Civ IV’s “renderer error” fixed

There is a nasty bug in Civ IV that prevents some people from playing the game. As far as I know it only occurs when you use an ATI graphics card. When you get the message “failed to initialize renderer”, you should try the following:

Requirements:

You have installed a retail version of Civ4, along with the DirectX update on the CD. You have installed the 5.10 ATI drivers.

Instructions:

1. Download, unzip and run this application.
2. From the menu, select PAK->Unpack.
3. Go to your Civ 4 Folder, Assets subdirectory (CivilizationIV\Assets), select the Art0.FPK file, click Open.
4. You’ll be prompted to select an extraction folder, select CivilizationIV\Assets – same folder as above.
5. Wait. The program may appear to hang with the progress bar at 100%, but it will be done with unpacking in 2-5 minutes.
6. Move the Art0.FPK file out of your Assets folder so that Civ4 can’t find it.
7. Run Civ4.

Apolyton Civilization Forums > Civilization IV > Civ4-Help > New fix for the renderer error

~ by Stargazer on October 28, 2005.