Crashing, can not play game any more

[Joshua Marius]

What OS are you playing on?
Windows 10 Pro

Do you have mods enabled?
I've tried both modded and unmodded

Have you tried verifying your game files?
Yes

How much "pain" is this causing you?
1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Please explain the issue you experienced in the most condensed way possible
First, it started at crashing every other autosave, then it turned to crashing every autosave. After that, the map wouldn't load and crashing there. Finally it turned to crashing, with now way of sending a crash report on startup. I have tried every "fix" I could find, I have tried fresh reinstalling it like 10 times now. The shadercache "solution" I see devs spewing on Steam I swear made it worst, as this most recent crash caused the game, Steam, and Discord all to crash. This all has only started over the course of this past week, so it was working perfectly fine for a good while. Also, for any files you may need, I'll need you to tell me where to find them and what you need.

Is there anything else you think could help us identify/replicate the issue?
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8600K CPU @ 3.60GHz
16GB RAM

 

[AndrewT]

Right click on victoria3.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, cap refresh rate at 60.


If those don'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/Victoria3/pdx_settings.json .
From your Documents/Paradox Interactive/Victoria3/logs/ folder, attach here system.log , error.log , exceptions.log

 

[Joshua Marius]

Right click on victoria3.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, cap refresh rate at 60.


If those don'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/Victoria3/pdx_settings.json .
From your Documents/Paradox Interactive/Victoria3/logs/ folder, attach here system.log , error.log , exceptions.log

I know the Victoria 3.exe is the launch button or something like, but absolutely nothing in the files say .exe for me, so Idk where to find it to do that properties and compatibility stuff

 

[AndrewT]

Right click on this game in your Steam LIbrary, manage, browse local files. Then double click on the Binaries folder, Victoria3.exe is in there.

 

[Joshua Marius]

Right click on victoria3.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, cap refresh rate at 60.


If those don'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/Victoria3/pdx_settings.json .
From your Documents/Paradox Interactive/Victoria3/logs/ folder, attach here system.log , error.log , exceptions.log

Well, it didn't work, here is the documents, with the exception of exceptions as it is not in that folder. I am not sure if that has to do with my more recent attempt to reinstall it again and praying to the gods it finally works.

 

[AndrewT]

In that dxdiag we see crashes in Steam, our launcher, crash reporter, and something called mousocoreworker.exe - but none in this game! Between that and your mention of other issues in your OP, I begin to suspect you have a problem outside this game.

What exactly happens if you run victoria3.exe directly from File Explorer?

 

[Joshua Marius]

In that dxdiag we see crashes in Steam, our launcher, crash reporter, and something called mousocoreworker.exe - but none in this game! Between that and your mention of other issues in your OP, I begin to suspect you have a problem outside this game.

What exactly happens if you run victoria3.exe directly from File Explorer?

Good news, the game runs fine via File Explorer. But that only solves part of the issue, I am a contributor to the mod Basileia Romaion, and I do need to be able to launch the mod to better continue my contribution to it. Is there a way to launch the mod with along with the game via file explorer? Or if correct on an outside issue, I may need to figure out which of those actually crashers are the issue

 

[AndrewT]

If the game runs from the .exe okay, that changes the possible causes quite a bit.

That can be a launcher problem, an antivirus app getting in the way, or a difference in the game settings in the launcher and the game.


For the launcher,
Please try this:

- uninstall Paradox Launcher v2 from the Windows "Apps and features" utility, if still present.

Delete the following folders if still present:

- C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Local/Programs/Paradox Interactive/
- C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Local/Paradox Interactive/
- C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Roaming/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2/
To see the AppData folder you'll need to enable View Hidden Items in File Explorer.

- exit the Steam app entirely
- run steam.exe as the Windows Admin user
- run the game from the PLAY button in Steam

IF that doesn't help, in this folder are some .log files:
C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Local/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2/
Please attach them here.
To see the AppData folder you'll need to enable View Hidden Items in File Explorer.

THEN exit the game/launcher, and You need to make sure all these apps are in your AV app's exceptions lists:

victoria3.exe (in the Steam vic3-binaries folder)
dowser.exe (in the Steam Vic3-launcher folder)
C:/users/{UserName}/AppData/Local/Programs/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2.2024..1/paradox launcher.exe
C:/users/{UserName}/AppData/Local/Programs/Paradox Interactive/bootstrapper-v2.exe

THEN exit GeForce Experience if running, and try the game again from Steam.

 

[Joshua Marius]

If the game runs from the .exe okay, that changes the possible causes quite a bit.

That can be a launcher problem, an antivirus app getting in the way, or a difference in the game settings in the launcher and the game.


For the launcher,
Please try this:

- uninstall Paradox Launcher v2 from the Windows "Apps and features" utility, if still present.

Delete the following folders if still present:

- C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Local/Programs/Paradox Interactive/
- C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Local/Paradox Interactive/
- C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Roaming/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2/
To see the AppData folder you'll need to enable View Hidden Items in File Explorer.

- exit the Steam app entirely
- run steam.exe as the Windows Admin user
- run the game from the PLAY button in Steam

IF that doesn't help, in this folder are some .log files:
C:/users/{userName}/AppData/Local/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2/
Please attach them here.
To see the AppData folder you'll need to enable View Hidden Items in File Explorer.

THEN exit the game/launcher, and You need to make sure all these apps are in your AV app's exceptions lists:

victoria3.exe (in the Steam vic3-binaries folder)
dowser.exe (in the Steam Vic3-launcher folder)
C:/users/{UserName}/AppData/Local/Programs/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2.2024..1/paradox launcher.exe
C:/users/{UserName}/AppData/Local/Programs/Paradox Interactive/bootstrapper-v2.exe

THEN exit GeForce Experience if running, and try the game again from Steam.

That one worked! Thank you!