DirectPlay Can't be enabled

[SOLVED]

Hey, everyone, me again. Finally got Roller Coaster Tycoon working, did not even STOP TO PLAY IT and, instead, immediately exited-out to revisit this thread and tell y'all what finally worked for me.

Okay, so: Something in the 1709 "Fall Creators Update" update stops all of us from enabling DirectPlay and LegacyComponents—and from being able to continue updating Windows 10!

In a 2015 (!) Microsoft Answers reply, Giridhar J details how to brute-force Windows 10 into updating by manually resetting Windows Update Components through command prompt. Following these steps allowed me, at last, to update from 1709 to 1803. And 1803 lets me install and enable DirectPlay.

Giridhar writes:

1. Press Windows Key + X on the keyboard and then select “Command Prompt (Admin)” from the menu.

2. Stop the BITS, Cryptographic, MSI Installer and the Windows Update Services. To do this, type the following commands at a command prompt. Press the “ENTER” key after you type each command.

                           net stop wuauserv
                           net stop cryptSvc
                           net stop bits
                           net stop msiserver

3. Now rename the SoftwareDistribution and Catroot2 folder. You can do this by typing the following commands in the Command Prompt. Press the “ENTER” key after you type each command.

                          ren C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution SoftwareDistribution.old
                          ren C:\Windows\System32\catroot2 Catroot2.old

4. Now, let’s restart the BITS, Cryptographic, MSI Installer and the Windows Update Services. Type the following commands in the Command Prompt for this. Press the ENTER key after you type each command.

                        net start wuauserv
                        net start cryptSvc
                        net start bits
                        net start msiserver

   5. Type Exit in the Command Prompt to close it.

Now you may try running the Windows Updates and check if the above steps resolve the issue.

Well, I did try running Windows Update, and it did resolve the issue.

I can't say that these steps will for-sure work for everyone, but I can say that if you are "stuck" on Windows Fall Creators Update, nothing you attempt will work until you address the main issue of your Windows being trapped on 1709.