Answers to Crash QuestionsQ: When I try to play Inner Space, it crashes. Why is it crashing and what can I do about it?
A: When software crashes, it wastes your time and is frustrating. We understand that frustration. That's why we spend thousands of hours testing on various computers to ensure that the game doesn't have bugs in it. Despite this, there's still the occasion problem, but the detailed information below should help.
The most important thing you need to know about crashes is that once any program crashes, you've got to restart Windows before the game can run correctly again. Windows and all Windows programs such as the game share many modules, so if the game or any other application crashes, the whole system becomes unstable.
Make Sure Windows is in 256 Color Mode
The game and Factory work best in 256 color mode, so if the game is crashing, make sure Windows is running in 256 colors. On some computers, not running in 256 colors only makes the game graphics not look as good or slows down the game, but on other computers, it can cause a crash or freeze. To check or change your video mode in Win 95, open the Control Panel, Display Settings, Settings tab. In Win 3.1, open Windows Setup, Display Settings to see video mode.
An Installer Problem?
It is especially frustrating when an installer fails, so this is the most rigorously tested part of the whole package. If you have had any sort of installer error, the first thing to do is restart Windows. Either Windows was unstable before running the installer (causing the crash) or the installer crashing made Windows unstable. Either way, you need a clean restart before trying to run anything. Always restart Windows after any error in any program. As indicated above, make sure you are in 256 color mode, because that is the safest mode to run the game and installer. Then try installing again. Make sure to Answer No if the installer asks if you wish to keep previous settings. If there is still an error, you may need to contact us for assistance. Please write down the exact text of any error messages.
Check if You Need to Upgrade
The most frequent cause of crashes is running an older version of the game that has errors we have since fixed. Any time we find a new error in the game, we fix it and post a free upgrade on our website. Therefore, even if you got the game today, compare your version # to that of the latest upgrader available on our download page. If the upgrader is a newer version, download and install it.
Narrow Down the Problem
95% of all bugs reported to us are fixed by switching to 256 color mode and upgrading to the latest version. If there's still a problem, here are the remaining possible causes of crashes, starting with the most likely:
1. Errors Caused by Custom Ships
2. Errors Caused by Saved Games
3. Could It Be the Video Driver?
4. Could it be the Sound Card or Driver?
5. Insufficient Memory or Hard Disk Space?
6. Is Another Program Messing Up the Game?
7. Is It a New Game Bug?
Look at the Error Messages
When the game crashes, the error message may point to the source of the problem. Most error messages are in the form "INSPACE caused a General Protection fault in module XXX.DRV". It won't actually say XXX.DRV. XXX will be the name of the driver that caused the crash. Inner Space called a function in the specified driver and the driver couldn't handle it, causing a crash. If the specified driver refers to your sound driver, video driver or MMSYSTEM, that's where the error occurred. Sometimes the names of the drivers are confusing. If the driver name has SND in it, is is probably a sound driver. If VID or S3 are in the driver name, it is probably a video driver. If it is MMSYSTEM, it has to do with sound. If you're still not sure, see if the driver name is similar to the name of your video or sound cards.
The other very important point is where the crash is occurring. Does it only crash when you hit certain keys, play certain ships, deploy certain weapons or some other specific user action? Does the game crash only in certain places?
Errors Caused by Custom Ships
When you make custom ships in the Ship Factory, it's possible to make ships with physical characteristics that the game can't handle, causing a crash. We tried to make everything bulletproof, but we can't foresee every type of ship a user might create. To test if this is the problem, remove all custom ships from the Inner Space SHIPS subdirectory and then play using the Sky Talon or some other ship that you did not create. If the game only crashes when a custom ship is used, the custom ship is the root of the problem. Go back to the Factory and try different settings to see if that affects anything. If you can't determine the problem with the ship, but you know it's the problem, send us your custom ship by email and we'll try it here.
Errors Caused by Saved Games
Similar to custom ships, it's possible to get a saved game that causes Inner Space to crash. This can be caused by getting into a game scenario that is extremely rare or more likely by a few bytes incorrectly stored in the saved game file. To test, try starting a new game from scratch. If the problem only occurs with the saved game, it is the root of the problem. It might be a freak occurrence that we can't do anything about, but it's possible that the saved game error could be safely handled by the game if we improve it. Therefore, if you find a saved game error, you're welcome to email it to us to see if we can fix the game to handle that error.
Could it be the Video Driver?
It's rare for a video card to be the problem but it's common for the video driver to be the source of game crashes. All game graphics go through Windows which sends it to the video driver and then to the screen. The spec for video drivers say they must do certain things. Since most Windows programs use only 30% of that spec, some functions aren't tested much and don't work the way they should. If the game calls a function in the video driver that doesn't work right, your system crashes. Fortunately, video drivers, like the game, are often upgraded to fix bugs. Almost all video card makers provide free driver upgrades and many can be downloaded from their websites.
To determine if the video driver is the problem, look at the error message when a crash occurs. As detailed above in Look At the Error Messages, the crash message will tell you if it's a video, sound or other sort of problem. If it's a video driver problem, see if the video card maker has a free driver update available.
Although we do so much testing, it's also possible that a crash in the video driver is caused by a bug in the game. See Maybe It's a New Game Bug below to proceed if there's still a problem after updating your video driver.
Could it be the Sound Card or Driver?
Sound cards are more the most problematical hardware components. Almost all sound cards are Sound Blaster compatible, but there are a myriad of variations. The drivers are also complex, providing sound effects, music and sometimes 3D panning and wave effects. When a sound card isn't working right, sounds can be chunky, sound and music won't play, and it could even cause a crash. All game audio goes through Windows which sends it to the sound driver and then to the speakers. The spec for sound drivers say they must do certain things but some functions aren't tested much and don't work the way they should. If the game calls a function in the sound driver that doesn't work right, it can cause a crash. Fortunately, sound drivers, like the game, are often upgraded to fix bugs. Almost all sound card makers provide free driver upgrades and many can be downloaded from their websites.
To determine if the sound driver is the problem, look at the error message when a crash occurs. As detailed above in Look At the Error Messages, the crash message will tell you if it's a video, sound or other sort of problem. If it's a sound driver problem, see if the sound card maker has a free driver update available. It's also possible that the sound card itself is not fully compatible with Windows. In such a case, you might need to turn Mix Channels down to 1 in the game Audio setup or even do without sound or music if the sound card isn't quite right.
Although we do so much testing, it's also possible that a crash in the sound driver is caused by a bug in the game. See Maybe It's a New Game Bug below to proceed if there's still a problem after updating your sound driver.
Insufficient Memory or Hard Disk Space?
These problems are very rare since the game's system requirements are pretty low. You need 8Mb of RAM and at least 2Mb of free hard disk space to install and run the game. However, when running the game, Inner Space shares the computer with every other program running and Windows itself. The Windows operating system uses a lot of memory to run. It uses so much memory that it often uses hard disk space as extra memory. This is called virtual memory. Because of this, Windows and the game can give errors and even crash if you don't have enough hard disk space assigned to virtual memory and enough free hard disk space for temporary files Windows creates. Make sure you have 2-10Mb assigned for virtual memory and that you have at least 2Mb free hard drive space for temporary files.
Is Another Program Messing Up the Game?
It is a very rare problem, but other software on your computer can interfere with the game. All programs shares the same memory space and many of the same modules to provide common services. Because of this, if any program has errors, Windows, the game, or other applications might give errors or crash. Beta software and virus checkers are notorious for messing up programs. If you are using a prerelease beta version of any program, you should assume it has bugs that can mess up Windows. Virus checkers are inherently troublesome because they watch everything that happens on your computer. They are written to watch but not interfere with normal operations, but sometimes they don't work quite right. For example, most packages tell users specifically to turn virus detection off before installing or the install might not work right. The other sort of problem is when some program controls a shared resource that Inner Space also needs to use. Some resources on your computer can only be used by one program at a time, so the first program to get it locks out all others. For example, if you had another game running, it might get exclusive control of sound and music, locking out Inner Space until you closed the other game. If you think you might have this sort of problem, close everything else before running the game.
Is It a New Game Bug?
We've gone through every reason that the game could crash except the possibility that you've found a new bug in the game. It's possible but unlikely because many thousands of users have played the game, we have fixed every problem reported to us and we have spent several thousand hours testing on different machines ourselves. After all that, the only sort of bugs that could remain are extremely unusual, so we really need your help to fix it. It could be a really weird combination of events that triggers a crash. Maybe the game crashes every time if you press three keys at once while flying into the Black Hole? That sort of thing. Provide us with detailed information about the crash, where it happens in the game and how we can reproduce the problem here. If we can't reproduce the problem, there's no way we can fix it.
If a user gives us little to go on like saying that the game crashes every time they run it, we can't do anything. Obvious problems would have shown up in our test machines and thousands of users would be complaining if such a problem happened generally. Please use our Tech Problem Report Form to tell us about the problem in detail. What we need is a detailed procedure (Do this, then this, and then this while playing this ship) that will cause a crash every time. Any problem we can reproduce, we can fix, but if it doesn't happen here, there's nothing we can do.
