If any of the information below is not solid please let me know what criteria needs to be met to make the information concrete and useful. I would be happy to answer any questions or perform further testing. Contact me by PM or admins may use email.
The eqgame.exe error has been visited many times on this and other forums. For many players of EQEmu there is a certain cause for this error at a certain stage of the login process that can block logins for an hour or more at a time, off and on throughout the day.
I'm going to call this error "SSSE" for Server Select Screen error. There are a number of causes for the eqgame.exe error message and it is necessary to focus on when it occurs on order to define the SSSE.
--- When the SSSE strikes ---
The SSSE occurs when the "LOGIN" or "QUICK CONNECT" button is pressed either with mouse button or tab/enter keys. If you use the "LOGIN" button the SSSE strikes immediately so you never get to press the "PLAY EVERQUEST!" button on the server select screen. Players find themselves trying to get to the "PLAY EVERQUEST!" button as quickly as they can by mouse or tab/enter but fail. A slowed mouse pointer is a symptom that the eqgame.exe error is about to pop up. Often players conclude it is a mouse driver problem until they try using the tab/enter keys but fail. It is also true that if the error does not strike immediately, sitting at the server select screen and doing nothing may eventually result in the SSSE. If the "QUICK CONNECT" button is used the SSSE will strike without displaying the server select screen. Once loading begins for the character select screen the SSSE will not occur.
The above is followed by the generic eqgame.exe error message which reads "eqgame.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience." In the same window there's also the standard Microsoft message with options to "Send Error Report" or "Don't Send". This is on Windows XP.
--- The SSSE cause ---
Recently I performed a series of packet captures and analyzed them. Searching the forums shows "neville" also did some packet captures. I'm not sure if anything further was done with his results.
http://www.eqemulator.net/forums/sho...5&postcount=21
http://www.eqemulator.net/forums/sho...6&postcount=22
What the results show connects a specific packet to the SSSE. That packet contains the survey information for the client. You may recognize this survey since occasionally it pops up during login, "Is this thing on?......... 1) Yes, 2) No, 3) What thing?, 4) Stop wasting my time!". This will be referred to as the survey packet.
Though the survey rarely displays during login the survey packet is always sent with one exception I'll mention later*. In my captures a survey packet arrives as either the 3rd or 4th packet from the server and never causes a problem. This survey packet arrives before the server list is sent for the server select screen. Anytime a second survey packet is sent to the client an SSSE occurs immediately.
A second survey packet can be sent at the tail end of the login process following the list of servers. This makes it impossible to log into your selected server even using the "Quick Connect" button. Generally repeated tries will eventually get through but may take 20 minutes and 40 login attempts or more.
A second Survey packet may also be sent at some point after the initial login while sitting at the server select screen. This survey packet also arrives at the tail end of the list of servers, but in this case it's the server list update. The delay between login and when this second survey packet is sent may vary from a few seconds to hours. When I was running tests on March 20th a second survey packet arrived with delays between 2.5 minutes and 34 minutes over five captures.
What follows is one of the second survey packets as it appears in the capture. It is always 233 bytes in size:
0000 00 0b 6a 58 fb f5 00 30 ab 07 79 7d 08 00 45 00 ..jX...0..y}..E.
0010 00 db 00 00 40 00 34 11 64 c2 0c a4 14 02 c0 a8 ....@.4.d.......
0020 00 02 17 6e 04 30 00 c7 47 b2 00 09 00 17 29 00 ...n.0..G.....).
0030 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 55 53 00 45 ............US.E
0040 4e 00 01 00 00 00 49 73 20 74 68 69 73 20 74 68 N.....Is this th
0050 69 6e 67 20 6f 6e 3f 00 04 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 ing on?.........
0060 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 01 00 00 ................
0070 00 00 00 00 00 59 65 73 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 .....Yes........
0080 00 01 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 ................
0090 00 00 4e 6f 00 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 ..No............
00a0 00 00 01 00 00 00 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 57 68 ..............Wh
00b0 61 74 20 74 68 69 6e 67 3f 00 04 00 00 00 00 00 at thing?.......
00c0 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 04 00 00 00 00 ................
00d0 00 00 00 53 74 6f 70 20 77 61 73 74 69 6e 67 20 ...Stop wasting
00e0 6d 79 20 74 69 6d 65 21 00 my time!.
For comparison a harmless first survey packet shown below is 241 bytes in size.
0000 00 0b 6a 58 fb f5 00 30 ab 07 79 7d 08 00 45 00 ..jX...0..y}..E.
0010 00 e3 00 00 40 00 34 11 64 ba 0c a4 14 02 c0 a8 ....@.4.d.......
0020 00 02 17 6e 04 30 00 cf 2b f6 00 03 04 00 15 00 ...n.0..+.......
0030 01 bf 00 09 00 01 29 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ......).........
0040 00 00 02 00 55 53 00 45 4e 00 01 00 00 00 49 73 ....US.EN.....Is
0050 20 74 68 69 73 20 74 68 69 6e 67 20 6f 6e 3f 00 this thing on?.
0060 04 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 ................
0070 00 01 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 59 65 73 .............Yes
0080 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 01 00 ................
0090 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 4e 6f 00 03 00 00 ..........No....
00a0 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 03 00 ................
00b0 00 00 00 00 00 00 57 68 61 74 20 74 68 69 6e 67 ......What thing
00c0 3f 00 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 01 ?...............
00d0 00 00 00 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 53 74 6f 70 20 ...........Stop
00e0 77 61 73 74 69 6e 67 20 6d 79 20 74 69 6d 65 21 wasting my time!
00f0 00 .
* The one exception is some accounts are never sent survey packets. These accounts do not receive the survey packet near the beginning of the login process or at anytime after and so never experience the SSSE. Currently I know of three such accounts, one I have tested myself but do not own. The other two are owned by someone who experiences SSSEs on his other accounts. Both owners would be interested in helping rid the EQEmu community of the SSSE.
I believe firewall settings may somehow help prevent or allow this problem to occur but right now this is nothing more than a hunch. I do not have packet captures showing differences between different firewalls and their settings.
Below is older information that I gathered over the past months and may be extraneous now. I'm including it in case it may be of some value.
--- Gathered information about the SSSE ---
1) Many hours may go by with no accounts/players experiencing SSSEs or at least the frequency of the SSSE is very low.
2) When there is a high frequency of SSSEs all accounts/players that can be affected by the SSSE will have great difficulty logging in. Repeated login attempts will eventually get past the SSSE.
3) While sitting at the Server Select screen an SSSE may occur immediately when there is an update in the server list.
4) Some accounts are completely immune to the SSSE. This is true even when an immune account is used on different computers in different global locations where the SSSE does occur and when it is occurring with a high frequency.
5) Some players never experience the SSSE.
6) For two weeks this past February I visited a different location 140km away using a different DSL modem and ISP. I took one of my EQEmu computer boxes with me but all other equipment used was from the other location. I often loaded up 4 EQEmu accounts and switched accounts to play different characters. For that two weeks I never experienced an SSSE even though other players often mentioned in game how harsh the SSSE was being to them. A couple days before I left home and the day after I returned home I experienced the SSSE on that computer box.
--- What I think ---
SSSEs are not related to drivers or settings on the client system. It is caused by data sent by the login server or server select server to the EQ Titanium client. The the frequency with which the data is sent raises and lowers in an irregular pattern. For some accounts this data is never sent at anytime. Some firewalls filter out this data preventing client crashes.
The SSSE form of the eqgame.exe error and cause
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