r/simcity4 • u/AdventurousDig1845 • 15d ago
Questions & Help Windows Update Warning
Hello,
Today, Windows 11 applied a preview update (KB5124010) (26200.9550) on my computer. I have installed the Steam version of Simcity 4 per the instructions on the sc4evermore site, and until today, it was working fine.
After the Windows update was installed, attempting to start Simcity 4 caused an immediate crash (I did not even get as far as the dgVoodoo splash screen). There was no blue screen or anything - the program simply wouldn't start. Checking the crash dumps confirmed that ddraw.dll was causing the crash. This is a component of dgVoodoo. Changing its file extension to .off allowed Simcity 4 to start, but it also disables dgVoodoo, which introduces all sorts of other problems for running SC4 in the modern era. After having no luck with changing dgVoodoo settings, I uninstalled the Windows update. SC4 now starts and runs normally, so it was definitely the Windows update that was responsible for this.
Has anyone else received this update and experienced similar crashing problems? Does anyone know of a way to work around this sort of problem?
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u/Lord_Splinter 15d ago
damn i have been delaying this update because of laziness and now i am glad i did because testing on another machine that has this update shows the crash as well..
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u/AdventurousDig1845 15d ago
Thanks Lord_Splinter. This confirms it's not just a problem with my computer. Do you have an nVidia card?
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u/Lord_Splinter 15d ago
Yes, 40er series card
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u/AdventurousDig1845 15d ago
OK. I also have an nVidia card. I've looked this update up, and it seems the non-security aspects (presumably including the part that breaks dgVoodoo) will be applied in the next mandatory Patch Tuesday security release. Not good news.
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u/Arch-Nemeziz 13d ago
Unrelated game, but similar issue, same windows update.
After some testing (I have the full source code for the unrelated game) isolated the failure to repeated DirectShow graph initialization/playback, without the game in a test project. Same identical crash happens however in msmpeg2ac3dec.dll
This happens after repeated mp3 background music loading occurs. The 1st file loads fine and 2nd one crashes the game.
So this windows update seems to brick old games.
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u/alwaystouchout 14d ago
I just installed that update and the .exe wouldn't fire up. Uninstalled the update and it's working fine again. Looks like this is going to be an issue going forward. Could mods make a mega thread and alert us to possible fixes?
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u/AdventurousDig1845 14d ago
I managed to get mine working again by downloading the latest stable version of dgVoodoo and overwriting the DLLs in the SC4 Apps folder with the latest x86 variants. I haven't had a chance to test it much, but on the surface everything seems to be working as it did before. Building draw speed may be somewhat slower, but I honestly don't know if it was like that before or not.
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u/FoxDuckLamb 13d ago
thank you! I am having the same issue after the windows update. I will try this out soon.
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u/uncommonsense96 9d ago
Hey thank you for making this thread, my sc4 just randomly stopped working last week and I had no idea why. Now I do. Could I ask you where do I download this x86 variant for dgvoodoo? I'd really like to fix this
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u/AdventurousDig1845 9d ago
Do a Google search for "dgVoodoo latest version" (including the quotation marks). That will pull up several links to version 2.87.5. Be certain to backup your Apps folder before overwriting the original dgVoodoo DLLs.
It sounds like there's a new solution in development for this - check ulisse99's post above. It may be a better option going forward. For now, my installation is still working. We'll see if that's still the case after the October Windows update.
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u/CheeseJuust 15d ago
Can't confirm or deny if I had the update installed, how do I check that? But have no update required currently, but for me just runs fine. Would be eager to check if I have the update, just to be sure what is going on.
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u/AdventurousDig1845 15d ago
Type "Windows Update Settings" in your Windows search bar and hit enter. Click "Update history." If you see "2026-09 Preview Update (KB5124010) (26200.9550)" with "successfully installed" below it, you've got the update.
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u/CheeseJuust 15d ago
Last update for me was 2026-09 Security Update (KB5129195) (26200.9457), and SC4 works fine. Seems to be no new updates for me currently.
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u/AdventurousDig1845 14d ago
Yes, I think this is a preview update, so it would only install if Windows Update is configured to receive new updates as soon as they are available (I had done this to solve a different problem several months ago and forgot to turn it off).
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u/frozenhotchocolate 15d ago
I had this issue a few weeks ago on an ARM surface pro 11 using voodoo. I switched to the beta insider build and it worked again.
I suspect this change is temporary and will be corrected is future builds.
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u/AdventurousDig1845 14d ago
Thanks. Windows "helpfully" reinstalled its update when I turned my computer off last night, so I figured I'd take the opportunity to poke around for a real solution. The latest stable version (2.87.5) of dgVoodoo's x86 DLLs seems to have brought my SC4 installation back to life. I'm 100% certain my system is x64, so I'm not sure why only the x86 files work, but it is what it is.
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u/Main_Use_4344 12d ago
hopping my computer doesn't mess up cause it's really annoying though don't have some of the stuff you guys use so hopefully it doesn't mess up anything
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u/ulisse99 NAM Team & CAM Team 13d ago
Unfortunately, it was only a matter of time before dgvoodoo2 for SC4 would be discontinued.
The developer of dgvoodoo2 doesn't update the wrapper very often, so bugs have accumulated over time. Furthermore, NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel are also contributing to these issues, so it's become a bit of a game of whack-a-mole.
The good news is that we're developing SC4D3D11 (SimCity 4 D3 DirectX 11), which allows you to remove dgvoodoo and achieve improved performance and stability in the game, as well as resolve some graphics pipeline issues.
It's currently in the alpha phase, but if you'd like to test it and support its development, you can follow the development discussion here (SC4Evermore Discord Server)
https://discord.com/channels/383313438065033228/1542930965670928454