CONSTANT RANDOM CRASHES -- An Unplayable Game

[Arsene Lupin]

CONSTANT RANDOM CRASHES -- An Unplayable Game

 

Hello Obsidian. I am revising this post because the "bug" I originally wrote about is much, much worse than I originally thought. I am getting constant random crashes. They occur 100% of the time. They make the game completely unplayable. If the opening PoE1 recap isn't skipped, the game will freeze/crash before the introduction cinematic (narrated by Eder) can play. If I skip the recap, the intro movie plays (Deadfire has not yet crashed mid-intro) and the first area--the In Between--loads and the game appears playable and stable. However it will always freeze/crash before the Watcher/Soul character makes it all the way to the Adra Pillar at the far right of the screen. Often the audio will cut-out, or seem to, a few moments prior to the freeze/crash. Exactly one time an audio line played to the end after the game froze, however.

 

I have attempted everything I can possibly do on my end to diagnose and/or workaround the problem, including but not limited to:

 

• Windows compatibility mode (Win7, Win8, even WinXP) settings.
• Administrator privileges off/on.
• Countless possible Deadfire configurations--windowed, fullscreen, every quality preset, every available resolution, multiple vfx enabled/disabled combination. The gamut.
• Steam did, of course, verify the integrity of the game cache.
• I also redownloaded the game, multiple times, after manually purging it from my system (not a fun thing to do when you suffer from bandwidth caps)
• Oh, and I've also tried running the game off of an SSD, off an HDD, from the default Steam install directory and from a unique Steam install directory.

 

I was able to get the game to run off of an old laptop, with an integrated GPU, albeit very poorly (10fps are far from optimal; combat is impossible) that doesn't even come close to the minimum recommended specs... but it doesn't crash. Using Steam cloud saves to load saves from the laptop to my PC (in the starting island, the world map and inside the cave) and... you guessed it, Deadfire still crashes on me, usually a few seconds after loading up the area. Sometimes I have time to move my party, but the game usually crashes before anyone can make a it a half-dozen steps.

 

To be perfectly honest, I've been a PC gamer for a very long time and I haven't had this much trouble with a game since I bought a copy of Daikatana out a bargain bin for $0.99, and that game was quickly re-purposed into a Frisbee.

 

My PC specs are as follows:

• 3.55ghz quad-core i5 CPU
• 16gb memory
• 2gb HD6870 GPU
• Windows 10 x64

 

(Note that this is a PC that ran Pillars of Eternity perfectly. And also note, as I've proved, that Deadfire is capable of running on a toaster.)

 

My working theory is that this may be a compatibility problem between whichever version of Unity Deadfire is using and my GPU drivers, but only because ATI drivers are typically the cause of my headaches (whenever I upgrade, I'm going nVidia and never touching ATI again). But at the same time, the game does load and appear to render properly, so I have no idea. No ideas, just lots of frustration.

 

Output file retrieved after recap crash: https://drive.google.com/file/d/13RPzhDTiaT_MdV-IeoeAOz8yzT1atwjX/view?usp=sharing

Output file retrieved after in-game crash: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AxLN1f9scVlJvda2K00c7b6FeacD8GQp/view?usp=sharing

 

....

 

NOTE I originally posted about this problem here, but am reposting it now because my initial assumptions about what was happening were incorrect. I will request moderators lock/delete the original thread.

 

....

 

EDIT1 I am experiencing greatly improved stability after patch 1.02. I can now play the game for 20 minutes--sometimes longer--before seeing a crash! And, now, when the game crashes a window pops up informing me of the creation of the output log, which is handy. I've attached the new output log file to this post.

output_log.txt

Edited May 18, 2018 by Arsene Lupin

[aartz]

Heya Arsene Lupine,

 

Sorry you're going through all this. I completely understand how frustrated you are, and I'm sorry that you're unable to play the game =(

 

Thanks for posting so much information. The logs and system specs really help. I've gone ahead and written up the issue and added to our database

 

Compatibility issues like these are always so frustrating, but hopefully we can get it all solved for ya.

[Nitrium Oxide]

I have been having the exact same problems. Couldn't even get past character creation section of the game. The game hard crashes, with a black screen and looping sound (no Windows error or anything in the PoE log), forcing pushing the PC's reset button.

System is an i5 760, R9 390, Win10 x64 (April update), 16 GB RAM. Screen Res 1920x1200 (16:10).

After trying all the usual (older GPU driver, graphics settings, fullscreen and windowed modes etc), I was able to "solve" it by switching to 1280x720 windowed mode, which provides rock stable gameplay. I now suspect that the non 16:9 screen resolution might be the issue? Anyway, try 1280x720 windowed and see if that works for you also.

[Nemesis7884]

i have the same issue - CONSTANT crashes for no reasons, even if nothing happens on the screen...very tiresome

 

ryzen 1600, gtx 1080ti, win10, 4k resolution

 

unfortunatly the game is unplayable for me....and even the small portion i could play was riddled with bugs... very disappointing

Edited May 11, 2018 by Nemesis7884

[EttinoObsidiSail]

I've been having a similar issue, where my computer will crash similarly during the game. although the furthest ive made it is to just past character creation before crashing. most of the crashes cause my computer to freeze before it can generate a crash log, but i have had 3 crashes which have generated crash logs.

 

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1pv33qKdjczMPZ5Tw67L92DhpfyttuNyw

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1byAYzYX040rK2I5oXYwozK03Av7Gq9dr

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1LKno_eat-eo1lkT69tZFvR9VfTEUAKrD

[yuliansavov]

I have the same problem, but with Ubuntu 18.04, ryzen 2600x, gtx 970 with 390.48 driver. The whole system just freezes. This is the content from Player.log file:

 

https://pastebin.com/h4FKv3aJ

[Amigo345]

If you have Win10 update 1803 try doing this - set poe2.exe to run as administrator and check disable full screen optimization.

[Arsene Lupin]

You mean PillarsOfEternityII.exe? Anyway, I tried it. Got about 15 seconds of play-time before the game crashed.

 

Heya Arsene Lupine,

 

Sorry you're going through all this. I completely understand how frustrated you are, and I'm sorry that you're unable to play the game =(

 

Thanks for posting so much information. The logs and system specs really help. I've gone ahead and written up the issue and added to our database

 

Compatibility issues like these are always so frustrating, but hopefully we can get it all solved for ya.

 

Thank you.

 

I'll admit I feel a bit better seeing that other people are having the same issue.

[Nitrium Oxide]

After setting the game to 1280x720 for the character creation section I was able to play the game at native resolution (1920x1200) up until Port Maje, where, as before, the game caused multiple hard crashes (requiring a reboot of Windows) at random times during the section with the Governor talking to the crowd on the platform and the subsequent interaction with him. Again, switching to 1280x720 Windowed allowed me to get past this scene, after which I could switch back to 1920x1200 and continue playing.

Launching the game in Administrator and "Disabling Fullscreen Optimisations" is unsuccessful for me.

[GregoyBaltoro]

Hi all,

I´m reporting an issue with this game. After I run new game and after introduction animation, you walk on path in-between and than you´re sucked and tossed in area with Pallid Knight (before the character creation process). After I finish dialog window with dwarf and the door opens the game crashes - "green or purple screen occures, sometimes flickering of stripes" and whole laptop reboots.

When I installed the game first time, I was able to get past the character creation process and get into game into first location on island. I could play a bit, but game crashed and rebooted the laptop every time when I checked the invetory, sometimes when I spoke to some NPC. I could play around 2 minutes and than the games crashed again. There was no logical pattern for the crash, no regularity. I decided I want to start a new game and from that moment I cannot get past the characted creation process.

I have the Obsidian version of the game. Also I have the Explorers pack.

What did I do to make the game work:

- i tried 3 different GPU drivers, as I think it´s issue of card hence the flickering and coloured screens with crash. I tried driver from manufacturer of my laptop MSI (382.05), driver download via Win 10 driver update (388.18) and I also have the last driver made specifically for Pillars 2 (397.64). None of this made any progress.

- I tried multiple graphical settings in the game itself. Changing windowed/fullscreen mode, different scales, different MSAA samples (btw there are stripes on screen if using higher than 1 MSAA), different frame rate on slider, occlussion, shadows, miscellanous, VSync

- googled solutions on forums for the whole day and half - checking possible causes of this - Win 10, unity engine, game itself, GPU, drivers etc. and trying those solutions whether from developer or some user who found workaround.

- reinstalled game couple of times on different drives C/(system - in program files x86 and D/ (special folder for Pillars)

- I downloaded game via GOG downloader and done file verification check everytime prior to instalation.

- I run the game with and without explorers pack and other dlcs, to make sure they´re not the issue.

- I tried to run the game in compatibility modes for win 7 and 8. Also as an administrator all the time. I have administrator rights.

- noticed I have almost similar problem like some MAC users in the same spot of the game and without the black screen, despite not using MAC and having Nvidia GPU. (https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/97389-mac-unable-to-start-game-black-screen/)

- contacted the Obsidian support for help as well.

- monitored realtime temperature and usage of GPU and CPU by the game. GPU was max 50% and CPU around 25%. Temp around 60-70 °C.

- my dxdiag didnt find any issues. All working fine.

- I have latest windows patches

- I ran the game in different CPU/GPU settings from Eco to Turbo(overclocked). No difference.

All of this leads me  to conclusion that it´s application issue, not my hardware/software issue.

I had similar game crashing issues with 3 other games. The Bureau: XCOM Declassified and some lastest Total War games. Also Ghost Recon Wildlands were sometimes crashing once or twice in 10-15 hours.

I could play PoE1 without any issues or crashes.

My specs:
MSI GT62VR 7RE laptop
iCore i7 - 7820HK (2,9 GHz)
RAM 16 GB
nVidia GTX 1070 8 GB Vram

all specs are attached in dxdiag. Also output log added. I couldnt upload saved games so here´s dropbox link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/4h3n0350in0fquu/PoE%20II%20-%20saves%20GregoryBaltoro.rar?dl=0

DxDiag.txt

output_log.txt

[yuliansavov]

I managed to resolve this issue by updating the motherboard UEFI. I thought I should try that, seeing how all people in this thread have different video cards, processors and OS. I have been playing the game for 4 hours now and all is good. Maybe doing the same thing will solve the issue for the others that have this problem.

 

btw the motherboard is ASUS TUF with x470 chipset

[ppipp]

The game crashes randomly, and especially when in the inventory or skill tree interface. Whenever it crashes, my screen goes black and I have to reinstall my graphic drivers (NVidia for a 970). It's so annoying I decided to stop playing the game. I had my first crash with 388.18 driver,  but even after installing the latest ones, 397.64, I have the same issue.

[Arsene Lupin]

@GregoryBaltoro lol, you've been just as thorough as I've been. Frustrating, ain't it? (Though I'll admit I was unable to test more than one GPU myself). From what I can tell, this issue seems to be occurring on a wide range of hardware. I initially assumed it might be an ATI driver problem, as in my personal experience it's almost always an ATI driver problem, but it seems to me that virtually everyone else w/ this problem (who is posting specs) is running into the problem on very different hardware.

 

GPU, OS, CPU, it doesn't matter.

 

Which seems kinda weird to me as, evidently, the constant freezing isn't as common as I'd expect it to be if it were purely a software issue.

 

I dunno, maybe we're all using the same sound card or something? Or have a very specific background application that is somehow interfering with things?

 

@Yuliansavov I've no idea how to go about updating my mobo UEFI, but I'll look into it just in case. Here's hoping it won't take too long, as I've already sunk far more time than I'd care to admit trying to diagnose this issue.

Edited May 13, 2018 by Arsene Lupin

[SableShrike]

Just spitballin here, but have you guys turned off : Enable Telemetry?

 

That was occasionally causing my rig to freeze and sometimes crash.

 

Might be the case for some of you with choppy internet like me.

[Maf]

As you seem to be able to troubleshoot the basics, have you tried checking your audio device?

It's a stretch, but if you're desperate:

 

Attempt1:

Go to device manager and disable your audio device(s).

 

Attempt2:

Go to your playback devices, disable any unused ones (do the same for recording devices) and try again.

Double check playback devices and try and fiddle with the default format values (I would definitely try switching between 44100Hz and 48000Hz if you can)

 

Attempt3:

Update you audio device drivers (whichever ones you can find).

 

Cheers and good luck.

 

-edit

Also try reading this post:

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/1480982971174752598/

While appearing for Windows 1709, it does reference something generic (scaling) which can be modified in any OS.

Edited May 13, 2018 by Maf

[Boeroer]

Just to report that crahes may not be a general problem: 

 

No problems for me on Ubuntu nor Windows. Not a single crash. Sometimes the game stutters and mouseclicks get delayed, that's all.

 

Maybe the problems are related to a specific hardware combination/configuration.

[PangaeaACDC]

Had another instant crash to desktop with no error log. This time when going down the stairs in the Watershapers Guild.

 

1. Clicked on the stairs

2. Black screen

3. *poof*

4. I'm staring at the desktop.

 

Don't have a player.log file now, because I pulled off that /dev/null trick mentioned in another thread, to prevent it from getting silly big. That is to say, I'm on a Linux system.

[EttinoObsidiSail]

Just spitballin here, but have you guys turned off : Enable Telemetry?

 

That was occasionally causing my rig to freeze and sometimes crash.

 

Might be the case for some of you with choppy internet like me.

I just tried this and is was able to get to just after the first combat encounter before crashing, which is the furthest I had gotten. when i then restarted form the save i was then able to play without crashing. thanks for the advice.  

[Arsene Lupin]

I've definitely tried disabling telemetry. Also wifi. Also the Steam overlay. Also the Steam client. Also DPI scaling and GPU scaling. All of the options I could possibly try, I have tried.

 

 

Just to report that crahes may not be a general problem: 

 

No problems for me on Ubuntu nor Windows. Not a single crash. Sometimes the game stutters and mouseclicks get delayed, that's all.

 

Maybe the problems are related to a specific hardware combination/configuration.

 

I think I commented on this before, but that's precisely why this issue is so weird: people are reporting this problem on a diverse array of machines. There does not appear to be any common piece of hardware. If we were all using ATI GPUs, for example, that'd be one thing. Or if we were all running Windows 10. But we're not. And with this problem cropping up on so many machines that are so different, it's strange that it's not affecting more people. In other words, it seems like a very difficult problem to diagnose.

 

And, no offense, but in general saying "I don't have any problems" isn't terribly helpful for discussions like these. Ultimately it only serves to diminish the people who *are* having problems at best, and at worst comes across as a kind of developer apologism. And I know most people usually don't, but I mean no offense. I genuinely don't think you intended either of those things. :D

[GregoyBaltoro]

I thought I might add two more files related to my app crash.

 

Maybe it will help.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/yf22ylosscpnb9u/PillarsOfEternityII.exe.3792.dmp?dl=0 - this is .dmp file which is too big to upload.

app crash pro pillars.txt

[thedarkbird]

PoE II randomly crashes and freezes my whole computer with it, requiring a hard reset. Very annoying. I'll just wait for a patch before continuing this game.

 

Win10 x64; latest version (April update); fresh install (!)

i7 2600k

ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3 motherboard

16 GB Corsair DDR3 

Samsung 850 PRO 512 GB SSD (SATA3)

MSI Geforce GTX 970; latest drivers

Full System Disk Encryption with Veracrypt

Private Internet Access VPN

 

I stopped finding a clear cause since no matter what I do, random crashes keep occurring. The frequency changes though: sometimes it crashes all the time, other times I can play an hour or more without.

Edited May 15, 2018 by thedarkbird

[Arsene Lupin]

@thedarkbird I think you're the only one that's been that specific about memory, but I'm pretty sure I'm also using Corsair-brand DDR3 sticks. I have no idea how such a thing could be possible, but might this finally be our common denominator? The *brand* of RAM?

[FlyingFox]

Same thing is happening to me. This happens almost 100% when I load a saved game. My 'crash' however, is a complete shut-down of my PC and this happens without fail when I am loading a saved game. I thought it was an overheating issue but I verified that nothing was out of the norm. I am not suffering anything remotely this bad from other games like Guild Wars 2, Total War - Warhammer, Warhammer - Vermintide 2, Divinity, Original Sin 2, etc that can be demanding in their own right so I really doubt it's a 'not meeting the requirements' issue.

 

My modest specs are:

 

Radeon Software Version - 18.4.1

Radeon Software Edition - Adrenalin

Graphics Chipset - AMD Radeon R9 380 Series

Memory Size - 4096 MB

Memory Type - GDDR5

Core Clock - 980 MHz

Windows Version - Windows 10 (64 bit)

System Memory - 8 GB

CPU Type - AMD FX-8320 Eight-Core Processor

 

I hope the team is looking into this as I have so much anticipation for this game. (PoE 1 and it's expansion ran perfectly fine). Very disappointed at the moment

[sleepytime]

Hi Arsene,

 

I don't think that's the issue. I'm using a completely different brand of RAM, and I'm experiencing some similar behavior. Some zones, for whatever reason, are literally unplayable for me on a specific character. I've not yet made it back to those zones on a different character to see if it's an issue with the zone itself, the character, or a combination of the two. I've got a save that literally restarts my computer a second after the load screen. I've tried many and all of the fixes listed in this thread to no avail.

 

However, I did notice that setting my graphics to low, disabling vsync, and setting MSAA to 4 bought me a few minutes inside of the zone before the restart. I've even resorted to running the beta branch of the game to see if that helps. I'm happy to share any and all saves, but I may just be out of luck until there's a future patch.

[sleepytime]

All right, so I'm feeling less defeated than yesterday, and I'm back to troubleshooting this problem further. I made the following changes and the zone that used to continually crash on me seems to be stable (I got through a long fight in the zone and just ran around for a few minutes before and after the fight):

 

• Updated video card drivers to the latest version (had been running the version prior to troubleshoot, but I don't think this is significant and doesn't affect your situation as you use an ATI card)
• Reverted from the beta patches to the live version of the game (again, doesn't affect your situation)
• Ran the game with low graphics options, vsync off, MSAA set to 4, frame rate max at 60, and resolution set to windowed and 1280x720 @ 60Hz (this may be the big change)

Just to ensure that the first two changes aren't significantly affecting the stability of the zone on my system, I'm going to set my resolution back to windowed 1920x1080 @ 60Hz and see if my system restarts. If so, I'll probably test more resolutions as well as bumping the graphics quality options back up. I'm not sure why the above workaround seems to be working given that my system handles much more demanding games without any issues, but if it at least buys me some playability until a fix is released, I'll be happy.

[sleepytime]

Okay, as I suspected, the game crashed almost instantly after setting my resolution back to windows 1920x1080 @ 60Hz and loading my save in a zone that has always caused problems. This leads me to believe that updating my video card drivers and reverting to the live version of PoE II did not help with game stability. It appears that changing the resolution to something outside of my max resolution for the monitor has resulted in more stability. My next test is to crank my graphic options back up to high and test the zone at windowed 1280x720 @ 60Hz. If that proves to be stable, my guess is that there's some sort of weird issue with certain zones/game flags/characters and my system.