Forums > Game Forums > Mission 9 > Mission 9 (AAVB error)
Ggoran on 6/9/2024 7:03 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
I was eager to finish this old adventure,but unfortunately after some progress,the game just crashes with a message "AAVB the specified file does not exist" ?! This is game for Win 3.11,but i tryied on each possible OS,yet with the same error at the same place (when i touch one pillar).In order for the game to work correctly, you need to install the "Autodesk Animator Pro" utility,so perhaps it causes this error,but I couldn't find another version of it to install and try,and i don't know any tweaks on these old OSes.Has anyone even played this game for a while,or even better...did some of you guys know how to solve this issue? (i was thinking that maybe CD is corrupted,but it happens even on Beta CD edition)
Rwolf (23529) on 6/9/2024 9:14 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
You could try capturing the file access with something like FileMon (from Sysinternals), and see if the missing file exists at all and what it is. (sometimes a single missing file can be replaced by a dummy with the same name just to proceed - done so in one other game with a missing/corrupt sound file)
(There is also some comments on the difficulty running animator on modern systems here: https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=4293 )
Ggoran on 6/10/2024 6:24 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
Thanks for the suggestion, which I will try. Just to say that it reports the same error when CD is not loaded (disconnected from PCem), so I doubt that it is a single file but some type of loss of connection with the datas in this particular area of the game.All in all, an interesting thing to tweak,but i'm not good enough in that field...but certainly i'll try anything to make this game works,cause this issue drives me insane.
Ggoran on 6/11/2024 6:20 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
I checked CD with the "power iso" and all the files are from 1994 and 1995, which means that no one messed with the files during years, and CD is probably valid. "AAVB error" (probably) is connected with "Autodesk Animator Player" utility, but I just don't know what to do to fix it. Perhaps some manual command entry in INI files,cause during installation of the game it changes some INI files in Win3.1...Gee man! Those old games drive me crazy!!!! Now i'm in search for some good tweaker,and i'm ready to pay him for trouble just to solve this annoyance.
Yuri Melkov (14173) on 6/11/2024 1:14 PM · Reply · Permalink · Report
Maybe you have not installed Animation Player from the CD?
Ggoran on 6/12/2024 11:08 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
I installed it couple of times (reinstall)....did even a couple of tweaks,but i'm not good in that. (at all). I personally think that this player has to be adjusted manually, but that still requires some knowledge of dos,and specially command lines etc etc.
Yuri Melkov (14173) on 6/12/2024 11:21 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
Too bad. I do not think that's a problem with that player then - probably indeed a cricital bug with a missing game file.
Ggoran on 6/12/2024 11:43 AM · edited · Reply · Permalink · Report
Gee man! Then it turns out that the game is unplayable and it was sold back then?! BTW i checked with power iso and all the files on CD are from 1994 and 1995,so nobody interfear in it,and CD is valid....really strange and frustrating case.
Rwolf (23529) on 6/13/2024 11:51 AM · Reply · Permalink · Report
It probably could run back then; though I'd never heard of it until now (I never was much into Win3.x for gaming back then, I preferred DOS). The author might want to chime in, if there were any issues. (I see he's an active Mobygames user&approver still.)
Ggoran on 6/13/2024 1:36 PM · Reply · Permalink · Report
First strange thing is that on whole net we didn't see any screenshot,or gameplay after that crital spot where game crushes. I'm not entirely sure, but I think there were other games that could not be solved without the patches that were made afterwards... if nobody reported anything to Scott those years, then obviously nobody played the game (or didn't care which is also strange), and I don't know if he made any "quality check". If he is active, it would be GREAT if it's possible to contact him, because this is a really interesting and unusual situation...do you think we could reach him somehow?
Ggoran on 6/13/2024 1:45 PM · edited · Reply · Permalink · Report
And yes, there is also a beta CD for this game, which is even a little different, and you can see that the developer changed some things on the budget version...but "BETA CD" also crashes in the same place...yet! its really hard to believe that he overlooked this error twice??!!!
Ggoran on 6/13/2024 7:30 PM · Reply · Permalink · Report
Great! I have to thank you personally because this game has already started to itch me. I hope Scott will read your message and remember his old work. I haven't played the game on the original system, but the closest thing to it is PCem, which almost completely emulates old computers.(not only virtualy,but hardware itself) I know it's not 1/1, but it's the closest to it. if Scott reply and confirm that the game worked in 1995 (to be concrete that he played it even after that "cursed" wooden pole),then i'll get some old PC,and istall OS just to solve this problem....this is the VERY first case where something seems unsolvable regarding the installation of old games so its really starting to hurt! 😄