Game crashes no matter what

[NeverNeverNever]

Information​

I have verifed my game files (Steam only)​

Yes

I have disabled all mods​

Yes

I am running the latest game update​

Yes

Required​

Summary​

Game crashes no matter what

Description​

No matter what, I try to load the game it crashes. I tried launching thru steam, I tried using the paradox launcher

Steps to reproduce​

I open the game and try to start an session

Game Version​

1.16.0

Platform​

Windows

Additional Information​

Affected Feature​

• Crashes

Save Game​

Other Attachments​

View attachment debug.logView attachment error.logView attachment game.logView attachment system.log

 

[BaliorPal]

My friend has a similar problem

 

[Qloc_Rainbowstorm]

Hello!
Can you elaborating on loading the Game? Do you mean by that creating new Game Run or rather loading Game Save from the previous version. If so, can you provide said Game Save?

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

Hello!
Can you elaborating on loading the Game? Do you mean by that creating new Game Run or rather loading Game Save from the previous version. If so, can you provide said Game Save?

Not OP but same issue. I have the same issue. First I couldnt get to the main menu. I reinstalled CK3 disabled all mods. have the latest update. I restarted my PC shutdown all background systems. I have Ryzen 7 7735 and RTX 4050 GPU.

I now managed to get on the map (play as any character option) after DDUing my drivers. But now it still wont load. It will crash when selecting a character now.


Some snippets of error log:
Application: Crusader Kings III Version: 1.16.0 Date/Time: 2025-04-29 09:28:01Unhandled Exception C0000005 (EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION) at address 0x00007FF7A6F4EC77Stack Trace: 1 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 2 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 3 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 4 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 5 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 6 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 7 ck3.exe (function-name not available) (+ 0) 8 KERNEL32.DLL BaseThreadInitThunk (+ 23) 9 ntdll.dll RtlUserThreadStart (+ 44) 10 ntdll.dll RtlUserThreadStart (+ 44)second crashreport:09:27:52][E][portraitcontext.cpp:326]: Persistent portrait info missing gene gene_hair_type! at 'file: save games/king_alberto_of_trani_1113_07_02.ck3 line: 1'[09:27:52][E][portraitcontext.cpp:326]: Persistent portrait info missing gene gene_baldness! at 'file: save games/king_alberto_of_trani_1113_07_02.ck3 line: 1'[09:27:52][E][pdx_persistent_reader.cpp:216]: Error: "Failed to read key reference: default_nudity: default_nudity, near line: 1" in file: "save games/king_alberto_of_trani_1113_07_02.ck3" near line: 1[09:27:59][E][gfx_dx11_base_buffer.cpp:68]: D3D error: hr returned: Not enough memory resources are available to complete this operation.[09:27:59][E][pdx_assert.cpp:619]: Assertion failed: hr returned:Not enough memory resources are available to complete this operation.[09:27:59][E][gfx_dx11_master_context.cpp:416]: Failed creating buffer[09:27:59][E][gfx_dx11_pixelbuffer.cpp:177]: CreateTexture2D failed on: DXT5_sRGB/2048x2048[09:27:59][E][gfx_dx11_pixelbuffer.cpp:178]: D3D error: hr returned: Not enough memory resources are available to complete this operation.[09:27:59][E][pdx_assert.cpp:619]: Assertion failed: hr returned:Not enough memory resources are available to complete this operation.[09:27:59][E][gfx_dx11_master_context.cpp:427]: Failed creating pixel buffer


I could run CK3 perfectly before this update, I can also still run victoria 3 and heavy graphics games like microsoft flight sim so I assume it is not my drivers
. I have attached my crash report.

 

[Divine]

...
Game crashes no matter what
...

My friend has a similar problem

The above might be related to the gene setup of your latest save game. Try renaming your save game folder under C:\Users\<your username here>\Documents\Paradox Interactive\Crusader Kings III\save games to old save games and see if you can boot the game properly? We have a fix upcoming for most of these issues in the next patch.

Not OP but same issue. I have the same issue. First I couldnt get to the main menu. I reinstalled CK3 disabled all mods. have the latest update. I restarted my PC shutdown all background systems. I have Ryzen 7 7735 and RTX 4050 GPU.
...
[gfx_dx11_master_context.cpp:427]: Failed creating pixel buffer [pdx_assert.cpp:619]: Assertion failed: hr returned:Not enough memory resources are available to complete this operation
...

This looks like you're running into a memory issue. You could try to close down other programs in the background to see if that helps. We're also working on memory optimizations to bring memory usage down which we will hopefully be able to bring in one of the upcoming patches. Lowering graphics settings could also work but your 6 GB GDDR from your GPU should be plenty.

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

The above might be related to the gene setup of your latest save game. Try renaming your save game folder under C:\Users\<your username here>\Documents\Paradox Interactive\Crusader Kings III\save games to old save games and see if you can boot the game properly? We have a fix upcoming for most of these issues in the next patch.


This looks like you're running into a memory issue. You could try to close down other programs in the background to see if that helps. We're also working on memory optimizations to bring memory usage down which we will hopefully be able to bring in one of the upcoming patches. Lowering graphics settings could also work but your 6 GB GDDR from your GPU should be plenty.

Hi thank you for your reply. Im not sure how to fix it. Victoria 3 and microsoft flight simulator (on high graphics, should be way heavier to run than paradox games on GPU) run fine. Any idea if it might be a memory leak form ck3.exe, or something similar? maybe tips how to diagnose this for me? or just wait for hotfix

 

[BaliorPal]

Hello!
Can you elaborating on loading the Game? Do you mean by that creating new Game Run or rather loading Game Save from the previous version. If so, can you provide said Game Save?

When he tries to start a new game run, the game crashes to the desktop without generating a crash log. After rolling back to the previous version, 1.15 Crown, everything started working normally again. We originally discovered the issue when he attempted to join our multiplayer session — I own all the DLCs, while he has none. His game crashed when trying to connect to the multiplayer lobby, and afterward he confirmed that the game also crashes when trying to launch a new single-player game run. He is not using any mods and has already verified the integrity of the game files.

 

[NeverNeverNever]

Hello!
Can you elaborating on loading the Game? Do you mean by that creating new Game Run or rather loading Game Save from the previous version. If so, can you provide said Game Save?

Creating a new game run, sorry

 

[NeverNeverNever]

Creating a new game run, sorry

I tried reinstalling, running vulkan and dx11, turning all background things off, but every time i try to launch a new game it gets too 100% load screen and freezes, I can tell it stops working when the music stops and it freezes the whole computer.

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

I tried reinstalling, running vulkan and dx11, turning all background things off, but every time i try to launch a new game it gets too 100% load screen and freezes, I can tell it stops working when the music stops and it freezes the whole computer.

exactly what happens to me. Sometimes i cannot get to main menu as well. though when i do it crashes when loading map to start new game

 

[Divine]

Hi thank you for your reply. Im not sure how to fix it. Victoria 3 and microsoft flight simulator (on high graphics, should be way heavier to run than paradox games on GPU) run fine. Any idea if it might be a memory leak form ck3.exe, or something similar? maybe tips how to diagnose this for me? or just wait for hotfix

We don't have any known memory leaks which are causing issues at the moment (doesn't mean that they don't exist for certain edge-cases) but this is rather the effect of us adding more content to the game over time and having to do memory optimizations continuously be smarter about our resource usage. And now we've not caught up fully with the optimization work but we're trying to address this as soon as we can so hopefully in a support patch in a not too distant future.

I tried reinstalling, running vulkan and dx11, turning all background things off, but every time i try to launch a new game it gets too 100% load screen and freezes, I can tell it stops working when the music stops and it freezes the whole computer.

Thanks for the explanations. This is definitely different from the save game issues that we identified yesterday evening then and something we'll have to look into separately.

Since you get a freeze I assume that you don't get the ability to upload a crashdump with our crashdump reporter - and that no crash-data is created in your CK# userfolder?

Could you additionally provide us with your pdx_settings.txt and possibly a dxdiag log?

And just for my own sanity since your error log contains a bunch of parsing errors from old save games just rename the save games folder temporarily to just hide the save games from the game?

 

[NeverNeverNever]

We don't have any known memory leaks which are causing issues at the moment (doesn't mean that they don't exist for certain edge-cases) but this is rather the effect of us adding more content to the game over time and having to do memory optimizations continuously be smarter about our resource usage. And now we've not caught up fully with the optimization work but we're trying to address this as soon as we can so hopefully in a support patch in a not too distant future.

Thanks for the explanations. This is definitely different from the save game issues that we identified yesterday evening then and something we'll have to look into separately.

Since you get a freeze I assume that you don't get the ability to upload a crashdump with our crashdump reporter - and that no crash-data is created in your CK# userfolder?

Could you additionally provide us with your pdx_settings.txt and possibly a dxdiag log?

And just for my own sanity since your error log contains a bunch of parsing errors from old save games just rename the save games folder temporarily to just hide the save games from the game?

I have attached the pdx settings and the dxdiag i think. i renamed the old save folder to the above suggested i can change it more too? i also found the minidump.dmp and i don't know if that is what you need sorry

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

We don't have any known memory leaks which are causing issues at the moment (doesn't mean that they don't exist for certain edge-cases) but this is rather the effect of us adding more content to the game over time and having to do memory optimizations continuously be smarter about our resource usage. And now we've not caught up fully with the optimization work but we're trying to address this as soon as we can so hopefully in a support patch in a not too distant future.

Thanks for the explanations. This is definitely different from the save game issues that we identified yesterday evening then and something we'll have to look into separately.

Since you get a freeze I assume that you don't get the ability to upload a crashdump with our crashdump reporter - and that no crash-data is created in your CK# userfolder?

Could you additionally provide us with your pdx_settings.txt and possibly a dxdiag log?

And just for my own sanity since your error log contains a bunch of parsing errors from old save games just rename the save games folder temporarily to just hide the save games from the game?

I have double checked. Went back to previous version. CK3 runs as smooth as ever. Must be something with this update specifically then. I will await the hotfix to see how it runs!