Windows 10 running via GOG Launcher.

Starts up fine, character create fine, but when it comes to game play, the game screen is black (edging still there), and Virgil speaking to me is just a blur of white letters.

Any idea? I can get a screenshot if needed.

If you look at the game page it doesn't say it is compatible with win10, yet. It's really never a good idea to buy a new OS. Best to wait 6months-1year after a new OS to even begin considering it, so they can get all the bugs and kinks worked out and you can see how it does for people over a period.

There are a few possible solutions in this thread:

http://www.gog.com/forum/arcanum_of_steamworks_and_magick_obscura/bad_news_everyone

Solutions please, not criticism.
I play old old old games on here just fine. I'm talking, only-works-in-DOSBox old.
SO if games can work on there fine on Windows 10, I am sure there is a way. Thanks!! I found a workaround via this.

I didn't mean to be criticizing (well other than the state of a new OS), I was trying to give advice and present the facts (the page says it does not support win10, simple as that). I didn't mean anything by it. I'm glad you got it working, of course, I figured there'd be a way! WOO!! ENJOY! GREAT game!

See, the reason those work on Windows 10 is because Dosbox itself works on Windows 10, and it's the kind of software that can be relatively easily configured or even modified to work on a newer OS (which, as it's only an interpreter, automatically makes most games it can run compatible with that OS). Games that do not use external interpreters can be trickier to adjust that way, you basically have to work with what's essentially just built-in configuration options and compatibility settings, which with an already bug-prone game like Arcanum can take time and can potentially make things even worse. Plus there might a bit of a hardware/software dependency thrown in, meaning a universal solution is even harder to find. Then again, it was pretty much the same for older Windows versions. You find what works for you through experimenting, but there's no guarantee it's going to work for everyone.

Glad you got it working!

Just curious, which workaround helped in your case? It might be nice to have that documented in this thread too in case someone else is looking for solutions.

Win 7 compatibility on, -no3d and -doublebuffer added and then I set it to run in maximized windowed mode. Once I set it to this mode, the black screen problem stopped.

So glad, this game is amazing.

Must reply as this helped it to work on my Windows 8.1 laptop too...

Right click on program, select 'Troubleshoot Compatibility', say it worked on previous Windows, select any from the list, say the game won't display properly, and it will automatically change the settings.
Test it, then save the new settings!
Yay for my other laptop haha.

Yes, this game is amazing!

I am playing with nice Virgil and good Dog now.

Level 40.

Win 7

:))

It was not working, since I upgraded to Win 10 (an error saying there was missing .dll files, kept popping up every time I clicked the shortcut).
After reinstalling, it's working perfectly.

Actually, this is a fairly important thing to note.

The Windows 10 upgrade process (if you did an in-place install, which you must initially do when getting the free upgrade from Microsoft; later you can make clean install media, but that first upgrade has to be done in place unless you purchase a new copy of Windows) sometimes has odd effects on existing software, which are not the case when the same software is reinstalled after Win10 has been set up.

In fact, sometimes the upgrade process will even declare a program to be altogether incompatible with Windows 10 and automatically uninstall it, even though it turns out the program is compatible after all (and works fine if you install it again). An example I remember from the reddit computer programs was the Speccy system analysis program.

So in general if you get a problem like this it's a good idea to reinstall the program first and see if it persists; also, the real moral is that in-place Windows upgrades suck, and shame on Microsoft for forcing us to do it that way for the free Win10 offer (after all, the discount Windows 8 launch upgrade deal didn't do that!) - you're probably best off doing a clean reinstall of Windows 7 or 8.1 and then upgrading to Windows 10 before installing anything significant, or else once your Win10 upgrade has taken, download the install media ISO from Microsoft and do a clean reinstall :)