If I roll back like that I get an error that it's not the correct version of the exe (although it IS 1.0.7.4 if I check properties). This is just horrible to get working...

Same here. And I can't seem to find any solutions online.

Ideas?

Jesus! Thank you so much! Ive been trying to run this game for the past few years with no luck, and now it runs flawlessly and in the correct resolution.
One of my all time favorites.

Worked for me, thank you!

why "EG: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Arcanum\Arcanum"?

is this a steam specific thing or do we also have to make another "arcanum" folder, inside the game folder for the gog version? and why?


edit: scratch that above. it seems it doesn't install correctly if you add another "arcanum" folder.

"EG" (which should have been "e.g.") is the abbreviation of a Latin phrase used to mean "for example".

There is no need to change any folder location of your game installation, that directory path is just an example for people that are not computer savvy and have no idea what to input when asked by the patch.

i know what e.g. means, but normally when you give an example you don't add random stuff after the default game folder, which for the gog version is "arcanum", that just leads to confusion. anyways, maybe it's a quirk of the steam version, i've seen people suggesting to use "arcanum\arcanum" before, which wouldn't make any sense otherwise.

Many Steam installations have another folder within the first corresponding to it in the "...\steamapps\common\" tree, which in turn contains the actual game files. Most of the times it will be named differently ("[GAME NAME]_Data", "[GAME NAME]Game", etc.), but it would not be hard to imagine that the Steam release of Arcanum has that folder named the same as the base one; although I do not know it with any certainty.

If you really want to know exactly why the OP has two arcanum named folders, you should ask people that own the game in Steam if that is the case.

Still makes no difference for the instructions of the OP. If it is just an example, it means that it can be any other path.

I'm still having some slowdown issues even after following these steps.
(without the hotfix version)

Specifically I'm getting noticeable slowdowns when there's a lot of enemies/npcs in close proximity (just outside the view or on screen) and a lot of it if I'm trying to also scroll at that time. It's noticeable with 2 followers and about 3-4 NPCs in the area, the more there are the slower the game gets.
As far as I can tell more followers increase the slowdowns, meaning you can't run around with too many of them.

First and foremost, disregard the comments above discussing the hotfix version. I am using the latest GOG version modded with UAP, HiRes, HQ Music and HQ Townmaps, in Windows 10 Pro 1903 and there are no issues at all (and I was using it in W10 1803 before, no issues either).

Make a clean install with the latest version from GOG (either backup installer or Galaxy are fine), follow the instructions in the OP and if you still have problems then, post again.

If you want to make sure the backup downloader version you get is the latest: the signature from GOG is dated 2018 October 3 08:52:55

Did that, last estversion.
The problem persists. The moment I hit a populated area my frames visibly tank and the animations happen like they're stuck in molasses.

But I did figured out what's causing all of the issue, I'm just not sure why I didn't figured it out till now.
Anyway it's related to the light and/or shadows, specifically I had two in my party with the 'helmet of light' (the one that produces light so you don't take darkness penalties to hit) and it was affecting the performance in crowded areas (or killing it with Dynamic Shadows on), removing the helmets and the provided light seems to have fixed the issues. I guess I just can't use the helmets, which I kinda liked.

Make sure that the drivers of your video card are not trying to do more than the game's engine was prepared for: Disable any kind of enhancement of the game's antialiasing, multi-framed samples, etc.

Also, if your video card's software allows for it, configure the refresh rate to be controlled by the game (just in case).

If all else fails, try rendering by software, by changing the "Renderer = 1" option in the HiRes patch config.ini file to "Renderer = 0", and running _install.bat again

... that actually fixed it, thank you.

But wasn't -no3d supposed to do the same?

I actually don't know if the -no3d still does what it is supposed to for the HiRes patched version of arcanum.exe. It accepts it without complaining, but in my opinion it is very probable that it does nothing.

It seems that way, it was certinly not helping with my issue.
Doesn't that mean " -doublebuffer" also does nothing?
I'm not using anything in my shortcut and it is working well but almost all of the old posts make mention of both -no3d and - -doublebuffer.