Game freezing (very) quickly after startup

[Dnomyar96]

As per the title, CK3 freezes very quickly after startup (I don't even have enough time (unless I just select a random character and quickly go into the game) to select a character and get in game). When it does, it freezes for a solid minute or so, after which it resumes. However, it will freeze again after about 30 or so seconds. This keeps going, except that the gap between freeze shrinks every time (until there is maybe 5 seconds between minute long freezes). It also freezes for a while immediately after hitting Play in the launcher, before I get to the loading screen. What I mean by a freeze: the cursor changing into the windows loading cursor and task manager reporting it as not responding.

I don't have any mods installed.

I'm on a completely fresh Windows install. I had a similar issue before I reinstalled Windows, but I brushed it off, as I was having a lot of freezing problems with my machine. Reinstalling Windows on a different SSD fixed all my issues, except this one.

I've seen threads with similar issues from back in 2020, but none of the fixes mentioned there worked for me. I also tried everything in the "Master List of Fixes for Crusader Kings 3" thread. Attached the files as requested in that thread (the error.log is empty).

I'm at a loss what might be the problem. Right now I just can't play the game at all, so any help is appreciated.

 

[AndrewT]

No obvious cause in those file. Was there no error.log for us?

Edit that pdx_settings.txt file and find the renderer line. Change it to be like this:

"renderer"={
version=0
value="OpenGL"
}

Does that make any difference?

 

[Dnomyar96]

No obvious cause in those file. Was there no error.log for us?

Edit that pdx_settings.txt file and find the renderer line. Change it to be like this:


Does that make any difference?

I'm currently unable to play for an extended period of time, but from the 10 or so minutes I just tried, it seems to be running much better (it didn't freeze during those 10 minutes). Thank you very much!

 

[Dnomyar96]

Unfortunately it didn't solve it. I guess I just got lucky this morning, since now it froze again after just 3 or so minutes. This time however, it did give me a error.log, I attached it here.

 

[AndrewT]

That error log looks bad, apart from anything else do you have old save games still there? Can you try moving them elsewhere then start a new test campaign please?

 

[Dnomyar96]

That error log looks bad, apart from anything else do you have old save games still there? Can you try moving them elsewhere then start a new test campaign please?

I just did this. Attached the new error log. There were no save games in the folder anymore, yet it still complains about a lot of save games (seems like pretty much every game I ever played, including multiplayer ones and saves I have long since deleted).

 

[AndrewT]

I know you've done a Windows reinstall already, but bear with me if you will.

Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- unsubscribe from ALL mods in the Steam Workshop for this game
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox Interactive/CK3 folders
In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.

- 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 with a new campaign, BEFORE restoring nay save game files.

If there are still issues let's see those logs yet again please!

 

[Dnomyar96]

I know you've done a Windows reinstall already, but bear with me if you will.

Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- unsubscribe from ALL mods in the Steam Workshop for this game
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox Interactive/CK3 folders
In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.

- 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 with a new campaign, BEFORE restoring nay save game files.

If there are still issues let's see those logs yet again please!

Unfortunately this didn't help either. I did every step exactly as you said, but it still freeze pretty quickly after launching it. Here the new logs.

 

[AndrewT]

Well, a completely different error log now - it only mentions the sound system in fact. So that clean reinstall did something!

Are you hearing anything happen in audio in sync with the problem, as you describe it in your OP here?

 

[Dnomyar96]

Well, a completely different error log now - it only mentions the sound system in fact. So that clean reinstall did something!

Are you hearing anything happen in audio in sync with the problem, as you describe it in your OP here?

Hmm, no there's nothing weird with the audio. In fact, the music keeps playing when the game freezes (I guess that's kind of weird?), but other than that, the audio is perfectly normal.

 

[AndrewT]

Run Task manager and go into Performance. Then run the game up in windowed mode; what do you see happen in TM when the problem starts happening?

 

[Dnomyar96]

Just before the CPU usage drops to about 20% (from around 40-50%). When it happens it drops to near 0% and quickly gets back to the 20%. The GPU drops to near 0% the moment it happens, but almost immediately gets back to the level it was when it was working normally (no drop just before like the CPU). Here's a screenshot of the CPU graph (the red line shows where it happened).

The error log is the same as before.

 

[AndrewT]

I'm pretty sure that CPU drop is a consequence of the problem rather than a cause of it.

Which leaves us no wiser as you why this is happening to you! The fact it happened before and after a clean Windows reinstall does tend to point to hardware, but I can't imagine what sort of thing could cause that!

In the Windows search box enter msconfig. Go to Boot-Advanced; if number of processors it ticked there, untick it, save and reboot.

Unload GeForce Experience before starting the game.

If those don't help, please install and run the free utility Speccy. Send its output to a text file and attach that here, thanks.

 

[Dnomyar96]

Unload GeForce Experience before starting the game.

I'm not quite sure what you mean with this. Do you mean to stop the process? If so, it unfortunately didn't help.

Attached the Speccy log.

 

[AndrewT]

I mean right click on it in your Windows taskbar and select Exit or Quit.

A few Windows updates are stalled there, if you run Update does it find anything to apply?

Lots of utilities and apps running, but nothing I've seen cause problems to our games before.

I have a feeling this is hardware-related but I haven't seen anythign to back that up, not even which general area it might be. We eliminated DirectX 11 but that's about it ... and why apparently only this game?

Do you have Imperator, if so dos that have the same problem? It's the only other one of our games that's quite similar to this one.

 

[Dnomyar96]

I mean right click on it in your Windows taskbar and select Exit or Quit.

A few Windows updates are stalled there, if you run Update does it find anything to apply?

Lots of utilities and apps running, but nothing I've seen cause problems to our games before.

I have a feeling this is hardware-related but I haven't seen anythign to back that up, not even which general area it might be. We eliminated DirectX 11 but that's about it ... and why apparently only this game?

Do you have Imperator, if so dos that have the same problem? It's the only other one of our games that's quite similar to this one.

Sorry for the late response, I'm very busy at the moment. I do have Imperator, so I'll try that once I have some time. I'll get back to you when I've tried it.

 

[Dnomyar96]

I mean right click on it in your Windows taskbar and select Exit or Quit.

A few Windows updates are stalled there, if you run Update does it find anything to apply?

Lots of utilities and apps running, but nothing I've seen cause problems to our games before.

I have a feeling this is hardware-related but I haven't seen anythign to back that up, not even which general area it might be. We eliminated DirectX 11 but that's about it ... and why apparently only this game?

Do you have Imperator, if so dos that have the same problem? It's the only other one of our games that's quite similar to this one.

Apologies for the delay. I've been able to try Imperator as well now. It suffers from the same problem. After trying it, I was able to play CK3 for about an hour again, but now it's back to freezing after a few minutes.

The most recent crash from CK3 only had a single line in the error log:

[pdx_assert.cpp:584]: Assertion failed: the character does not have alive data!

I've attached the logs from the Imperator crash here, just in case they might be helpful.

 

[AndrewT]

The most recent crash from CK3 only had a single line in the error log:

If there's nothing there, nor in dxdiag.txt referencing either game, that again starts to look like a hardware issue - or at least an issue from outside the game, which the game of course cannot log.

Do you see any ERROR or WARNING entries in the Windows Event Viewer in the few minutes leading up to these crashes?

 

[Dnomyar96]

If there's nothing there, nor in dxdiag.txt referencing either game, that again starts to look like a hardware issue - or at least an issue from outside the game, which the game of course cannot log.

Do you see any ERROR or WARNING entries in the Windows Event Viewer in the few minutes leading up to these crashes?

There's a single warning around the time of the crash:

"
The application-specific permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID
{2593F8B9-4EAF-457C-B68A-50F6B8EA6B54}
and APPID
{15C20B67-12E7-4BB6-92BB-7AFF07997402}
to the user DESKTOP-FUGDH5I\raymo SID (S-1-5-21-3676018167-727980-4048045268-1001) from address LocalHost (Using LRPC) running in the application container Unavailable SID (Unavailable). This security permission can be modified using the Component Services administrative tool.
"

It sounds like there is some kind of permission issue, but I don't really understand this message.

 

[AndrewT]

Me either, I have to say! We've exceeded my knowledge and experience of the internals of Windows I'm afraid.

I found this article on that message:

The application-specific permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID - Microsoft Q&A

The application-specific permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID {2593F8B9-4EAF-457C-B68A-50F6B8EA6B54} and APPID {15C20B67-12E7-4BB6-92BB-7AFF07997402} to the user DESKTOP-L859GOU\Mudda SID…

docs.microsoft.com

It seems to say it's likely cosmetic - do you only get that message just before these crashes, or elsewhere in the WEV?