Gothic 3 Multiple loads required to start/reload - Anyone else with this issue?

Hi everyone - I have had my copy for about 1 week now and the gameplay works well - when I can get to it. I'm experiencing slow load times and one additional issue that I haven't heard any comments on: Multiple loads required to start the game and usually multiple reloads to load saved games.

Specifically when starting, I click on the icon to start the game, usually a message like this will appear "Do not remove DVD when loading, insert disc to continue". I'll then (not before) open and close the DVD drive and the game will load correctly, sometimes. When loading a save game, the load screen with the green bar will fill in to the end, then the game cursor will appear on the loading screen but then it stops loading. I'll hit F9 to reload again and it'll work, usually. Strange and making for some very slow and disruptive progress - anyone else experience this or have any tips on how to fix it?

To be clear, I have the system requirements - P4 3.0, ATI X1600, 3GB RAM + patch 1 & 2 and the gameplay is fine, it's the loading to get to play that has got me thinking about putting the game down for a few weeks until they can make it ready for primetime... anyone else experiencing this or have any tips to solve it? Thanks for your thoughts...

Never heard of that problem. If it was only on initial load, I'd say it was your hardware, but after the first game load, you can remove the DvD and play without it!!

Sounds like a conflict with either your Dvd or Software on your computer conflicting with the Copy Protection.

It sucks because once the c***k came out many for Patch 1, (most?) got performance increases when loading games.

Now with Patch 2 we can't its back to slower load times, since no c***k has been released yet.

Its sad when you have to wait for C***kers to debug a game for better performance.
As long as Copy Protection companies can convince pubs and public they are helping sales, we are stuck with nieve desisions which actully hurt sales.

Oddly enough Copy Protection companies can't prove what they say since its all based on phony numbers, ad hominem fear and attack propigana.

It gets even funnier, since back in the late 90's there were actually stuidies done by non industry groups.
Economics and Accounting professors (iir) showed how it was actually much worst because CP drove up costs and alienated many people whom would normally buy games. This was due to technical problems intrduced and the ablility Not to be able return PC games once opened, even if the game will not work, run reasonalby or was unfinished crap, which has certianly turned out to be accurate if you follow the game scene, anyway.
PC game sales have dropped tremediously in the last 6 or so years and there are huge class action lawsuits against CP, well they are larger than I have ever seen against the game industry.

Reinstall the copy protection drivers from the DVD. Maybe this fixes your problems.

Thanks for the suggestions, sounds like it is something unique to my set-up vs. a general problem. The copy protection comments seem reasonable since the DVD seems to be starting and stopping on strange intervals when this happens. That said, I'm not sure how to fix it.

Regarding the comment to 'reinstall the copy protection drivers', could you give me a sense of what I would do to do this? I'm using the original DVD shipped without any adaptations. Should I be doing something to reverse changes from the two patches? Any suggestions or direction would be appreciated. Many thanks.

I have had exactly the same problem. Also, my load times where absolutely horrible (up to 5 minutes). I have been having problems with my DVD ever since I uninstalled some starforce drivers though. Anyway, I borrowed a DVD player from a friend and the problem was gone. I had to return it, but two days after that a noCD crack appeared, and that solved all of my loading problems. I haven't tried it with the new patch, so I'm not sure if it will work.

Edit: Like Acleacius already said, there's no crack yet for the second patch. So perhaps just do what I've done and only install the first patch + crack?

Right the thing to do is, backup your inportant info, your G3.ini in Gothic III\ini and Useroptions.ini in \My Documents\Gothic3.
Then uninstall and reinstall, I would say go ahead and reapply both patches, but realise it still may not work and you may have to uninstall and reinstall again using only Patch 1 as hiciacit mentioned.
It could have been just a bad install or something which reinstall could fix, though it could be an out and out CP issues.

Think about this look how buggy the game is and the fact that most of us got better performance without the CP in Patch 1, due to JoWoods shoddy work its very likly they screwed something up on this one as well or really don't give a sh*t if they are part of the confused (deluded?) group that believes the propaganda, CP helps.

I must more trust the intentions and abilities of PB than I do at JoWood.