trying to get a game to work, an error message comes up after install Options

[BmanCity]

The error message reads: The driver of a powerVr 3D card has been detected, but the hardware could not be initialized. Please remove the file SGL.DLL from your windows and windows/system directory and try again.
Problem is, I don't have that kind of file on my system.
I'm on the road, this is a laptop, and me and the guys just want to play a kool game. The game is the Fifth Element, and the company we're affiliated with gave us a different computer to deal with, the last one (computer that is) that game worked on was win2k, we now have win xp.

Can anyone help us out?
from the dudes on the road without a clue....

[Steve]

BmanCity,

Thanks for the PM, only thing is I know naff all about games !!!! You are better posting in here. All I can suggest is looking at the games website, see if there are any patches or updates needed to run it on XP, the other thing would be to look for the latest video drivers.

See if anyone else has better suggestions !!! No doubt they will !

[Pollock]

Steve was right.
I can't even find out who makes the game to help. It may not recognize the video card without a patch or it may just be incompatible with it.

[Steve]

looks like a bit more info would help, BmanCity, see if we can take it from there !!!

[Grasshopper]

The game seems to have been last published by Focus Multimedia and was compatible with 95/98/ME. Focus don't list it at all now & there is nothing useful on their site. So really that was a fat lot of help to you! :frown:

[Guest_David S_*]

How about trying...

a. the latest display drivers from powervr.com
b. running the game in compatability mode
c. downloading the application compatability toolkit wizard and using that to force a compatability mode
d. Oh and doing what the error says and doing a search for sgl.dll and deleting it

[BmanCity]

We just wanted to say thanx to everyone for their help! We're gonna try David's suggestion about checking out powervr.com. But here's more info (for Steve), the manual has four web sites, I can't quite figure out which one will help but here they are: www.ubisoft.com
www.gaumont.fr
www.thefifthelement.com
www.kalisto.com

we also did a search on the computer and found no such file SGL.DLL

what do you think guys?

[viperdriver]

I cocur with David S - update the drivers and run the game in compatability mode

[Johnline]

Ok guys, ignore what DavidS suggested, none of it works. I've found the solution, and it works on my xp professional.
I know how frustrating it is trying to get a game to work when it gives you a vague error message, thats why I joined these forums just to make this post and you guys help out. After all it was an awesome movie, and the game is inspiring.
Undo any changes you may have made to the Fifth Element directory and make sure the program isn't set to run is 256 colours, different resolutions or 95/98/any compatibility.
I found the solution on a french website but the file contents are English enough, (skip to the bottom link to download the soda.zip fix):
http://www.jeuxvideo.com/

This site then gave me a link to the ecological archives:
http://www.esapubs.org/
The site strangely talks about birds, immigration, and matlab. It is actually a site that hosts an analytical program designed to run in matlab, but because matlab is also an old program, the site hosts an archive called soda.zip, which contains files which seem to cover any compatibility issues or absent files win2000 and xp might have.
So Download Soda.zip
Extract. Ignore the file "soda.exe", but copy all the other .dll files to C:\WINDOWS and run the game unmodified, it should work.
Supergreen.