I contacted Itch, but in the meantime, can you also forward me your last response from PayPal, to my email account: chezjfrey@hotmail.com?  If we are unable to resolve this, I can do something to get you the game, but I'd also like to participate in working with PayPal to get to the source of the trouble.

No, nothing is blocked from my account.  In fact,  from what I can find about the topic, I think the ability to block certain currency types and countries is only available as an option for Premiere accounts and I do not have such a thing and can find no option in my settings, so I would not be able to block even if I wanted.

Though, I am linked through Itch.io for my Paypal, so maybe something to do with Itch is causing the issue?  Might want to send something to Itch support and ask the same questions.  Maybe the Itch Paypal configuration is contributing to the problem.

Got your email and the system.log tells us the problem is a missing questbook.ini file.  Not sure why you don't have it, as I verified the source for the Itch upload does contain it.  Maybe the Itch upload tool glitched?  Or the download glitched?  Anyway, I sent you the missing file in an email reply.  Let me know how it goes.

First, make sure logging is checked in config.exe, then do this again.  Send me the system.log, compile.log and if there is an error.log file, send that too.  Email: chezjfrey at hotmail dot com

Need more info:

What game?  ERAS, GOF 1.2, COAS, etc.?

What specifically did you do to expect a log entry?

I just tried the log in ERAS and my old logs are all there (current and completed), plus I accepted a shipyard mission and the log wrote properly, so if there is a problem, it does not appear general to all, but may be a specific log?

For now, the Itch client allows a way to play the multiple mods/games (e.g. COAS, GOF 1.2, ERAS, etc.) with just one set of Maelstrom.exe + modules/*.dll fileset; the old cd version required a separate copy of the *.exe + *.dll files for each one.  However, the Itch install does not let me modify the special Itch manifest file to tailor the file location of each place.  So I added instructions to change it, but it is not optimal if someone chooses file locations that are different than the hardcoded, supplied manifest file.

A work in process is to perhaps provide a single executable that will allow just one manifest entry in the Itch file to launch that, and the new executable will allow one to select from a dropdown list the engine version to play (e.g. DX8, DX9 32 bit, or DX9 64 bit) and a dropdown of the various mods/games, but that will take some time to develop.

I just wanted to make it easier to keep current on the engine, by only having one, because multiple copies would require a person to download and copy them all separately, and remember to keep them updated manually, but the Itch client can automatically keep a single one updated for you, and also provide a simpler way to launch the separate mods by just clicking a button in the Itch client.  But you are free to break that update process and simply copy the Maelstrom.exe, Config.exe and the modules folder to each mod/game like the old game used to be.

I am still waiting on that other person to try your fort/boarding save on an AMD machine.  But, I did try several times on a Win10 machine, using a standard Intel video chipset and did not have any crash trouble.  So your problem is still a mystery because I've been unable to reproduce your colony battle problem on any machine I have access to (Win7 on Intel, WinXP on Intel, Win10 on Intel), even with your save, or other attempts I've made in my own games where I've sacked various towns.

First, that web site has problems for new registrations (our deal with a web site developer went bad, so it has not been updated/fixed).  But there is a utility I can use to manually confirm your registration, so I did a search of pending users, found gnatd and manually accepted you, so if you can remember your user/pass that you used, it should work now.

Second, the $language is a new feature I added to help more easily adopt other translations.  If you are having the trouble you describe, I suspect you don't have the most current Maelstrom version that supports this new $language item, but rather you have an older version, before I added the feature.  Update to the newest Maelstrom version and this problem should disappear.

Still unable to experience a crash myself.  I am sending this to someone else, with an AMD chipset to see if they have any problems.  I also have one other machine I can try, with a different operating system (mine is Win7) that I will also try when I can.  So far, I have not been able to get a crash to happen.  I also don't see any crash-related problems in the log files.

If my attempts to obtain a crash don't work out, I might need you to create a Windows Crash Dump file.  I will let you know if I need that and how to make one.

Wherever you put the ERAS II files, there are directories for Program, RESOURCE, SAVE and a start.ini file that apply to the mod.  In that same directory is where you will find the system.log and compile.log file (and error.log if there is one).  If there are none, you will need to turn on the logging checkbox with Config.exe.  The SAVE directory will contain your save files for each profile name you have created.

I'm not sure.  I was never able to get your last save to crash on my system during several attempts to enter the city, but did find some errors in the logs that I resolved in the update yesterday, but since they didn't cause me to crash, they may not be contributing to your problem and it might be something else.

You can try providing another save before entering a city.  But in addition, attack the city, and if it crashes, also send me the system.log, compile.log and an error.log file (if you see one).  Those 4 things and I'll see if I can recreate your problem.

Played the save through several times.  I did not experience a crash myself, but I did note some errors in my logs, one about a bad model that could not be loaded and that can lead to crashes.  So I corrected that problem and updated Itch.  Download the latest ERAS II Update (the Itch client will do this automatically), then try to play through from that PeterBlood AutoSave you gave me.  Let me know how that goes for you.

So the fort is destroyed, and now you use the "boarding" action to enter the city and proceed to the next fight?  If that is the case, can you send me a game save file from before you entered the city?  It is usually auto-created if you did not turn that feature off.  You can post it on a file sharing site and give me a link, or email me at chezjfrey@hotmail.com.

I will take a look at it and see what happens.

Also, what version of the Maelstrom.exe?  Is it 64 or 32 bit?

We connected on Discord (also Buccaneer account enabled) and we got this resolved.  The latest update contains a fix that resolves game not launching and failing validation if Japanese language installed.

P.S. We are working on our own launcher that will deal with any mods you might have, so that Itch will simply launch-the-launcher, but that is not yet complete.  But when finished, should hopefully simplify things.  I just wasn't aware of how Itch operated, until we did it, so kinda learning the Itch peculiarities as I go.

The switching ships at sea bug was presented to me earlier today and it should already be fixed.  I just uploaded the fix to Itch less than an hour ago, so make sure you update Maelstrom.  The game not launching through Itch is probably where you installed the game.  Itch installs don't allow me to modify paths in the shortcuts and manifest paths, so if you place the game/mods differently than the instructions, you will have to manually modify the shortcuts and manifest file.  There are some instructions/screenshots how to do that in the MaelstromSetup.pdf.  If that is not clear enough to follow, I can probably walk you through it.  But that might be easier real-time through Discord:  https://discord.gg/t6mZMmq

We are not in violation of any laws, and this was legally vetted during a year-long process by our lawyers.  If you have any concerns regarding such, you may contact our legal counsel:  https://www.dubofflaw.com/

I don't think it should be a problem.  All of the mods and resource content have been available all over the internet for free, for years.  We are just providing the same mods for free here.  The only thing requiring payment is the rewrite of the engine, which was also provided over the internet for free, years ago.  Our legal counsel has told us that if that source was given out for free, but was substantially rewritten like we did, we can charge for our rewrite.