I remember having to right click and then "Run as administrator" on a game installer years ago when I was still on Windows 7. Even though I had disabled UAC, the setup must be ran as administrator so that the files will be associated.
Then on Windows 8.0 I once ran a game installer with just normal double click and UAC set to default. The installer then popped UAC up, asking for administrator privilege and I clicked OK to continue. It ran fine but on post-install, I can't execute any available options. It says the setup needs administrator privileges.
For instance:
That was not the installer I'm talking about, it's just example. So I can't "Go to the website now" because of privilege issue.
Therefore, right now on Windows 8.1 Pro x64 MSDN I ALWAYS execute any installer with administrator rights, even though I know they will prompt for it if I just double click it (like Microsoft Office 2013). It's just in case so there will be no file association issues nor post-install issues.
As a test, you might create a new administrator account to see if you have the same issues while signed in to it.
Could be poor programming on some cases, or just older software that's not completely compatible with Windows 8.1. In addition to using "Run as administrator", you might see if using compatibility mode on any software that written for previous versions of Windows may help.