinstalled Windows 10 clean ground up as well as the game etc. Nada now. Nothing listed above (movie, wmp, ie11, directx, where you start it from, etc. meh) works. Game flat out wont run in clean and updated install of Windows 10 Creator.

When I first got the game I kind of hated it. The gfx and UI are like circa 1990 but it grew on me and I loved it. Now, it may as well not even exist. When I purchased it the decision was between DW or Stellaris off steam. I went DW because it looked to be far more in depth and frankly I try to avoid Steam. Unfortunately Stellaris is no longer on sale. Bad move I suppose given this game no longer runs. Suppose that is a word of warning anyone looking at games like this.

I had the same problem as the OP. My game installed ok but would'nt run at all.
What I ended up doing was downloading and running the dxwebsetup.exe and also changing the startup.ini file from playmovie 1 to playmovie 0 even thou I have windows media player on my windows 10 laptop. Took me ages but finaly got it to run at last.

I bought this a day ago, spending a few hours on quick start guides and the manual. I spent much of today trying to run it and so far have had no success trying to run on Win 10 Pro with 8 G RAM. It is the same launch that does not get off the launch pad issue.

I've tried pretty much everyone shown in this thread..
1) Run everything as admin
2) Set playmovie to 0
3) Made sure WMP and IE 11 are present and active on the system
4) Checked that the Intel drivers are up to date
5) Installed the June 2010 DirectX runtime package
6) DirectX Web Installer
7) Microsoft XNA 4.0
8) Made the registry change suggested in crash dump file (admittedly the intent of this is to add info to the report)
9) Put in an exception to the AV for the GOG Games folder.

So far there has been no significant change in the results. Glancing at a few other web posts, there may be issues and workarounds for running XNA 4.0 under Win 10, but I have not looked into it in detail.

Any other suggestions out there?

I have the same problem, running Windows 10 Home 64-bit, before the April 2018 major update the game ran properly but after the update it won’t start after I click ‘Play Distant Worlds’.

I hate how Windows 10 just has to force these useless and annoying major updates on us, it resets so many settings in my apps like Bandicam and adds/removes features which then cause some of my games to not work afterwards.

Managed to get the game to work after installing the Directx June 2010 end-user runtime and setting playmovie to 0. Normally if this happened on a lesser quality game I wouldn’t even bother trying to troubleshoot it and head straight to requesting a refund, but for DWU I’m going to make it a special exception — Because it is that good.

Windows 10 user here. After installing DirectX and also changing Startup.ini's playmovie 1 to playmovie 0, I still have the same issue (launcher fine, click Play, launcher goes away, then comes back, with no game launching).

This is the first game I've been disappointed in GoG's support for. Many folks both here and at the official forums for the game are having this issue. There must be a solution to it, or folks wouldn't keep recommending it. Please, GoG, patch the installer so that this game works!

Not sure how good this game is, but the fact its this difficult to get to work... well I am requesting a refund. I tried installing Direct Play and WMP. WMP refused to install and Direct Play did not help neither did editting the ini fial to stop the intro from being played.

Hmmm, I also tried Installing DirectX June 2010. Still no luck, I open the launcher, it opens the game for a few seconds, well not something that fills the screen or anything, you can just tell its trying to load, then jumps straight back the the launcher without explaining anyway.

The only thing which finally worked for me was installing the Microsoft XNA Framework Redistributable 4.0.

(For whatever reason I cannot post the link here. But you easily find it by searching in Internet. Then download from the Microsoft web site.)

After that the game started normally, even the opening movie worked.

Hello,

Hope this might help someone,

I am on a fresh Windows10 installation and installing the following two components, that can be obtained directly from the Micorosft Website made the game run. Including the intro video:

- Microsoft XNA Framework Redistributable 4.0
- DirectX End-User Runtimes (June 2010)

Note that you need to extract the DirectX runtimes and after that run DXSETUP.exe from the target directory manually.

@GOG: I would expect YOU to give me this instructions, or better bundle them in your installer. The game requirements list Windows 10 as a supported plattform, but It was a considerale effort to make the game I just purchased run!

Tried every step in this thread and nothing works for me on Win10.