If you are attempting to launch Call of Duty 2 and are met with the fatal error the issue is almost certainly related to how the game interacts with your modern video drivers or DirectX configuration.
Add automated renderer mismatch fix for Call of Duty 2 Description: The "Failed to initialize renderer, version mismatch" error blocks players on modern PCs. A built-in feature could auto-wrap DirectX 9 calls via DXVK or dgVoodoo2, add a config toggle to skip version check, and apply compatibility settings. This would make CoD2 playable on Windows 10/11 without manual tweaking.
Find config.cfg (Singleplayer) or config_mp.cfg (Multiplayer). Open them with Notepad. Search for the line: seta r_rendererPreference . Change the value: