PoE Won't Open - Fix + Ensuing Questions

[qiuyidio]

This tormented me for the larger part of yesterday and I finally figured it out (6:30AM!)

 

The Original Issue:

 

1.  Click to load the game

2.  Cursor turns into game cursor

3.  Small black rectangular appears in the top left

4.  Nothing else happens

5.  Only way to exit is through Alt+F4 or Task Manager

 

The Fix:

 

1.  Right click on PoE

2.  Set to run in 640 x 480 resolution

3.  Run PoE (it won't work)

4.  Alt + F4 out of PoE

5.  Right click on PoE

6.  Uncheck the 640 x 480 resolution

7.  Run PoE

8.  Voila!  Wait... the graphics look really crappy...

9.  Ok!  Go into Settings -> Graphics, and choose a new resolution

10.  Here's what happened when I tried the various resolutions:

 

- 1280 x 720: Super weird results!  Hard to describe, but it looks like the screen was cut horizontally into 10 equally sized rows, and then offset by a few inches from one another and then wraps around the screen.  

- 1280 x 768: Works, but ugly

- 1360 x 768: The best option I found

- 1366 x 768: CRASH.  This was the default that caused all the earlier problems.

 

Logic?

1.  The default resolution the game installs with does not work with my computer!  Forcing it to 640 x 480 temporarily lets you into the game to change some functions

 

New Questions / Issues

- WHY does my default resolution (1366 x 768) not work???

- When using 1360 x 768, the extreme left and right sides are technically not part of the game - this makes it very difficult to scroll the map with the mouse!  The "Caged Cursor" option had no impact on this.  I am currently looking into third party apps that force your mouse to stay in the game window, so we'll see if any work.

- Do not try Window Mode within the game settings!  Or, if you do, take note that I had to reinstall and uninstall to get back into the game.  I looked for a settings.ini file or something I could edit without entering the game, but could not find it.