[2022] Game crash upon startup after graphics card update

BTW there is a bad mod shown at the start of that error.log

I will guess you have an nVidia card as that is the most common. If so:

- uninstall its driver and all other nVidia software
- reboot
- install August 2022 https://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us
- reboot again

Good luck!  

BIna said: For the record, the NVIDIA driver download criteria I had to use for my laptop model was GeForce 10 series (Notebook), GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, Windows 10 64-bit, Standard driver type, English (US). Version 472.84 is the latest driver available to these specifications.

That's odd, as I went through those same options and ended up here:

GeForce Game Ready Driver | 517.48 | Windows 10 64-bit, Windows 11 | NVIDIA

Download the English (US) GeForce Game Ready Driver for Windows 10 64-bit, Windows 11 systems. Released 2022.9.27 www.nvidia.com
Only 1 day old!

Probably best to do another clean reinstall of nVidia to get to it, due to jumping so many versions.  

Odd ... you may need help from nVidia support on that.

Do you still get those DX11 errors in that log?  

If there was a bug in this game that stopped it working at all for everyone, we'd know about it well before now! So I doubt a patch will fix your problem, which is more likely in Windows somewhere.

If there are no errors in that log we've made progress it seems, but clearly not enough. If you run ck3.exe directly from File Explorer now, what happens?  

Okay, let's start from scratch! Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox Interactive/CK3 folders
- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add CK3.exe to the exceptions list of your antivirus app; ESPECIALLY if you have Windows Defender, add it to the Ransomware "Apps Allowed Through" list.
- start the game with no mods active and test

In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.


If that doesn't help:
DXDIAG is a program you run from the Windows search box on the task bar. After running it will open a window and start collecting info with a progress bar in the lower-left corner. When it completes click the 'save all information' button and save it to a file then attach that file here.

Please attach here your Documents/Paradox Interactive/CK3/pdx_settings.txt .
From your Documents/Paradox Interactive/CK3/logs/ folder, attach here system.log , error.log  

No mention of CK3 in that dxdiag , I see. That would typically point to an issue outside the game.

But as you can see, still those DX11 errors in that log. Right click on ck3.exe , properties, compatibility. Tick "disable fullScreen optimisations" untick every other box in that dialog, Apply and exit.

Then in the launcher Game Settings menu, select fullScreen display mode, Vsync off, refresh rate 60.

Is that any better?  

That may be due to your unusual edition of Windows 10 Enterprise 2016 LTSB, which I don't recall coming across before. I see it is intended for use in situations where frequent updates would be a problem such as hospitals. I'm sure we don't test our games on it. And it becomes unsupported in about 2 weeks' time.

Were you at all considering going to Win11 any time soon? If so this might be a great time for that!  

It's a Windows setting, nothing to do with Steam, so I'm sure not.

Whether there's any way to do it in, say, the registry is beyond my Windows knowledge I'm afraid.