This is for Doug

[photolady]

Rich said for me to ask you this question I asked him.

Is there such a thing as "Fair use" when it comes to games? I heard this on another forum and in my opinion only, don't think there is such a thing if the software was meant to play on only one computer. So???

Oh, and I'm baaaaccckkk!! :D

[mommalina]

Oh, and I'm baaaaccckkk!! :D

Welcome back, Cotter -- ooops, I mean Photolady!

:welcome:..:welcome:..:welcome:..

Lina

[dbarrow]

There is a "fair use" where your game is only supposed to be installed on one machine at a time. Installing it on 2 and trying to play the same ONLINE game at the same time will give you a keycode error as each cd has a key and an online server will reject simultaneous use of the same key.

For many games, you require the cd to run it or start it.
Many of them have been hacked with a "no cd hack" that allows you to play it without inserting the cd.

[photolady]

Thanks Doug. The question in play was a member on another forum couldn't install call of duty2 and said it was his mate's game. I presumed he'd copied it and said that was against forum rules for us to help him. That is when the other member mentioned "fair use" and of course it turned out the one asking about it, had gotten it from his mate cause the mate didn't like the game and gave this one to him.

[photolady]

Hi Lina. Thanks for the welcome back. ;)

[Dan18960]

First off - Welcome Back PL :)

I have several programs that require you to uninstall the registration before moving them to another machine. I wonder if that was not done by that user's mate?

Incredimail comes to mind - you get a registration and have to uninstall it while online. That notifies the "server" that whatever they use for authentication has been changed when you apply the registration to a new system.

Just my .02 cents. :confused:

[dbarrow]

You can install COD2 on multiple machines, you just can't play it online from both at the same time.
I have it on upstairs and downstairs machine.
Single player requires cd in tray to play, "no cd" hack is easily available.
This is my favorite game that I play online regularly as a member of an organized clan with our own server.

What specific "can't play" issues?
There are several patches for it since release and current 1.3 patch must be applied for most online servers.

[photolady]

He was getting a black screen with an error message. I'm not sure which error message right now. I thought it was his video card FX5200, but someone said that game would play on that card. So then he also said his harddrive free space was only 4gb, I do not know if that is part of the problem or not!?

[photolady]

And Dan; thanks for the welcome back.

I am not sure if his friend uninstalled the game or not but as Doug has already said, this doesn't seem to be a problem with this game.

[dbarrow]

COD2, while still using an older but improved version of that game engine, is extremely demanding on the vid card and resources. Some people manage to get it to play, with very reduced settings, on marginal machines.

There can be many factors, vid card, vid drivers, ram, overall system performance, connection and ping.

Un-install/re-install may help ... after ... updating vid driver and DirectX, then apply patches.

[photolady]

Ok, I just popped over to see what the error message was he's getting. It's : Error -1639 Invalid command line arguement. Consult the windows installer SDK for detailed command line help.

He said he gets this before it even attempts to install. Is this really a windows error and not a game error?

[dbarrow]

It would be an MSI installer error.
If he tried a previously unsuccessful install, it may be necessary to JV16 strip it out.
There are various COD2 forums and tech support sites out there.
Great game... going to play for a while now!

[photolady]

I think I'll point him to a cod2 site/forum. MSI installer error? And what is JV16 strip it out?

I'll see about this tomorrow. bed time for me now.