Civ6 DLC: New Frontier bugg - can’t even start game (PC, Win 10)

[graffen69]

Bought New Frontier the day it came out (21 May 2020).
Wanted to wait with installing it since I read other reviewers on Steam had problems with the new DLC. But it auto installed and now every time I try to start Civ6 I get an error message saying “Authentication failed. Error: Check steam client is running.”

As I cannot enter the menu screen I don´t know the patch version; I´m assuming it´s the latest patch.
I have never had this happen before with any game on Steam and the only time Civ 6 has ever crashed (in-game) is when I have played with mods that are not up to date.
No problems starting or playing any other Steam games.

I have both expansions and all DLC´s, playing on a PC with Windows 10. I have 4 mods that I have installed manually and around 5 other mods installed through Steam Workshop that all worked prior to New Frontier DLC self-installing. Also got about 10 more mods installed, but not up to date, through Steam Workshop.

I did try restarting computer, verifying files (twice), un-checking DLC on the installed list (on Steam) but the same error message pops up every time wither I try to start from steam (on and offline) or through a Civ 6 New Frontier shortcut on the desktop.


I´ll upload my latest auto-save file of a game I had going with Victoria prior to the self-installation that crashed the game. I also noticed an "AutoConfigGame_02.Civ6Cfg" file that popped up in my Auto-Save file directory afterwards but I cannot seem to upload that file since it does not have the right file extension.


Any help greatly appreciated.

 

[GIO888]

Its the Mods. I had to unsubscribe from all of mine and re-aqqure Civ Vi files on Steam.

Good luck!

 

[purringcat]

It's not the Mods. The game won't run with all the mods disabled. Reinstalled the game and it still doesn't run. It's the game or Steam's installer and there are hundreds of messages from users unable to play it with just the patch installed.

 

[graffen69]

I seriously doubt it´s the mods since mods don´t usually prevent the whole game from even starting.
I did remove all mods, both those installed manually and through Steamwork, and the same error message pops up.

I´m at a loss.
Prolly will refund the DLC in a couple days before 2 week timer runs out and hope the basic game still works.
But I wanted to at least check if anyone has found a fix, temporarily or permanent.

 

[Half Nelson]

I still have similar issue after going through same troubleshooting as you, I even reinstalled Steam. I don't use any external mods but the CivVI DLC have the same effect:- I can play a game with just a single DLC enabled (e.g. GS only or vanilla game with a leader DLC enabled) and I have played Gran Columbia on the vanilla (standard rules) game. Devs are aware and are trying to help. Check out thread in Bug Reports titled "citys missing there map hud" for further info.

 

[graffen69]

Thank You Half Nelson.
I will make a post there and hopefully a moderator can move this thread to the bugg section where it belongs as I have no idea how make contact with a moderator (I´m not that good with computers).
Uploading my DXdiag Save for anyone to check out if needed.

 

[dshirk]

Thank You Half Nelson.
I will make a post there and hopefully a moderator can move this thread to the bugg section where it belongs as I have no idea how make contact with a moderator (I´m not that good with computers).
Uploading my DXdiag Save for anyone to check out if needed.

Greffen, lets start with the simplest possibility we are aware of. Could you navigate to your Civ documents directory (mine is here for example C:\Users\dshirk\Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization VI)

...and copy and paste in the path that you see?

 

[graffen69]

Greffen, lets start with the simplest possibility we are aware of. Could you navigate to your Civ documents directory (mine is here for example C:\Users\dshirk\Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization VI)

...and copy and paste in the path that you see?

I´m not sure I understand; you want me to copy all the files from that place?
Or you want me to verify that´s where Civ 6 is installed?

I used to have Civ6 installed on C:\ but seeing as I had almost no space left on my HDD (C:\) I uninstalled and reinstalled Civ 6 on D:\.
But at the directory you referred to (C:\Users\cg96\Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization VI) there's 595 mb of files: Catalogues like Cache, dumps, GameSummary etc., some text-files like AppOptions.txt and GraphicOptions.txt and a few other files like HallofFame.sqlite and InputSettings.json.

I think it´s leftovers from where I used to have Civ6 installed.
I also used to have Steam installed in both C:\ and D:\ due to having Civ6, as the only game on Steam, installed on C:\.
I currently have Civ6 installed in D:\Games\Steam.

 

[dshirk]

I´m not sure I understand; you want me to copy all the files from that place?
Or you want me to verify that´s where Civ 6 is installed?

I used to have Civ6 installed on C:\ but seeing as I had almost no space left on my HDD (C:\) I uninstalled and reinstalled Civ 6 on D:\.
But at the directory you referred to (C:\Users\cg96\Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization VI) there's 595 mb of files: Catalogues like Cache, dumps, GameSummary etc., some text-files like AppOptions.txt and GraphicOptions.txt and a few other files like HallofFame.sqlite and InputSettings.json.

I think it´s leftovers from where I used to have Civ6 installed.
I also used to have Steam installed in both C:\ and D:\ due to having Civ6, as the only game on Steam, installed on C:\.
I currently have Civ6 installed in D:\Games\Steam.

The path looks fine. Can you zip up your logs directory and post them here? Thanks!

 

[graffen69]

Ok, I zip, or as in this case rar all my files in the log directory, and post that rar-file?
At least that's how I understood it and did.

 

[graffen69]

I guess this will take some time?
Steams 2 week refund policy is coming up next day and I don´t dare to hang on to a DLC that is crashing the game before it even starts.
I hope the file has been of some help tracking down what´s causing it and that we all can enjoy the new content some day.

 

[Half Nelson]

I guess this will take some time?
Steams 2 week refund policy is coming up next day and I don´t dare to hang on to a DLC that is crashing the game before it even starts.
I hope the file has been of some help tracking down what´s causing it and that we all can enjoy the new content some day.

I seem to have sorted my issue by getting extra RAM (16GB from 8GB) for my PC. If you have access to a second PC with compatible memory, might be worth "borrowing" its RAM for a test before going for a refund. Good luck.

 

[graffen69]

I currently I have 16 RAM GB on my PC, you mean I should raise it to 32 GB?
Eh, kinda expensive and I´m not sure it would even fix it since we have similar but not exact issues with the DLC.
Might try a few other things though before I do a refund tomorrow just to rule out some things.
Thx for the tip though.

The bigger issue is > do I dare to buy the DLC again down the line?
What happens if the same issue pops up again and I have over a 150 € worth of a game that cannot be run?
Seeing as how few of Firaxis developers communicate with their customers due to strict regulations by 2k I´m afraid I might not be able to get hold of one if this bug should persist long after the whole DLC package is released in Mars 2021.
I was so hoping they would have fixed it by tomorrow. I´ll cross my fingers and hope for the best but not counting on it.

 

[Ciro77]

I don't think that the current game problems have anything to do with the amount of RAM you have in your pc. I have 16GB RAM as well and all games im playing runs fine and I'm talking for open world RPGs with heavy textures, etc.

 

[Half Nelson]

I currently I have 16 RAM GB on my PC, you mean I should raise it to 32 GB?
Eh, kinda expensive and I´m not sure it would even fix it since we have similar but not exact issues with the DLC.
Might try a few other things though before I do a refund tomorrow just to rule out some things.
Thx for the tip though.

The bigger issue is > do I dare to buy the DLC again down the line?
What happens if the same issue pops up again and I have over a 150 € worth of a game that cannot be run?
Seeing as how few of Firaxis developers communicate with their customers due to strict regulations by 2k I´m afraid I might not be able to get hold of one if this bug should persist long after the whole DLC package is released in Mars 2021.
I was so hoping they would have fixed it by tomorrow. I´ll cross my fingers and hope for the best but not counting on it.

No, your 16GB should be more than enough from my experience, I guess your issue is different. I only had 8 and (although it should be sufficient) was getting memory errors until I increased capacity.

 

[graffen69]

So I refunded the DLC but the error message still prevents the game from running.
This DLC is really something else.

I think I´m gonna buy an early access of "Old World" instead to get my daily dose of 4x-games.
Even in early access that game looks VERY promising and is made by the main developer (Soren Johnson) of Civ4 and he was involved in Civ3 and Civ5.

I will come back to Civ6 once the DLC and all (or most) issues are fixed but seeing as how that could take a lot of time I´ll just play something else meanwhile.

But whoever heard of DLC that prevents the basic game from starting even when you don´t have the DLC anymore.

 

[dshirk]

I guess this will take some time?
Steams 2 week refund policy is coming up next day and I don´t dare to hang on to a DLC that is crashing the game before it even starts.
I hope the file has been of some help tracking down what´s causing it and that we all can enjoy the new content some day.

It looks like you still have a large number of mods loading looking at your latest logs, including a number of errors related to some of those mods. To remove the possibility that this is the issue, I would recommend unsubscribing from all of them (or removing any that were added manually) to make sure one of them is not the core cause of the problem. Thanks, and once you do that, please post your logs again so we can take a look.

On further look, it appears these logs are dated 5/19. Are these from an old location? These do not appear to be current logs.

 

[graffen69]

I did remove all mods, both the manually installed and those via Steam Workshop.
I also went through the Steam Workshop list and ticked off all subscribed Civ6 Mods. Also uninstalled and re-installed Civ 6. No difference.

The logs might be from when I had Civ 6 installed on my HDD (on C:/) as stated earlier this post.
I currently have Steam and Civ 6 installed on D:\, but if memory serves I never uninstalled Steam from C:, I just reinstalled Civ6 in D:/Games/Steam where I have the rest of all my Steam games installed.
Not sure where to find logs for where I have Civ6 currently installed; closest I found was D:\Steam:\Logs which is what I zipped and sent down below:

 

[graffen69]

So it has been more than 6 weeks now that I cannot run Civ6 anymore since I installed and refunded the DLC.
I´m getting worried here due to not gaining any further responses as well as seeing how new content is released regularly while this particular issue still affecting players.

I re-bought the DLC cause I figured it can´t get much worse and might actually help find what´s causing this issue.
Anything else I can do on my part? Is there some light at the end of the tunnel?

Any feedback welcomed.

 

[graffen69]

Actually it became a lot worse; now I cannot connect to Steam at all anymore.
Everything else is working, running Blizzard Games as well as other internet requiring games.

Did reboot router, several computer restarts, scans, turning off Virus protection, restore windows etc, no difference.
Help wanted!