Did anyone encounter this problem? HOMM3 installs and runs fine, except that I can't skip the intro movie - every time I start the game, I must endure the whole movie before I can play. I thought perhaps a firewall is blocking the game from polling keyboard, but that is not the case - I get the same behavior on a completely different computer with no firewall installed. The older versions of the game (with copy protection - that's why I bought GOG version) are able to skip intro easily.

Thank you for the solution! It worked for me, I searched the registry completely and after a few hits, i find the right line, where i changed show intro 1 to 0.
Now i get direct to the menu without intro! Great!

@ donkong:

Ich persönlich freue mich darüber, dass es bei mir läuft- schade, dass es bei Dir nicht klappt.
Wie so häufig gibt es hierbei offenkundig nicht die "eine" Lösung.
Es hilft aber auch nicht, solche Äußerungen zu tätigen...
Trotzdem noch viel Glück!

Interestingly enough I had the same problem, which I fixed by changing the registry values. Now after some time it just stopped working! No matter the values in the registry it wouldn't let me skip the intro. I went ahead and searched the registry, where I found one more place to look at:

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\VirtualStore\MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\New World Computing\Heroes of Might and Magic® III\1.0

Inside I have many more values but also another "First Time" one, which was set to "1". I changed it to 0 and the problem disappeared ... again

You're a life saver. I have no idea how you could have even found that

I just followed the instructions in that post and it stopped the intro from playing the next time I loaded the game, after I force-closed the game from Windows Explorer as it was playing the intro during the previous time I had just loaded it.

I've been playing this game off and on for years, using the same one installation, and the game would always frequently play the intro again, even though I've already been forced to see it countless times before.

In other words, this is an ongoing problem and a game-breaking bug with the GOG version of the game.

Users shouldn't have to alter their Registry in order to workaround the bug.

Instead, GOG should patch the bug out.

Which map are you unable to complete due to this bug? I suggest you contact GOG Support with your concern. They would be more likely to notice and act on it if contacted directly, rather than posting here and hoping they see it.

god, i really hate that nothing just works out of the box when it comes to old games on GOG. For every old game i bought i have to make another extra 3 steps just to make it work on an acceptable level. Here i cant skip intros, i have to edit the registry, did that , doesnt work, so now i have to find a community patch? God damn man, i thought the whole point of buying games on GOG was that i dont have to deal with stuff like this...
At least they could have done something similar to Vampires The Masquarade, like making the community patch available for install directly from the launcher or something...sigh...

Again, there is NO bug here. Intro work. All your problems - cause of wrong install location and no admin run.

VirtualStore in AppData and WinRegistry VirtualStore lcoations should be almost empty and absolutely NO game files there. It cannot be fixed -it you who should properly set it up.

Disabling UAC do not disable using of VirtualStore. Keep it enabled by default and always use adminrun on games related executables and installers. Admin permission question pop-up should appear each time.

Games should not require administrator access to run, only to install. If the game as shipped by GOG is not writing this registry entry properly, then GOG should either patch the game to write it properly (hard) or write the entry during the installer (easy, but causes the intro never to autoplay, even on first run).

There is no issue here either. so let it be no adminrun and Windows virtualstore. There is still no any bugs, no issues with intro. If you faced some troubles here witch one require manual editing of winregistry - that mean something prevent game use win registry at all, even when Windows try to redirect everything to virtualstore store.

Its in first play issue not with the game itself.

Well, or game require admin for first run. Still normal for that old game, ut on current OS...

And no. proper way is to give admin rights to games. Maybe for first launch only. But here virtualstore is what do cause problems. if first run in adminrun - all runs should be in adminrun. or all - in virtualstore run. One or another.

And Heroes3 probably require admin for first run only. This is a game from age when it be even more "normal" than now.

VirtualStore same helpful as problematic.
If you press launch game directly from installer finish screen - it start in adminrun and create normal regirty. next time it be from virtualstore - another one registry entrie.

Maybe it even game specific issue and not only your fault at system tweaking. Still no one and no reasond to be that someone should do something. At first you should do tweaking. Someone can do officially fix something to update games to nowadays Ms WinNT standarts instead of old ones, but no one should do that just because it is in store. store sell game files as is - nothing else. Its not a consoles, it is PC gaming.
And that sometimes is superiority of PC gaming. You can get game as is. And do with files wha you want, install any fixes available online. While on consoles storefronts you get re-released games without possibility to tweak game files.
But... in fact, 50/50, same for PC. Digital releases not work on original systems. This is not how it should be. Especially for Good Old Games.
(for GOG - ScummVM releases always mess).

"Which map are you unable to complete due to this bug?"

Answer: ALL them, because the super long intro that I have been forced to watch a million times before, since it has become unskippable for me a million times before, keeps preventing from being able to access the game and/or load into my saved games at all, unless I agree to put up with the agony of being forced to watch it again.

And I also have an update to my previous post in this thread: manually changing the registry does not solve this problem on a permanent basis.

I just tried to load the game tonight, months after the events described in my previous post in this thread, and now, despite me having changed the registry entry manually to supposedly-but-not-really disable the intro permanently, now the intro magically started becoming forced upon me again when I loaded up the game, for no apparent reason.

I made no changes whatsoever to my installation of the game since the last time I played it with no intro, and now when I load it the intro randomly starts becoming forced upon me again, despite me having disabled it in the registry, which is extremely aggravating.

So, please explain why the game is doing this, exactly, and what exactly caused it to undo the registry change that I had made manually? The game must have done that automatically somehow. I certainly didn't give it any instructions do that.

By the same token, why did this keep happening to me many times in the past, over many years, before I ever edited the registry in the first place?

The game keeps mistakenly thinking I'm running it "for the first time" even though I've already ran it hundreds of times on this same system and with this exact same installation of, which I've never modified in any way in-between any of the times when I've run the game.

And this begs the question: is there any real solution to this game-breaking bug problem, aside from GOG patching, which they stillvery desperately need to do?

That's 100% not true. This is definitely a real issue. I'm not making it up, and nor are any of the other posters who also rightfully complain about it.

This game is very badly bugged and needs to be patched, period. There is no excuse for this crap which is needlesslyg aggravating the players for no good reason, other than because someone isn't bothering to patch it even though it requires a patch.

Here is your "true" - very first thread comment:
https://www.gog.com/forum/heroes_of_might_and_magic_series/homm3_cant_skip_introduction/post2
Go to REGEDIT and manually change cinematic value. Something like firsttimeplay=0 or something viceversa with =1.
For exact config locations, if you didnt find them, check
http://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Heroes_of_Might_and_Magic_III

And for properly working games in future - fix your OS. Its unnormal not matter of which one Win10\11 build you use.
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First of, it is something with disabling UAC. Including 3rd party tweaks\modding to OS. Including non-original OS installation (user-friendly warez repack).

Turn VAC to default state. And anyway always use adminrun at least on installers. Warning pop-up windows should appear and block temporary your Desktop('s).

Reinstall game then. Run setup exe as dmin and check if UAC properly set. if not - its too early to tweak games. before reinstallation check if setup file are properly digitally signed, and during installation do not uncheck "files verification" option in installation settings.

As for GOG Galaxy (Steam, p2p sharing etc-etc) - always do files verification next to downloading finished. At least twice in a row. Especially at least twice or more - for current GOG Galaxy that is no more reports of verification and always do redownload some files. At the end result should be 'check pass, no files to download'. Its for EGS\Origin\Bnet\etc and BitTorrent only, since both Steam and GOG always do redowanlod something.
............
Ok. You guys already done some thing on both Steam and GOG - go ahead. Report game as absolutely broken and require delisting it from stores. As you all always do in such threads.

There IS NO issues with the game. I do start it in adminrun from Installer Finish-Launch last window. Then i start it WITHOUT admin run from exe - saw intro again - and that be last time i saw an intro. Well, at least for English and Russian verisons offline builds.

So let it be by your opinion - some new-braking-thing-patches from 3rd party outsource Ubisoft devs and\or delisting game from store. Not matter if game is work in general.
No one can fix properly and officially ingame bugs now, but we anyway talking about installation\distribution. Same as always in such thread whinier ultimatevely blame distributed version for brokening. This what is "that simple not true". never be a true.

On Amazon i saw comments under Digital versions (exe+mutiple-bin) that its crashed broken bla-bla-bla. Because they did not use adminrun on installer. And that again issue with their OS'tems. Because nowadays Windows (7+) automatically detect executable as installer (require admin rights) if it named setup. or install.exe. Just rename random exe file to it and you will see.
And yet there is MASS reports of such broken Windows installation they have. And only one comment from someone normal who say 'run in admin mode and no issues'.

This subj situation is same. There is no big issues with VirtualStores that prevent games to work properly. Something at 1-2 first run, but next it should work as indendent.

Anyway. Reinstall (as admin) Steam\GOG Gagalxy\etc and games to proper path:
X:\Games\Game-name\
X:\Games\Steam\
X:\Games\SteamApps\
not to program files, C:, root folders, non-latin path.
Do first start of all games as admin. or always optionally (if it in \Games\).

As for Steam\etc - it always should be in adminrun (even to properly work Nvidia Optimus (intel+nv)). But if you start them in admin - it automatically apply to all games started directly from client's libraries (steam links always broken, Galaxy games are DRM-free if started not from Library - so never ever use desktop links for Digital games)

This what is "true". Not your alls always whining that its "not true".

So the introductory video never ends, and you cannot reach the main menu, ever? That is odd. I don't know. It never did that to me. Have you asked GOG support for help with this? So far, you are just complaining at fellow players. Use Wine? The game works great on Linux using Wine. "Badly" bugged to me would mean the game crashes or has maps that cannot be completed, no matter how good you are. Sitting through the introduction repeatedly is annoying, but not game-breaking.

I note that you are not saying how you attempted to fix it, so we cannot verify whether your attempted fix should have worked. If you expect us to help you, tell us exactly what you did, at a detail level that we can reproduce it here and cannot possibly get it wrong.

They think it is vendor who should make game work on every systms for every possible tweaks. Steam, GOG, any else drm-non-drm portable\installers vendors.
Include un-official and changed-gameplay tweaks. Im sure there is someone (for time heroes3 been here), who blame GOG for not adding HD+Mod as default build option.

Well, this one thread is unique. Its not general (and often) issue that games not started at all silently closed (not win8+ issue, can happen even on WinXP). There is exact specific issue here and exact specific known solution. There is knowledge it is about WinRegistry entrie that game generate at first launch (if not pre-set by installer or removed by player).

There is already knowledge and solution that it is user end system issue. And even way to fix mentioned few posts above. Someone admit that to fix someone personal winregisrty issue it can be fixed only as force installer set firsttimeplay=0 for everyone.

And even that not solve issue for everyone. Because installer do that been in admin mode for normal HKLM path, while game been first launched without adminrun generate settings entries in userspace virtualstore and ignore what installer did. Shouldnt be an issue. cause next time everything should be alright.
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ZOOM Platform staff try to make games portable. But only for older games, they use retail 1.0 (sometimes both US+EU), patches if they found them, and they make DRM-free as crack - ZOOM coders remove DRM and winregisty references from exe. Sometimes they get succes to do that. Sometimes not (admit that on ZOOM's discord). Sometimes better not to do that.

Should be - and im acrually sure there is - solution (api) to wrap winregistry to portable - to file inside game fodler. Some solutions by Microsoft (not all code are closed proprietary) maybe. And ofc some 3rd party solutions (still based on which one is available from ms). Wine (but on Linux only).
But existed solutions not always can be used in official versions and in storefronts like GOG doe to license.

And yet, even if if possible theoretically (yes require some work from GOG, they not so pro at it initially, but already made DDraw+D3D and Dinput wrappers), wrapping winregisrty on Windows itself (unlike Linux) is not mandatory and not so useful. Shouldnt be issues if game use VirtualStore WinRegistry. This is nowadays Windwos standard - and how it is should work on users OS side.
Its not for solving issues, its some principallity. Better if game is DRM-free, and better if portable.

It's interesting to read that it's my fault that the game screws up stuff in my registry if I install it as provided by GOG, without taking additional steps nobody told me about. How is it not the publishers' fault that their instalator is faulty?

You start game for first time - it start in adminrun. And real HKLM which one created by installer (both GOG and GOG Galaxy versions, at least english ones).
Second start in NO admin run - game and OS generate and use HKCU/.../VirtualStore/.

Third and any next lacunch - game use one or another depend on did Windows give game admin rights (depend on how you start it). As result - no intro. Both section have firsttimeplay=0 or something like that.

This is what happened with GOG\Galaxy versions on ANY OS starting from WinVista. Including 10/11 too.

GOG installer not related here at all. Game dont care if there is winregitry entries pre-set by installer and generate new ones.

I dont know how that happened, but your system prevent game use all Win Registry sections. It is not your but your system fault. Probably 3rd party security tools. Even if you disable UAC - that make game always use VirtualStore. Still no issue. You just see intro one more time for second launch only.

Im sure you install GOG Galaxy and games to Program Files. This mean it is exactly your fault. Additional 3rd party security tools-services can apply more restrictions to system folders than even Windows+Defender usually do. That for sure. Did they prevent Win Registry? Looks like that. Even Program Files folder shouldn't be a big issue for standard UAC and W.Defender.