Four Fat Chicks -- Installing 9: The Last Resort on a Newer System

Installing 9: The Last Resort on a Newer System

By MrLipid
January 2004

If you played 9: The Last Resort when it first came out in 1996 and have been thinking about loading it up again or if, like me, you just picked up a copy in the bargain bin, you may be in for a not-so-pleasant surprise.

Depending on how your system is configured, you could wind up seeing this when you ask 9 to install:

If you don't see the above installation error message (or any other error messages when you ask the game to start), enjoy! If you do see the above error, the following might help. (The following workaround will not work if you have more than 512 MB of RAM installed and are running XP Home. And if you are running XP Pro, you can stop reading now. 9 will not run on XP Pro. Period.)

Basic Game Configuration

Before attempting to install 9, regardless of your OS, set your color depth to 256 and adjust your resolution to 640×480. Also, check which version of QuickTime you have installed. 9 ships with QuickTime 2.1 on its CD but is perfectly happy with 2.1.2. If you don't have 2.1.2, you can download it from OldVersion.com.

Instructions for XP Home

Here's the good news. As long as you don't have more than 512 MB of RAM in your system, 9 should install with no problems on XP Home. Just drop in the CD and let Autorun begin the installation process. If your copy of 9 does not contain Autorun, just click on Setup.exe on the CD.

Instructions for 95, 98, 98SE and ME

If you've already gotten the error message shown above, here's how to get around it. Click here and save the file Nine.zip to your hard disk. It's about 6 MB. When you unzip it on your hard drive, Nine.zip will create a folder called NINE. When you open that folder, it will look like this:

If your CD-ROM drive is not D:\, open Tribeca.ini with Notepad and put in the proper drive letter. Put your 9 CD in that drive, click on Nine.exe in the NINE folder on your hard drive, and you should be good to go.

Technical Note

The Nine.zip download contains only those files that must be on the hard drive for 9 to run. You still need your CD to play the game. This is a workaround for an installation problem, not an illegal copy of the game.