Cannot get Oblivion to run, please help

[Timuri]

I got Oblivion through Steam a few days ago and I'm already frustrated out of my skull. It's been nearly three years since I was able to play it, despite occasionally going back and trying to reinstall it again. I'm on a brand new laptop now with these specs:

 

CPU: AMD Phenom II X3 Mobile Processor N850

HDD: 320 GB (With over half still free even with nearly a hundred downloaded mods)

Video: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4250

RAM: 4GB DDR3

 

When I tried to load it up with OBMM and OBSE the first time, it gave me an error saying that I had to load through Steam, and to make certain the 'Enable Steam Community While Playing' box was unchecked if OBSE didn't load. So I did that, and as soon as the Bethesda logo music started the screen flashed, the music stopped and the game crashed. So I disabled every mod, including all the DLC stuff, Shivering Isles, and Knights of the Nine that came with the Steam version, and tried to run it. It got to the title screen that time, but as soon as I clicked on 'New Game' it did the same thing. Any help with this would be very greatly appreciated. I dearly want to play Oblivion again, and this is beyond simply frustrating.

 

Edit: Forgot to mention a couple things. I'm running Windows 7 64-bit, and I've done an archive invalidation through OBMM and have verified local cache files through Steam.

Edited November 22, 2010 by Timuri

[bben46]

You MUST install without any mods first. Then installing the steam version on a computer that has ever had any other version will most likely crash because of the files left behind in the Window registry. All of these must be cleaned out before a new install. The easy way to do this is to use the first part of my Complete Uninstall/reinstall procedure. After you have removed the game entirely from your computer, and when you reach the part about reinstalling from a DVD, use the steam install procedure instead.

 

Here is a link to my complete uninstall/reinstall procedure located in the articles section of the Nexus

http://www.tesnexus.com/articles/article.php?id=240

 

It allows you to preserve any saves and mods, or remove them completely - your choice.

 

After you get the vanilla steam version working, and it has finished updating then you can add your mods back in.

 

I recommend making a backup copy of your data folder before making any changes to it.

[Timuri]

You MUST install without any mods first. Then installing the steam version on a computer that has ever had any other version will most likely crash because of the files left behind in the Window registry. All of these must be cleaned out before a new install. The easy way to do this is to use the first part of my Complete Uninstall/reinstall procedure. After you have removed the game entirely from your computer, and when you reach the part about reinstalling from a DVD, use the steam install procedure instead.

 

Here is a link to my complete uninstall/reinstall procedure located in the articles section of the Nexus

http://www.tesnexus.com/articles/article.php?id=240

 

It allows you to preserve any saves and mods, or remove them completely - your choice.

 

After you get the vanilla steam version working, and it has finished updating then you can add your mods back in.

 

I recommend making a backup copy of your data folder before making any changes to it.

 

 

I'll try uninstalling and reinstalling again. This is the first time I've tried to install Oblivion on this new laptop, my old games were on my old desktop. I've gotten a new one since and haven't attempted to install Oblivion on it. I'll go ahead and do a complete uninstall and redownload Oblivion through Steam and try to run vanilla. Hopefully that works, but it never worked before on my old desktop. I'll have an update sometime tomorrow after it finishes downloading.

[Timuri]

Well, doing that did get Oblivion running, up to a point. I've been backing up the entire game folder before adding the next set of mods. The issue I'm having now I'm sure is a mod issue somewhere. If I remember right it's a missing mesh or something? The issue comes in two flavors, since I'm crashing just before the wall falls apart and you fight your first rats in the tutorial dungeon. The male characters in the character generation, the dark elf in the cell opposite the player's, and the Blades Captain all have their torsos missing. In addition, the second male guard (the one that dies just before you reach the sewers) has his torso replaced by a giant (and I do mean giant) yellow square with an exclamation point on it. The rats were also giant exclamation points. I saw that just before the game crashed. I'm using OBMM and OBSE, and I don't know if Wrye Bash would help as I've never used it before.

 

This is my mod list and load order, in case it helps. Numbers notate active mods in the load order. Dashes are for .esp files that are there because they're part of another mod and I didn't remove them in case I want them later.

 

001 Oblivion.esm

002 OblivionMountProject.esm

003 Armamentarium.esm

004 Artifacts.esm

005 DLCShiveringIsles.esp

006 Knights.esp

007 DLCSpellTomes.esp

008 DLCBattlehornCastle.esp

009 DLCHorseArmor.esp

010 DLCOrrery.esp

011 DLCVileLair.esp

012 DLCMehrunesRazor.esp

013 DLCFrostcrag.esp

014 DLCThievesDen.esp

015 ElaborateEyes for Robert's Bodies.esp

016 ANBRobertsCupSizes.esp

017 KT_CustomRaceFix.esp

018 Slof's Snow Leopard Race.esp

019 Slof's Clouded Leopard.esp

020 Burmecian.esp

021 Moogles.esp

022 ArmamentariumLL.esp

023 ArmamentariumLLMagic.esp

024 ArmamentariumLLArmaVendor.esp

025 ArmamentariumArtifacts.esp

026 Artifacts.esp

027 Artifacts - ArmaCompleteAddon.esp

028 Roberts Armamentarium female.esp

029 nGCD.esp

030 nGCD Oghma Infinium.esp

031 nGCD Birthsigns.esp

032 Disable Tutorial Text.esp

033 NGCD Skeleton Key.esp

034 Apachii_Gddess_Store.esp

035 C_Rings.esp

036 TalosPlazaSaga.esp

037 IC Market District malachi delacot.esp

038 road+bridges.esp

039 NRB4+UL-II Patch.esp

040 xulImperialIsle.esp

041 xulBrenaRiverRavine.esp

042 xulLushWoodlands.esp

043 xulSnowdale.esp

044 xulTheHeath.esp

045 xulAncientRedwoods.esp

046 xulFallenleafEverglade.esp

047 xulColovianHighlands_EV.esp

048 xulChorrolHinterland.esp

049 XulEntiusGorge.esp

050 xulCheydinhalFalls.esp

051 xuldarkforest.esp

052 xulBravilBarrowfields.esp

053 xulRiverEthe.esp

054 xulArriusCreek.esp

----- xulRollingHills_EV_withoutWheat.esp

055 xulRollingHills_EV.esp

056 xulAspenWood.esp

057 xulCloudtopMountains.esp

058 xulStendarrValley.esp

059 xulBeachesOfCyrodiilLostCoast.esp

060 xulAncientYews.esp

061 xulSkingradOutskirts.esp

062 xulBlackwoodForest.esp

063 DBSQR.esp

064 DBSQR - Shivering Isles.esp

065 DBSQR - Knights of the Nine.esp

066 DBSQR - Orrery.esp

067 DBSQR - Vile Lair.esp

068 DBSQR - MehrunesRazor.esp

069 DBSQR - Battlehorn Castle.esp

070 RealSwords - Argonian LO-NPC.esp

071 RealSwords - Khajiit LO-NPC v1.3.esp

072 RealSwords - Orc LO-NPC v1.0.esp

073 RealSwords - Breton LO-NPC.esp

074 RealSwords - Goblin.esp

075 RealSwords - Redguard LO-NPC.esp

076 RealSwords - Nord LO-NPC SI.esp

----- RealSwords - Argonian HI-NPC.esp

----- RealSwords - Argonian HI.esp

----- RealSwords - Argonian LO.esp

----- RealSwords - Khajiit HI v1.3.esp

----- RealSwords - Khajiit HI-NPC v1.3.esp

----- RealSwords - Khajiit LO v1.3.esp

----- RealSwords - Orc HI v1.0.esp

----- RealSwords - Orc HI_NPC v1.0.esp

----- RealSwords - Orc LO v1.0.esp

----- RealSwords - Breton HI-NPC.esp

----- RealSwords - Breton HI.esp

----- RealSwords - Breton LO.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord HI-NPC SI.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord HI-NPC.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord HI-SI.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord HI.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord LO-NPC.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord LO-SI.esp

----- RealSwords - Nord LO.esp

----- RealSwords - Redguard HI-NPC.esp

----- RealSwords - Redguard HI.esp

----- RealSwords - Redguard LO.esp

077 NRB4 Standard Road Record.esp

 

I dearly hope it's something I can fix, because these are the minimum mods that I really want to run with this, especially the RealSwords and Unique Landscapes lines of mods. The road record for the Roads & Bridges mod is after all the inactive mods simply because the readme said to put it at the very bottom of the load list. Also, the Elaborate Eyes for Robert's Body mod and all the RealSwords mods are from OMODs. The Elaborate Eyes mod said that it already included Robert's Bodies for both male and female, as well as Slof's Better Beasts. If that isn't actually true then getting those may help the issue, but I don't know.

[Smooth613]

If the torso's are invisible, which it seems like when you first mention the issue, you likely need Archive Invalidation.

 

The giant triangles with ( ! ) exclamation points are missing resources, particularly meshes. You can install FormID Finder and use it in game to determine where the problem lies.

[Timuri]

I've done an archive invalidation through OBMM with every mod load, but thanks for the advice. I'll check out that FormID Finder. I'd like to get all these problems worked out so I can play Oblivion while I'm deployed without worrying about crashes and the like.

[Fonger]

as a general rule of thumb

 

you need to run that load order through BOSS (as found on tesnexus)

 

and follow its recommendations very closely

 

(if you don't get recommendations, you either didn't run or install BOSS correctly)

 

 

then

 

is there any particular reason you are not using the unofficial oblivion patch (series)

 

if not, install them - all three of them and then find the patch for the patch and install it as well

 

 

re-run BOSS

 

 

then install Wrye Bash

 

and make a Bashed patch.

Edited November 23, 2010 by Fonger

[Timuri]

Okay, so I've gotten BOSS, Wrye Bash, and the FormID Finder in addition to OBSE and OBMM.

 

I've run Wrye Bash, BOSS, and OBMM to work out the load order and any issues with the mods, and I think I've found the issue. According the the FormID scrolls produced in-game when I right-clicked on the missing meshes the meshes are not modified by any of my mods. It says that they're missing meshes from the Oblivion.esm file I got through Steam.... >.> It almost looks as though the game is either not loading or missing the greater portion of the meshes that are supposed to come out of vanilla. I ran just vanilla Oblivion after a new install, actually trying to go through the sewers instead of being satisfied once character creation pops up, and the exclamations are still there and it still crashes when the rats are supposed to appear. Three times I've downloaded and installed Oblivion through Steam with that happening, so I don't know if the problem is on my end or if Steam has issues with their download.

 

Edit: Okay, an update on that. I just opened up the Oblivion - Meshes.bsa archive and the missing meshes are there. Why is it not pulling them out of the archive, or am I going to need to manually extract each of these .bsa archives?

Edited November 24, 2010 by Timuri

[Smooth613]

You have a mod causing this problem or an Archive Invalidation issue. You say it does this with a vanilla install but I'm betting you did not delete your Data folder when you reinstalled. STEAM will not automatically delete the data folder and any mod files located within it. I have the STEAM version and know this to be true.

 

I suggest you do the following.

 

• Uninstall Oblivion via STEAM
  
• Manually delte the Oblivion file located at <drive letter>\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\oblivion
  
• Now delete the Oblivion.ini from your My Games folder. Located at Documents\My Games\Oblivion
  
• Reinstall via STEAM. DO NOT ADD ANY MODS.
  

 

At this point you need to load up Oblivion and everything should be working 100%. After you are sure vanilla Oblivion works then you can start adding mods. Add them one by one, then test. When, or if, you run across errors you will know that the last mod you installed is causing the issue. Then you can properly troubleshoot the problem.

 

Good luck.

[Timuri]

Well, I've gotten Vanilla working and gotten it working with the UOP mods. I'm trying to load Robert's Male & Female body replacers next, but whether I load them individually or together it causes it to crash as soon as the opening movie with the emperor would show up. I would really prefer to use these body replacers, since they work best with Slof's two feline races, so any ideas to fix this would be much appreciated.

 

I've got a backup of my Oblivion folder at a stable and working point to go back to each time now so that I don't have to redownload it through Steam. Each time I load a new mod, I erase everything from the Oblivion folder in the My Games folder (since I have no save files yet), then I run a fresh archive invalidation using OBMM, then run BOSS, then I rebuild the Bash Patch in Wrye Bash and make sure that Enable OBSE is checked off, then I BOSS it again and run a final archive invalidation through OBMM before trying to run the game.

 

Edit: I tried loading the Unique Landscapes mods with the same result just a few minutes ago, and had an idea. I'm going to try loading again with OBSE disabled. I'm wondering if Steam is doing something that conflicts with OBSE and is causing these crashes? I hope not, but I don't think I've got any mods that specifically require OBSE since I primarily have mesh and texture mods.

 

Edit 2: Still a no-go. Didn't really think that that'd fix it, but I seemed to remember not having it checked to enable that when doing the unofficial patches. I really wish I could figure out what's doing this...supposedly I'm doing this more as it's supposed to be than before, but I'm not getting even that far now. >.<

Edited November 26, 2010 by Timuri