Hi, im hoping someone can help me, i've read alot of the 'problems' people are having with this game. Im having a problem too. I installed Emperor. Ran Auto-Update to 1.09 (i believe). Launched the game, the EA logo comes up as does the westwood globe. But once that happens. Black Screen like its loading the next part, 1 or 2 brief flickers. Game drops back to desktop. My setup is MSI 6380E Kt333 Mainboard, Amd Athlon XP2100, 256 PC2700 DDR Kingston, Asus v8440 Geforce 4 4400 128 DDR. SBLive Soundcard. I can run dxdiag and/or ea ez if you need me to. Please reply. im looking forward to playing this excellent game and get involved in the 'Duniverse' :)