Getting a Windows 98 game to run on modern windows

[vulcanlogician]

I suck at computers. I don't even know what version of windows I have, except that it's "not Windows 10." ------7 maybe?

Anyway, I'm trying to run a Windows 98 game (Neverwinter Nights Diamond Edition) on it but it won't work. I've tried adjusting the compatibility thingie under properties. That didn't work. I've been reading some stuff online that says to uninstall it and reinstall under compatibility mode. I have no idea how to do that.

Any suggestions?

[Brian37]

I suck at computers. I don't even know what version of windows I have, except that it's "not Windows 10." ------7 maybe?

Anyway, I'm trying to run a Windows 98 game (Neverwinter Nights Diamond Edition) on it but it won't work. I've tried adjusting the compatibility thingie under properties. That didn't work. I've been reading some stuff online that says to uninstall it and reinstall under compatibility mode. I have no idea how to do that.

Any suggestions?

Sledgehammer? Brass knuckles and pepper spray? Lighter fluid and matches?

What? Nobody likes my suggestions.

I am the wrong person to ask. 

I will say this, the more distance between old operating systems vs newer ones, the harder it becomes to get them to be compatible. There are geeks who know how to partition hard drives, and get one segment to mimic older versions. I wouldn't know how to do that though.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

emulator

[Dr H]

What he said.  You can get windows versions from 7 onwards to emulate previous versions.  

I have a laptop with Windows 7 that is set up to emulate XP, 2000, and 98se.  What you do is set up a virtual machine, which creates a subenvironment and lets you open a window in which you can install and run previous versions of Windows.  Then you install your legacy software via that virtual machine window.

Doesn't work 100% of the time, but it's not too bad -- maybe 95%.

For windows 7:

https://microsoft-virtual-pc.en.softonic.com/

For later versions:

https://www.virtualbox.org/

Have fun.

[Aliza]

Have you tried a time machine?

You might need a time machine for this project.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Have you tried a time machine?

You might need a time machine for this project.

On it.

[FlatAssembler]

In my experience, there are 3 basic reasons preventing programs for Windows 9x to work on modern versions of Windows:
1) The programmers assumed the most efficient method of doing Just-In-Time compilation is to store the machine code in .COM files and executing them. That was true in MS-DOS and Windows 3.x. That was not true in Windows 95 (since they were 32-bit, it involved putting the processor in the virtual 8086 and back into normal, which was inefficient), it's even less true on 32-bit Windows NT (because it involved running NTVDM, which was even less efficient), and it's even less true on 64-bit Windows (which doesn't have NTVDM, so the program that tries to invoke a .COM file crashes). A work-around is to use a 32-bit Windows rather than 64-bit.
2) The programmers assumed their programs would always be run on Windows 9x, rather than on Windows NT or its descendants (such as Windows 2000-10), so they didn't make it possible for them to deal with NTFS. That is, they made those programs rely on being able to modify their own files on the fly, which NTFS doesn't allow if a program is installed in "Program Files". Modern programs that do that need to invoke the User Account Control to ask for permission. Oddly enough, simply invoking "fopen" from MSVCRT.DLL to open a file, that is considered by NTFS to be a system file (since it's in "Program Files", the same directory the program itself is usually in), for writing, doesn't by itself invoke User Account Control, but instead returns a null-pointer and sets "errno" to 5. A very simple work-around is not to install the program into "Program Files", but into, for example, "My Documents".
3) The programmers assumed the then-current version of Windows would be the last one and programmed that program to try to detect an operating system itself instead of the available features. That's especially true for Direct-X-based games, because Windows 2000 supported less DirectX than Windows ME did. So, now that program tries to detect an operating system, incorrectly detects a modern OS as non-complying and refuse to run on it. A work-around is to set the "Compatibility Mode".

[bennyboy]

I think you can dual-boot with a little twiddling. Maybe install actual Windows 98 on your drive?

[FlatAssembler]

Windows 98 relies on BIOS to access the hard drive during booting. That can't be done with hard drives bigger than around 7.5 GB. If you insert a Windows 98 boot-disk into a modern computer, the FDISK can't even detect the hard drive (I've tried that myself).

[Brian37]

What he said.  You can get windows versions from 7 onwards to emulate previous versions.  

I have a laptop with Windows 7 that is set up to emulate XP, 2000, and 98se.  What you do is set up a virtual machine, which creates a subenvironment and lets you open a window in which you can install and run previous versions of Windows.  Then you install your legacy software via that virtual machine window.

Doesn't work 100% of the time, but it's not too bad -- maybe 95%.

For windows 7:

https://microsoft-virtual-pc.en.softonic.com/

For later versions:

https://www.virtualbox.org/

Have fun.

Um yea, but you cant downgrade on most machines now. Believe me I tried to go from Windows Vista back to 7, the tower I bought with Vista on it wouldn't allow it, and trust me, I took it to a computer expert, and he couldn't do it.

If the OP really wants this game, hate to say it, they are going have to buy an old tower with an old enough OS already on it.