Launcher is just white

[DaBushWookie]

My CK2 launcher is just a white box, can't select anything or play the game, I've tried a clean install of the game and its the only paradox game that is suffering this issue, I'm not really sure what to do.

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

Disclaimer: I'm just another forum member
Until tech support arrives..

My CK2 launcher is just a white box, can't select anything or play the game, I've tried a clean install of the game and its the only paradox game that is suffering this issue, I'm not really sure what to do.

1) "Clean install" as you said included manually deleting the CK2 folder in Steamapps/common ?
Uninstalling via Steam or Windows only leaves the folder and a few files.

2) I'd suspect the Antivirus or Firewall (or a not opbvious Windows Defender).
You could add ck2game.exe to the exceptions in the respective program.

 

[DaBushWookie]

Disclaimer: I'm just another forum member
Until tech support arrives..



1) "Clean install" as you said included manually deleting the CK2 folder in Steamapps/common ?
Uninstalling via Steam or Windows only leaves the folder and a few files.

2) I'd suspect the Antivirus or Firewall (or a not opbvious Windows Defender).
You could add ck2game.exe to the exceptions in the respective program.

Thanks but I already deleted the folder in docs and the steamapps and verified the cache after reinstalling, and the game's already whitelisted in AV and firewalls.

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

Thanks but I already deleted the folder in docs and the steamapps and verified the cache after reinstalling, and the game's already whitelisted in AV and firewalls.

Have you just installed CK2 today ? If so a simple reboot of your computer might work. Registry and all that..

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

Thanks but I already deleted the folder in docs and the steamapps and verified the cache after reinstalling, and the game's already whitelisted in AV and firewalls.

Apart from a reboot, start the game through Steam(the program)-Library-Games the first time and not through a shortcut or the exe.
This is all assuming you installed the required software, but i don't recall that being the cause for this issue in the past.

Another point coming to my mind, i think you have to install the game, when asked, as admin, because it requires sending and receiving info via the web.
At least the admin part used to be a fix for some.

Okay, this will be the last part from me today.
I only responded, as tech support is sometimes not around at this time of the day and not as active on the weekend.
All the best for now.

 

[DaBushWookie]

Apart from a reboot, start the game through Steam(the program)-Library-Games the first time and not through a shortcut or the exe.
This is all assuming you installed the required software, but i don't recall that being the cause for this issue in the past.

Another point coming to my mind, i think you have to install the game, when asked, as admin, because it requires sending and receiving info via the web.
At least the admin part used to be a fix for some.

Okay, this will be the last part from me today.
I only responded, as tech support is sometimes not around at this time of the day and not as active on the weekend.
All the best for now.

Thanks for trying to help but I've had CK2 installed and working correctly for 2 years now, and all those suggestions were stuff I already tried before making the post.

 

[AndrewT]

I've had CK2 installed and working correctly for 2 years now,

What change or update seemed to trigger the problem?

the game's already whitelisted in AV and firewalls.

What AV app do you use? Some need extra steps to be done.

 

[DaBushWookie]

What change or update seemed to trigger the problem?


What AV app do you use? Some need extra steps to be done.

I use Norton, and I'm not too sure which update, I assume it was the new great works update, but the old versions in the beta section also don't seem to work, so I'm not too sure about what the actual issue is being caused by.

 

[AndrewT]

DXDIAG is a program you run from a command prompt or the Windows start menu 'run' dialog box (or 'search programs' in Windows 7 or later). 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 your Documents/Paradox/CK2/settings.txt.
From your Documents/Paradox/CK2/logs/ folder, attach system.log .

 

[DaBushWookie]

DXDIAG is a program you run from a command prompt or the Windows start menu 'run' dialog box (or 'search programs' in Windows 7 or later). 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 your Documents/Paradox/CK2/settings.txt.
From your Documents/Paradox/CK2/logs/ folder, attach system.log .

Here you are.

 

[AndrewT]

The game is not detecting your video driver:

[gfx_settings.cpp:21]: Loading settings for adapter 0, fullscreen=0, multisample=15
[gfx_settings.cpp:49]: Graphic Adapters:
[gfx_settings.cpp:54]: 0:
[gfx_settings.cpp:68]: Using Adapter [0] to check for multi-sampling support:

Please try this:

- uninstall the nVidia driver plus all associated utilities

- reboot

- install the latest one by fresh download from here:
https://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

- reboot again

If still no good please post those three files again, thanks.

 

[DaBushWookie]

The game is not detecting your video driver:


Please try this:

- uninstall the nVidia driver plus all associated utilities

- reboot

- install the latest one by fresh download from here:
https://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

- reboot again

If still no good please post those three files again, thanks.

Thanks but still no luck.

 

[Vattik]

I made a post about this issue on the CK2 Steam forums, after having taken these steps as well without success. I had mentioned that this seemed like a DirectX problem, thanks AndrewT for coming to this conclusion.

Here's what I posted on the Steam forum thread:
"What I initially thought was an issue related to the mods I was using, seems to be something else entirely. After removing all mods, uninstalling, and deleting the Documents\Paradox.. folder, and then re-installing (on Win 10). There seems to be a strange issue where the launcher comes up as a blank white window.

I initially thought the launcher was frozen, but after clicking around sporadically on the blank white launcher window, I caused several web pages to open up with Paradox news. So I can infact interact with the launcher window despite not being able to see what I'm clicking on.

With this in mind, I decided to take things further and pushed the enter key on the blank white launcher. Low and behold the game started, however what displayed was my desktop with my cursor becoming the Crusader Kings 2 cursor and the intro music playing in the background. I couldn't click on anything on my desktop sooooo the game itself was transparently layered over it.

Considering my searches have brought up very few issues of this nature with Crusader Kings 2, my best guess right now is this is a directX issue, though I haven't the foggiest clue where to start with troubleshooting this. One thing to note is my attempt at obtaining a version of DirectX directly from the Microsoft website, but their webpages are constantly failing to load. I'm assuming they're having server problems."

I've gone ahead and included the same 3 files that were requested from DaBushWookie.

(Messing around with directx .dll files, I have several older version of directx and now Steam won't even load. I did another clean install of my video drivers and Steam starts up again, but I'm noticing that d3d9.dll is not being included by my Nvidia driver.)

Edit: I picked up a redistributable for Direct X and successfully installed it after no newer versions of directx were detected. After starting up Crusader Kings 2, the Launcher is once again a blank white window. I'm out of ideas. My system is now back to how it was, aside from the updated Nvidia driver. Gonna go watch some anime and let my brain rest for a little bit. For a second I almost thought I had completely broken my system trying to get Crusader Kings 2 to work lol, hopefully there's a bright person out there with the know-how that can share some insight into a solution for this issue.

 

[AndrewT]

Both of you please go to these two folders:

C:\Windows\SysWOW64\
C:\Windows\System32\

Delete all files that fit the pattern d3dx9_??.dll in both those folders; usually about 20 in each. Then go to:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8109
(run dxsetup.exe after extracting from this download)

 

[Vattik]

Both of you please go to these two folders:

C:\Windows\SysWOW64\
C:\Windows\System32\

Delete all files that fit the pattern d3dx9_??.dll in both those folders; usually about 20 in each. Then go to:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8109
(run dxsetup.exe after extracting from this download)

You'll also find dxsetup.exe in:
...\Steam\steamapps\common\Steamworks Shared\_CommonRedist\DirectX\Jun2010\

Edit: Thanks for the information on _CommonRedist in the ~\Steam\.. directory, I managed to get DirectX re-installed, unfortunately the Launcher is still a blank white window.

 

[AndrewT]

You'll also find dxsetup.exe in:
...\Steam\steamapps\common\Steamworks Shared\_CommonRedist\DirectX\Jun2010\

 

[DaBushWookie]

You'll also find dxsetup.exe in:
...\Steam\steamapps\common\Steamworks Shared\_CommonRedist\DirectX\Jun2010\

Still no luck, both with the DirectX in the steam directory and the one from Microsoft, it's still just a white screen

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

As it was a fix for issues the last two years before, a suggestion:

Go into Steamapps/common/Crusader Kings 2
right click ck2game.exe
->Properties
-> click on Compatibility tab
-> check "Disable fullscreen optimisation"

 

[DaBushWookie]

As it was a fix for issues the last two years before, a suggestion:

Go into Steamapps/common/Crusader Kings 2
right click ck2game.exe
->Properties
-> click on Compatibility tab
-> check "Disable fullscreen optimisation"

Already had it ticked, doesn't work with it off or with it on.

 

[Vattik]

Small update: I stumbled upon a Steam forum post that mentioned updating Microsoft's .Net Framework. I was using ver. 4.5, so I updated to 4.7.2. No luck there either.