Yes! Its working, villagers are aging properly and even the audio is playing back correctly.
For anyone trying to get it working but is getting caught up following the old guide on Myabandonware I will share what I did to get it working.
Install guide working 2021
- Download the B&W2 iso from Myabandonware and save it in a new folder you wont forget
- Unpack the iso with winrar or something of the like
- If you want to install black and white to a specific folder/drive then create that folder in the location you want now, by default the game will install to: C:\Program Files (x86)\Lionhead Studios\Black & White 2
- Go to where you unpacked the ISO and right click "setup.exe" and run as admin (please note that the installer seems to skip installing land 5 but I can not confirm if that is an issue or not as I am not that far yet) (Also I got an error about failing to install a sound file but I clicked ignore and it has not been an issue thus far.
- Download all 3 patches and install them in order (1.1, 1.2, 1.42) Remember to run as admin to be safe and make sure each one is done installing before moving onto the next.
- Now the old guide says to mess around with swapping exes around but DO NOT DO THIS, it is outdated and no longer required, once the patches are installed you are finished, you can run the game from either the exe in the Black and white 2 folder or the installer should have created a desktop icon that also works, be warned though there will likely still be some issues
Fixes for various issues
If your sound is not synced correctly it is because your frame rate is too high, for Nvidia users you can,
open the Nvidia control panel>Manage 3d settings>Program settings tab>find black and white or add it>Scroll down to Max Frame Rate and set it to 60-90, I've tried 90 and the audio lines sometimes are very close together but my good and bad conscience are not interrupting each other anymore
Mouse is behaving strangely especially in the esc menu, this is due to B&W not being built with high polling rate mice in mind, some mice you can adjust the polling rate, for some Razer mice you can change it with Razer Synapse. No matter what mouse you use it needs a polling rate of 125hz max, most office mice will work fine if you can not adjust your own polling rate.
Villagers are not getting any older, This is an old Anti piracy system put in the game and is caused by cracking the exe, with the install method above there is no need to crack the exe so if you followed the instructions in this post the issue should be resolved (You will need to start a new game)
How can I tell if I did everything correctly?
You can figure out what is working and what is not pretty easy during the first land where you choose your pet, if you DO NOT see the tiger available to pick standing slightly behind the standard creatures then you did not install one of the patches correctly.
To see if your mouse polling rate is ok then just open the esc menu while in game and move your mouse around slowly, if it gets stuck or does not act like you would expect, your polling rate is too high.
If your FPS is too high then the good and bad conscience will be constantly interrupting each other during the intro.
If you need to check your villagers are aging simple make a few disciple breeders and a few homes and wait for a baby, open the villager overlay with the "S" key if the baby stays 1 year old for more than 10ish minutes then you're likely using a cracked exe and should follow the guide above instead. Alternatively you can just follow around around an existing villager with the overlay open and see if they get any older after a few minutes.
Thanks everyone that helped me get the game running, I will leave this here for anyone that wants to get the game running without wading through years of forum posts or trial and error, I have probably missed some bugs or other issues but the guide above will at least get the game running properly and I can say that it at least works upto land 4 because that's what I am on at the moment. I will update here if the installer skipping land 5 becomes an issue when I get there.