True Patch Gold Edition -- DIRECT DOWNLOAD LINK

[Tessera]

Hi Tessera, just wanted to say I give infinite respect to you for your work on this patch for one of the best games ever made. It is a tragedy of boundless proportions that Activision did what they did to this masterpiece, but thanks to your hard work we get the chance to enjoy it as it was meant to be. Not gonna mention that other "patch"... My hat is off to you, and I hope people have taken and continue to take the time to express gratitude for everything you put into this patch. *bow -- FYI, I constantly praise this game to the uninitiated, and the second thing I mention is your patch, which I consider indispensable to enjoying the intended experience.

Any rate, just repeating what the poster above said. Game is completely unplayable with this patch when using Win 10. CTD right after clicking "new game". I imagine it will get hammered out, eventually. I'd report to MS per your suggestion, only I don't know what information exactly to give them. The crash log is Greek to me. I imagine you have it right and it's DirectX-related. You got any suggestions on what information is pertinent or on a good way to collate this stuff for MS? I don't agree with you about MS, btw, but that's neither here nor there, and I'm hoping as a fellow lover of this wonderful work of art, you might look past that and try to help a fan out even if you do think they're... misguided.

Thanks for everything that you do!

Well first, thank you for the compliments. I appreciate it.  

Regarding Windows 10 issues... I think I've already covered that problem. If VTMB plays fine on every version of Windows -except- Windows 10, then it doesn't take a genius to figure out that the problem is with Windows 10 itself... not with VTMB, and not with the True Patch. This wouldn't be the first time that a new version of Windows has broken a bunch of great games -- and I'm sure it won't be the last.

Truly, people... it's too soon to be reporting Windows 10 problems, for this or ANY other game. Win 10 has only been around for less than a month. And like every new OS from MicroSlop, it's almost certainly filled with hundreds of bugs and probably just as many compatibility issues. This is why I've been urging everyone... and gamers in particular... to STAY AWAY from Windows 10 for at least another year.

Keep in mind that you aren't losing anything by doing so... because from what I've seen, Win 10 doesn't offer anything new and wonderful, so far as PC gaming is concerned. Not one single thing. So if high-end gaming is what your main priority is, so far as your operating system is concerned, then you gain absolutely nothing by switching to Windows 10 at this point in time. There isn't a single game on the market which has been optimized for Win 10... all of the top titles are still based around DirectX 11 and the Windows 7 OS, actually. Most developers are probably hanging back and waiting to see how popular Win 10 is, before they start basing their designs around that particular OS.

So what's the hurry in switching to Win 10, people..? Gamers are gaining nothing AT ALL by doing so.

I don't want to repeat myself -- and I think my points have already been made. Just give them a chance to iron out the numerous issues with Win10 before installing it. "Newer" isn't always "better," especially where Windows operating systems are concerned. It took MS nearly two years to work out most of the bugs with Windows 7, and they NEVER managed to work out all of the compatibility issues with its predecessor, Windows Vista. As for Windows 8... it's a dog, nobody wants it and everybody knows it, that's why its sales have been absolutely abysmal.

So step back from Win 10 for now, and just stick with Win 7 for a year or so. That is my advice to everyone. If you want to report compatibility issues to MicroSlop, then fine... go right ahead. But you'll still be waiting for at least a year before they get around to fixing it, so again... dump Win 10 for now, and revert to Win 7. At the very least, set up Win 7 as a secondary OS on your computer and just do all of your gaming there.

[Prisoner416]

Just wondering, since I've been gone for a while. What was the reason for the removal of the high-res texture pack again? Was it because it came too close to modding?

I've seen various success rates with Windows 10, and I didn't really have a choice in the upgrade after a hard drive failure and not having an OS disk, so I suppose I'll reinstall and see if I can get it running on mine.

I'd also think that one could reinsert the decapitation sequence in SOMEHOW, but you'd have to really know how it was programmed and risk messing up all sorts of things in the process. Shame it was removed, as I only ever had the Steam version.

[Tessera]

Just wondering, since I've been gone for a while. What was the reason for the removal of the high-res texture pack again? Was it because it came too close to modding?

Yes, that...

...and also because those textures were old and not of the same quality as that of my later VTMB mods. That hi-res texture pack was one of the very first texture mods that I ever created for VTMB, way back in early 2007. And back at that time, the quality of my VTMB mods were pretty lousy, to be honest.

In truth, I was sort of embarrassed by them... so I removed them from circulation, so to speak.  

[Prisoner416]

It's been a long time since I played, I remember mainly using an improvement for the eye models, which I can't remember if it was included with the patch or not.

Lately I've been doing a lot of typo hunting on the Fallout series, namely 1, 3, and New Vegas.

Guess my old account was removed for inactivity. I'll try to pop in every now and then when I can. I see the patch has updated since the last fix, which was my submitted Brujah seduction error. Have to find a change log and see what all was modified.

[Tessera]

LOL... I don't write change logs. Not since 2008. :laugh:

I have fixed so many goddamned bugs over the years, that I quickly got tired of trying to catalog them all. I mean... we're talking about hundreds and hundreds of bugs here. The sheer size of the TPG should give you an idea of how much of an undertaking this project has been.

This game was such a mess before the True Patch... most of you have no idea just how many bugs there are in the plain-vanilla game. It's an insane amount. So it didn't take long for me to just say "Fuck it," and stop keeping notes on every single bug fix. Hey... it's not like anybody is paying me for this stuff.  

[Gamael]

Hello
Ok, so I followed the Installation Instructions thoroughly (and made sure before to paste the vampire content from the Steam Library to another folder outside of the Steam folder). When I tried to start the game (using the exe.file in the root folder) I heard sounds but no graphics until the start page turned up. I chose "New game", but after that the game Crashed To Desktop. I noticed that a crash log was created after the crash so I provide it here, hoping that might bring light into what happens.

Cheers

EDIT:
Just to be sure I understood it right: After copying the contents of the TRUE_PATCH_MAIN into the root folder (the folder containing the vampire.exe), when I got the question about what to do with conflicting files, I chose "Copy and remove" on all conflicting files.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


EDIT by Tessera: removed crash log data, as it was not helpful in this particular situation and also, it was taking up too much space.

[Tessera]

Which version of Windows are you using..? If it's Windows 10, then I have been getting reports that VTMB is not compatible with Win 10. At present, Win 10 is apparently very unfriendly to older (pre-DirectX 11) games.

Did you move VTMB out and away from Steam and into its own unique folder on your hard drive BEFORE patching it with the True Patch..?

Are you using the most recent, up-to-date version of the True Patch Gold Edition..? And did you download it from THIS web site..? If you find the TPG on some other site, then you need to know that those versions of the TPG are unauthorized. They may not be up-to-date... they may even have been altered... and I will not support them.

Are you using any other third-party mods for VTMB..? If so, then are those mods 100% True Patch compatible..? And did you install them AFTER you installed the True Patch..?

If you are running the game in widescreen resolution (most people are these days), then did you use the VTMB ResPatcher utility that is bundled in with the True Patch..? And did you select the correct set of widescreen resolutions (16:9 or 16:10) when you used it..? NOTE: the ResPatcher should not be used until AFTER the TPG has been fully installed.

Is there anything else about your system that you can tell me..? Even the little things can sometimes be important. The crash logs don't help me at all... they merely say which modules crashed, but they rarely say WHY they crashed.

[Gamael]

Which version of Windows are you using..? If it's Windows 10, then I have been getting reports that VTMB is not compatible with Win 10. At present, Win 10 is apparently very unfriendly to older (pre-DirectX 11) games.

Did you move VTMB out and away from Steam and into its own unique folder on your hard drive BEFORE patching it with the True Patch..?

Are you using the most recent, up-to-date version of the True Patch Gold Edition..? And did you download it from THIS web site..? If you find the TPG on some other site, then you need to know that those versions of the TPG are unauthorized. They may not be up-to-date... they may even have been altered... and I will not support them.

Are you using any other third-party mods for VTMB..? If so, then are those mods 100% True Patch compatible..? And did you install them AFTER you installed the True Patch..?

If you are running the game in widescreen resolution (most people are these days), then did you use the VTMB ResPatcher utility that is bundled in with the True Patch..? And did you select the correct set of widescreen resolutions (16:9 or 16:10) when you used it..? NOTE: the ResPatcher should not be used until AFTER the TPG has been fully installed.

Is there anything else about your system that you can tell me..? Even the little things can sometimes be important. The crash logs don't help me at all... they merely say which modules crashed, but they rarely say WHY they crashed.

I´m using Windows 7 (haven´t upgraded yet because of the often usual trouble with using latest version)

I did cut out the entire Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines folder from the Games Steam/ Steamapps/Common folder and pasted it in a folder called VTMB at another place on my computer before applying your patch to it.

I used a version of the True Patch that I downloaded from this site. Not sure if it is the latest though... I downloaded it a couple of weeks ago. UPDATE: I checked it and it is the one with hotfix 8.

I decided not to use any third party mods for now. "Better make the main game work first." I thought.

I am running the game in widescreen resolution but I haven't used the VTMB ResPatcher yet. Not sure how to use it either.

Well, I´m using windows 7, Home premium with Service Pack 1.
I have a Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 2400 CPU @ 3.10 GHz,
RAM 8 GB,
64 bit operating system

Not sure what more I can provide... Oh, and after the failure with starting the game, I erased all of it, downloaded a new version and tried start it without your patch after I extracted it into an external folder, but then it complained that it couldn't find steam.

UPDATE:
I found the ResPatcher utility, opened up the Instruction Note and tried to find the config.cfg which is supposed to be found in the VTMB\Vampire\cfg sub-folder, but the only files in there is an autoexec file and a notecard called "dummy". No config.cfg to be found there.

[Tessera]

The game writes its own config.cfg file after the first time it has been run. Since you haven't been able to run it yet, you don't have a config.cfg file.

I've never heard of a "dummy" file before... not for VTMB, anyway. That sounds a little suspicious to me. I suggest deleting that file.

Anyway, I have no idea why you're having trouble with it. VTMB with the True Patch should run just fine on every version of Windows 7 that exists. I myself have Windows 7 Ultimate x64 installed on one of my machines, and VTMB runs perfectly there. No problems of any kind whatsoever. I realize that this doesn't help you at all, but I just wanted to mention it.

It's possible that your VTMB download might be corrupted, I suppose. I would suggest deleting the game and then re-downloading it from Steam. It couldn't hurt to try.


Other possibilities:

(1) Your video card might be causing problems with VTMB. Certain models of nVidia video cards have a history of crashing this game. ATI video cards, on the other hand, have not been known to cause any problems with VTMB.

(2) Certain on-board audio hardware can likewise cause the game to crash. VTMB expects to find a separate, dedicated audio card plugged into one of your PCI slots.

(3) Regarding sound cards: just about ANY sound card based upon the Creative Labs "X-Fi" chipset will not only cause problems for VTMB... they will also cause problems for lots of other games and applications, too. This is especially true when an X-Fi card is used in conjunction with a 64-bit operating system. If you own such a sound card, then get rid of it. They're nothing but malfunctioning garbage, frankly. I recommend replacing it with any sound card that is built around a C-Media chipset.

(4) Certain applications running in the background can sometimes interfere with VTMB and other games. Try shutting EVERYTHING off... all of that extra crappola that's running on your task bar. Then see if the game will run.

(5) Do not try to run VTMB on a laptop computer. And it makes no difference how good your laptop is. This game engine pre-dates "gaming laptops," and it has no idea how to properly address laptop hardware. The OS should take care of this issue and translate the instruction sets properly... but in many cases, it doesn't do a good enough job and the game runs poorly, or not at all on a laptop machine. This game... and every Source engine game, really... was meant to be played on a full-sized, desktop gaming rig.

[Gamael]

The game writes its own config.cfg file after the first time it has been run. Since you haven't been able to run it yet, you don't have a config.cfg file.

I've never heard of a "dummy" file before... not for VTMB, anyway. That sounds a little suspicious to me. I suggest deleting that file.

Anyway, I have no idea why you're having trouble with it. VTMB with the True Patch should run just fine on every version of Windows 7 that exists. I myself have Windows 7 Ultimate x64 installed on one of my machines, and VTMB runs perfectly there. No problems of any kind whatsoever. I realize that this doesn't help you at all, but I just wanted to mention it.

It's possible that your VTMB download might be corrupted, I suppose. I would suggest deleting the game and then re-downloading it from Steam. It couldn't hurt to try.


Other possibilities:

(1) Your video card might be causing problems with VTMB. Certain models of nVidia video cards have a history of crashing this game. ATI video cards, on the other hand, have not been known to cause any problems with VTMB.

(2) Certain on-board audio hardware can likewise cause the game to crash. VTMB expects to find a separate, dedicated audio card plugged into one of your PCI slots.

(3) Regarding sound cards: just about ANY sound card based upon the Creative Labs "X-Fi" chipset will not only cause problems for VTMB... they will also cause problems for lots of other games and applications, too. This is especially true when an X-Fi card is used in conjunction with a 64-bit operating system. If you own such a sound card, then get rid of it. They're nothing but malfunctioning garbage, frankly. I recommend replacing it with any sound card that is built around a C-Media chipset.

(4) Certain applications running in the background can sometimes interfere with VTMB and other games. Try shutting EVERYTHING off... all of that extra crappola that's running on your task bar. Then see if the game will run.

(5) Do not try to run VTMB on a laptop computer. And it makes no difference how good your laptop is. This game engine pre-dates "gaming laptops," and it has no idea how to properly address laptop hardware. The OS should take care of this issue and translate the instruction sets properly... but in many cases, it doesn't do a good enough job and the game runs poorly, or not at all on a laptop machine. This game... and every Source engine game, really... was meant to be played on a full-sized, desktop gaming rig.

I'm not so good with computer specs but I made a search and I think I have a Realtek Digital Output (Realtek High Definition) sound card, WDM-type (not sure if I found the right info though). I have an ASUS R9, 280 Series video card.

[Tessera]

RealTek is almost certainly on-board audio hardware. It's not a separate sound card... it's built into your motherboard.

[Nicemods]

Hello,

I was trying out the TPG with the megamod and I ran into a really strange problem, I can only imagine I'm doing something wrong so let me run you down with my process. For the record i'm using Win 8.1 and Geforce GTX 760.

#1. Download a fresh copy and move VTM away from steam.
#2. Copy all TPG files over to VTM
#3. Copy all Megamod files to VTM
#4. Start up the game to get a config.cfg file and exit before making any characters.
#5. Run the VTMB res patcher for 1920 x 1080
#6. Open config.cfg and find r_anamorphic and change its value from "0" to "1"
#7. Make a shortcut to my desktop and add the command line  -w 1920 -h 1080 at the end
#8. Restart the game and make a fresh character.

Now, the game works fine all through the tutorial, however, once I am in the city, random buildings I enter will not let me go back out.  As in, the door will open, however I will not zone out, leaving me trapped forever.

Reloading to a previous save does nothing as the building will permanently be unexitable no matter how many times I try it.

I have tried deleting everything doing steps 1-8 again and doing the tutorial, it resulted in new buildings being unexitable, and the diner crashing me several seconds after I enter it.

I would sincerely appreciate any help or advice you may have!

Thank you.

[Tessera]

The game may be running out of memory. "Crashing when entering the diner" is a classic symptom of this issue.

Try adding the following switch to the end of your VTMB command line:

-heapsize 800000

And make sure that you are not using any other mods -- unless you are absolutely positive that they are 100% compatible with the True Patch. I'm saying this because "not being able to zone out of buildings" sounds suspicious to me. No one has ever reported anything like that before, which indicates that there is something weird going on with your specific installation of VTMB.

Since you intend to use my VTMB Mega-Mod, it is a good idea to install the game itself and the True Patch first, and then start the game and create a test character BEFORE you install the Mega-Mod. Make sure that everything is working properly, before shutting the game down and installing the Mega-Mod files. The main reason for doing it this way is to ensure that you will be better able to track down the source of any potential problems that may arise. So, install VTMB... then install the True Patch... and then, create a temporary test character and start the game normally. If you can make it through the opening cinematic and the subsequent tutorial segments of the game without any glitches, then it is safe to assume that everything is working properly. I STRONGLY RECOMMEND MAKING A FULL BACKUP COPY OF THE GAME AT THIS POINT, AND KEEPING IT IN A SAFE PLACE. Once you have done all of that stuff, go ahead and install the Mega-Mod... after which you will need to erase your test character and create a fresh, new play character.

I should also mention that I myself have VTMB installed on two separate test computers. One of those computers has an ATI Radeon "HD" series video card, whilst the other machine has a much newer nVidia GTX 780 Ti video card. Well, on the computer with the nVidia card, the game occasionally suffers from odd and intermittent glitches... where as on my machine with the ATI Radeon card, it never has any problems of any kind whatsoever. There is a long history of VTMB not getting along very well with certain models of nVidia cards.... which is why I felt that it was worth mentioning.

But try the above "-heapsize" switch first. You mentioned that you're using the VTMB Mega-Mod... and that mod is a serious memory hog. The "-heapsize" switch allows the user to allocate additional memory to VTMB (it actually instructs the Source engine to grab more system RAM and use it as a file cache when it loads). And for VTMB Mega-Mod users, it's an absolute MUST. By default, VTMB only allocates a measly 200 megabytes or so of system RAM for its own use. Keep in mind that the game was released back at a time when most people only had 1 or 2 gigabytes of RAM in their machines. But the VTMB Mega-Mod requires... at the very least... approximately 600 megabytes of memory overhead (more is better)... otherwise, it will simply fail to load certain game maps and as a result, the game will crash.  

[demontrace]

Is there a post or something that compares the differences between the Tessera patch, and the Wesp5 patch?

[Tessera]

There are several threads in this forum, posted by various people, which make comparisons between the True Patch and the so-called "unofficial patch" produced by Wesp.


One of the best threads devoted to that subject can be found here:

http://www.tessmage.com/forum/index.php?topic=57843.msg78317#msg78317


It's an older thread that was created a few years ago, but just about all of the information presented within that thread is still accurate and pertinent.

[Nicemods]

The game may be running out of memory. "Crashing when entering the diner" is a classic symptom of this issue.

Try adding the following switch to the end of your VTMB command line:

-heapsize 800000

And make sure that you are not using any other mods -- unless you are absolutely positive that they are 100% compatible with the True Patch. I'm saying this because "not being able to zone out of buildings" sounds suspicious to me. No one has ever reported anything like that before, which indicates that there is something weird going on with your specific installation of VTMB.

Since you intend to use my VTMB Mega-Mod, it is a good idea to install the game itself and the True Patch first, and then start the game and create a test character BEFORE you install the Mega-Mod. Make sure that everything is working properly, before shutting the game down and installing the Mega-Mod files. The main reason for doing it this way is to ensure that you will be better able to track down the source of any potential problems that may arise. So, install VTMB... then install the True Patch... and then, create a temporary test character and start the game normally. If you can make it through the opening cinematic and the subsequent tutorial segments of the game without any glitches, then it is safe to assume that everything is working properly. I STRONGLY RECOMMEND MAKING A FULL BACKUP COPY OF THE GAME AT THIS POINT, AND KEEPING IT IN A SAFE PLACE. Once you have done all of that stuff, go ahead and install the Mega-Mod... after which you will need to erase your test character and create a fresh, new play character.

I should also mention that I myself have VTMB installed on two separate test computers. One of those computers has an ATI Radeon "HD" series video card, whilst the other machine has a much newer nVidia GTX 780 Ti video card. Well, on the computer with the nVidia card, the game occasionally suffers from odd and intermittent glitches... where as on my machine with the ATI Radeon card, it never has any problems of any kind whatsoever. There is a long history of VTMB not getting along very well with certain models of nVidia cards.... which is why I felt that it was worth mentioning.

But try the above "-heapsize" switch first. You mentioned that you're using the VTMB Mega-Mod... and that mod is a serious memory hog. The "-heapsize" switch allows the user to allocate additional memory to VTMB (it actually instructs the Source engine to grab more system RAM and use it as a file cache when it loads). And for VTMB Mega-Mod users, it's an absolute MUST. By default, VTMB only allocates a measly 200 megabytes or so of system RAM for its own use. Keep in mind that the game was released back at a time when most people only had 1 or 2 gigabytes of RAM in their machines. But the VTMB Mega-Mod requires... at the very least... approximately 600 megabytes of memory overhead (more is better)... otherwise, it will simply fail to load certain game maps and as a result, the game will crash.  

Thank you very much Tessera, the heapsize switch seems to have fixed everything.

[Tessera]

 

[Nicemods]

Or not...

Well, the diner certainly doesn't crash anymore, and I made it significantly farther into the story before the no zoning thing happened again, (after I got the Astrolite from the pier and went back into mercio's apartment.)

I tried upping the heap size a bit, and I still seem to be stuck in the building. For the record, i'm not using any other mods.

This really is a strange issue.