Game crashes when I try to load something the second time.

ImAPaladin

Chieftain
Joined
Mar 25, 2012
Messages
24
I apologize if this issue has been resolved before, but I couldn't find it. All the forum posts I could find related to this issue just died because no one could answer it.

So here's my issue. When I first start up Civ 5, the first game that I load(whether it's a fresh game or a saved game), it loads fine, but the second time I try to load either of them, I get a CTD with no message.

I thought it had something to do with paged pool memory running out(because I'm still using windows xp lol), so I tried increasing it via registry edit but it didn't fix the problem(maybe it's still not enough, or totally unrelated).

The game itself works fine, I finished a standard sized game with no crash during the game or slowdown that made the game unplayable, with highest settings.

The odd thing is that it didn't crash when loading the game I mentioned the second time, or even third time a few days ago, so I thought it somehow fixed itself but I encountered it again today.

Please help me!!!

PS. I don't know if this is related or not, but I tried starting a huge game and when the game loaded, there were red squares in place of the resource icons on tiles. Same red squares on unit/building pictures in civpedia too(except bigger to cover the whole pictures). However when I loaded again, they weren't there. It appears to be random.

Specs
OS: Windows XP 32bit Professional SP3
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400 @ 2.66GHz
RAM: 4GB(Limited at 3.25G)
GPU: Radeon HD 6850
 
Might be a memory error, because it sounds like if there was not enough memory available to load all the textures. Since Win 32bit can only handle 2 GB per program, an increase to 3 GB could help. An explanation is here, but that's at your own risk!
 
Thank you for the reply.

Hm, before I try this method with a 'risk', I'd like to rule some things out first.

Maybe it's only this time, but the odd thing is, this time I did get an error when trying to load a saved game while I was already in a game(second time loading something after starting Civ 5).

The error was
AppName: civilizationv.exe AppVer: 1.0.1.511 ModName: msvcr90.dll
ModVer: 9.0.30729.6161 Offset: 0003ae7a

I looked around a little, and it seems this 'msvcr90.dll' error was an issue for people using an OS in Spanish. I'm not even using an OS that's in spanish(although it's not English), and I thought this was supposed to be fixed.

Could it be that it's because my OS is not english?

Oh, and I forgot to mention...I only need to restart the game for it to not crash, not the computer itself. Does this still mean that it's memory related? Does just restarting the game 'reset' the memory?
 
Thank you for the reply.

Hm, before I try this method with a 'risk', I'd like to rule some things out first.

Maybe it's only this time, but the odd thing is, this time I did get an error when trying to load a saved game while I was already in a game(second time loading something after starting Civ 5).

The error was
AppName: civilizationv.exe AppVer: 1.0.1.511 ModName: msvcr90.dll
ModVer: 9.0.30729.6161 Offset: 0003ae7a

I looked around a little, and it seems this 'msvcr90.dll' error was an issue for people using an OS in Spanish. I'm not even using an OS that's in spanish(although it's not English), and I thought this was supposed to be fixed.

Could it be that it's because my OS is not english?

Oh, and I forgot to mention...I only need to restart the game for it to not crash, not the computer itself. Does this still mean that it's memory related? Does just restarting the game 'reset' the memory?

It is memory related. About all you can do is verify the local cache, which should be run until "all files varified succesfully". This will help with corrupted files from the memory crash. Restart the computer to allow the OS to flush out memory.

If that does not work, then your memory may be starting to develope logic errors and then it is a hardware problem.

The only catch is if the saved file becomes corrupted, then there is no way to fix it. Reloading that particular file, may keep introducing the same error that was the original problem.
 
I tried validating the game and it downloaded 1 file, and validating the second time said "all files varified successfully". However, I got the 'msvcr90.dll' error again. I tried validating again after I got the error, and it downloaded 1 file again. I guess my lack of memory keeps corrupting this file?
So all that's left is following The_J's suggestion.
But wouldn't increasing the virtual addressing beyond 2GB steal from reserved space for GPU and such and reduce graphical performance? Is this the price I have to pay if I don't want to get memory crashes?

BTW, it didn't happen in standard map size, but I'm currently playing my second game on a huge map and sometimes when the leader screen pops up, it crashes with 'msvcr90.dll' error as well. It's Arabia's leader, who was present in my standard size game(but didn't cause any problems in standard size). It doesn't crash with other leaders, and lowering the leader screen quality to low or minimum fixes the problem, but it looks too ugly! I guess this is memory related too, just thought I'd let you know.

EDIT: I tried forcibly increasing the Virtual Address Space by editing boot.ini following The_J's advice, and when I rebooted into that mode, I get problems with screen; it loads very slowly, buffering like I'm using a very slow computer. So I guess this solution is out of the question, even before I got a chance to editing the executable's memory limit. Do I have no hope then? Am I doomed to be stuck with these problems? I just got this game not long ago, I love it, but I've never had a game that caused so many problems!!! WHYYYYY
 
About the only answer here is avoid huge maps, or use a more powerful computer. That is probably not the answer you want to hear, but that was/is my experience with the game.
 
I believe even just updating my OS so I can let the game use more memory would help alot... but oh well, with a 10 year old OS...I guess I can't expect too much. Still, I expected to be able to enjoy every aspect of the game if I surpassed minimum requirement by a good margin. Also this game is(or was) pretty notorious for having many bugs/glitches as I found out, so it MIGHT be the game's fault...not sure. I tracked the memory usage of the game while playing, it seems to keep using up like 1GB memory even after I exit to main menu(unlike when I first enter main menu, when it's barely using anything). Not being able to load games twice in a row without restarting the game with 2GB memory seems a bit...odd to me, albeit the game is known for memory hungry beast.

Anyhow, thanks for your advices ^^
 
I thought I should update this...

Odd thing is, this doesn't happen anymore and the only thing I really did was update the catalyst drivers to the latest version(although at the time of posting, I was using the then-latest catalyst version) to fix skyrim pixel bug introduced in the last drivers.

I already tried using different driver versions back then but it didn't fix it. Not exactly sure what happened but... good for me.
 
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