I've been encountering the same problem. I decided to do a little testing. It seems that if the file is edited it will cause this error.
You can open the file and look at it, but if anything is edited (even edited to the same thing ex: deleting a zero and putting it back in) it will cause this error. The game will also find any unedited copies of the file in the same folder and will use that instead of any edited copies.
I read through their patch notes in the readme, but there's no mention of this.
So how do you get it to work?
Welp, get Winzip or Winrar, then open spreadsheets.mob with it. It should bring up all the tables. From here you can open and edit them. The program should be able to compress them back so that the game will read it properly.
Hope this helped.
(V 1.25)
I have been trying to get this to work for a couple hours now.
But every attempt has ended with the game giving me some directx error when I am done setting it up
And yes I did use Winzip as you suggested to modify the files with the same result.
Any attempt at modifying this file results in a directx error.
I tried running with some mods I found for the game with the same result.
It seems to me like any attempt at running the game in any other way than the vanilla version results in this error.
This really infuriates me as it seems that even in easy mode its impossible to keep up with the AI in any area and I usually end up lagging so far behind I give up the game long before it would otherwise have ended.
Its like the AI has a massive advantage in any and all areas (research, manufacturing, colonization, etc).
The few times I have tried to compete with the AI, I either end up losing to the Orion senate elections or I get steamrolled
[Edited by Ethelryn, 5/28/2012 11:19:37 AM]