I discovered that there was something wrong with my Windows install - having reinstalled everything it now works.

Thanks for the assistance!

<r> Windows Media Player comes embedded / integrated into Win8.1 - I've tried turning it off, rebooting, and then turning it back on with no joy. The same goes for dotNet. <br/>
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I've found this whole experience deeply frustrating - I was all psyched up to play after listening to John G Hemry ...

<t> I'm running Windows 8.1 with latest versions of drivers installed, and I can't get the game to work. I get to "feeding the giant Kaltors" and then a crash.<br/>
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I've followed the various troubleshooting steps suggested. Here is the windows crash log, as nothing appears in the %appdata ...