Original Red Alert 2 and Yuri's Revenge Discs on Windows 10
Hi,
I know through my previous searches that this topic, in one form or another, has come up time and time again. Unfortunately nothing I've read has helped me fix my issue so I hope you don't mind me creating yet another thread about this one!
So here's my issue: I have my original RA2 and YR discs from back in the day. I dutifully went through the install routine, popped the CD key in, patched to 1.006 and 1.001 respectively and launched the game. I encountered the black screen issue but found a fix for that (from this very forum). So far so good - until I started a campaign. I ran into the anti piracy measures where all your units explode almost instantly. This happens for both Allied and Soviet campaigns on both RA2 and YR.
But... these are my legitimately purchased, original discs that used to work just fine on my old Windows 7 machine. They are not pirated copies and are installed using the original CD keys from the box. I haven't installed any third party patches or mods etc. The only thing I did was add the DDWrapper fix mentioned above to fix the black screen issue.
I've checked the registry using RegEdit and there is a value for "Serial" in the correct place (it's different to the actual CD key - but I assume that's because it's some sort of hash of the key or something), along with all the other usual registry keys created by the installer.
And yes, I've set the relevant compatibility modes on the necessary .exes and flagged them to run as admin.
So, anyone know what's going on? Most of the threads and questions I've found about this are for the Origin downloaded versions. Why am I running into the copy protection issue with legitimate discs installed using the game's own installer? And more importantly, how can I overcome this? I'm not exactly overflowing with money unfortunately and even if I was I shouldn't have to re-purchase games I already own fair and square just to get them working, so I don't want to get them from Origin or Steam or whatever.
Any suggestions? I'm not generally into piracy to be honest, but in this case I'd accept any cracks, hacks or shady tricks if it's the only way to get my games working again (so long as doing so isn't going to riddle my PC with malware of course). I just want to play the games I own!
Edit: I've just read here that RA2 and YR aren't installable on Windows 10/11. Presumably it means not playable as they installed just fine, I just can't actually play them! Is the only option really to buy them again? Because if so that's ridiculous! You can't buy them separately - you need to buy the whole collection. I haven't got the money for that and I don't want any of the other games anyway - RA2 and YR are the ones I grew up playing, the ones I want to play, and the ones I already own. Anyone from EA want to throw me a bone here? I get that technology moves on, but the games are clearly playable on Win 10/11 in some form and they're not remakes so I'm guessing the original discs could, in theory and perhaps by way of a patch or something, be made to work on modern OSes if EA could be bothered.
