Civ5 will not run on Windows 11 after updating to version 24H2

[zxcvbob]

I got a notice from MS today that my PC was ready for the newest build of W11. After updating, Civ will no longer launch. I tried starting running the executables in administrator mode and that didn't help. I'm rolling-back to 23H2 right now; don't know if that's going to work or if I need to reinstall Steam.

 

[coolhandluke11]

The issue is with drm certiicates and older games. microsoft said they rolled back and addressed this issue in the november patch but it didnt resolve on all games and it may never be resoved unless the devs of civ patch in a fix. This is why you need a supported tpm chip for windows 11. Without it one you will have these issues.

Digital rights management - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[zxcvbob]

The issue is with drm certiicates and older games. microsoft said they rolled back and addressed this issue in the november patch but it didnt resolve on all games and it may never be resoved unless the devs of civ patch in a fix. This is why you need a supported tpm chip for windows 11. Without it one you will have these issues.

Digital rights management - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Thanks. This PC does have a supported processor (10th gen Intel i5) and has TPM 2.0 enabled. Shouldn't that be enough? I didn't see anything relevant in the wiki page you linked.

 

[coolhandluke11]

Microsoft are cracking down on pirated software with windows 11 and enforcing tpm drm certificate verifications. civ 5 is so old that it doesnt have one so its redflagged and doesnt start. microsoft said they rolled back this requirement for older games in novembers 24 patch until developers patch there software. i found the roll back patch notes in windows 10 rollback notes

scroll to highlights to see the windows 10 fix >>>>

November 12, 2024—KB5046613 (OS Builds 19044.5131 and 19045.5131) - Microsoft Support

support.microsoft.com

If you scoll to windows 11 24h2 patch notes for november 24 you will see they diidnt apply this fix to windows 11 24h2.>>> https://support.microsoft.com/en-us...-preview-2040f716-b719-482a-8aff-f7f02c79b147

My own solution to this was to install windows 10 ltsc 2021 which runs until 2031 with unpaid updates or until i stop playing older games.

 

[zxcvbob]

I assume Fixaris has no plans to update their older games. Do you think Civ5 would run okay in a VM? I might could install Win 7 or XP in virtual machine, but when I played around with VMs on another computer years ago the performance sucked. Or dual-boot Linux or SteamOS for games...

 

[Balrogjfs]

I assume Fixaris has no plans to update their older games. Do you think Civ5 would run okay in a VM? I might could install Win 7 or XP in virtual machine, but when I played around with VMs on another computer years ago the performance sucked. Or dual-boot Linux or SteamOS for games...

So I have a desktop running win11 24h2 that will actually run civ5.
I had a laptop that was on 23h2 that would play civ5, when updated to 24h2 would not.
I had another laptop, same model, win11 24h2 that would not run civ5, and I wiped the HD and loaded Win10. Civ5 still would not run.
I did all the cache deleting, exe deleting then restoring, running as admin, reinstall steam and civ5, I turned TPM and Secure Boot on and off in BIOS, nothing worked on win10.
Then after a reinstall reboot whatnot, I chose DirectX9 the first time I tried running the reinstalled steam/Civ5.
I saw the "updating executable" which I'd seen many times before, then in that same place I saw "installing VC++ redistributables" then it showed "installing DirectX9", and then -- it ran.
So I went back to the first win11 laptop, and specifically chose DirectX9, and now **IT** works.
The problem is that there are so many things I've tried on so many systems, I cannot point to the silver bullet.
But DirectX9 seemed to be key.

 

[Gregsy]

I got this and solved it by going into steam and verifying the game files. It said 3 files were missing which it restored, Worked after that (although I had to reset my video options)

 

[Balrogjfs]

I got this and solved it by going into steam and verifying the game files. It said 3 files were missing which it restored, Worked after that (although I had to reset my video options)

Thanks. That's one of the many things I tried, but sadly it did not work for me.

 

[Balrogjfs]

I assume Fixaris has no plans to update their older games. Do you think Civ5 would run okay in a VM? I might could install Win 7 or XP in virtual machine, but when I played around with VMs on another computer years ago the performance sucked. Or dual-boot Linux or SteamOS for games...

Okay. I may have something.

Bear with me.
Laptop was downgraded to Win10, fully up to date as of Dec 9, 2024 updates.
I went and upgraded to Win11, in place, save apps and data.
Civ5 stopped working.
Run as admin, betas "ineedlegacyaccess", run choosing DirectX9, nothing.

I read something about DirectX 11/12 not having 9 compatibility or something. Someone suggested downloading DirectX9, install, reboot.

It works now.

Redirecting

that's the message

This was the download

Download DirectX End-User Runtimes (June 2010) from Official Microsoft Download Center

The Microsoft DirectX® End-User Runtime installs a number of runtime libraries from the legacy DirectX SDK for some games that use D3DX9, D3DX10, D3DX11, XAudio 2.7, XInput 1.3, XACT, and/or Managed DirectX 1.1. Note that this package does not modify the DirectX Runtime installed on your Windows...

www.microsoft.com

Restarted machine, not shutdown, and it **WORKED**

 

[zxcvbob]

Now that I've finished the GOTM, I might try 24H2 again. Installing and rolling-back didn't break too much last time (had some problems with Chrome but just reinstalled it)

 

[zxcvbob]

Okay. I may have something.

Bear with me.
Laptop was downgraded to Win10, fully up to date as of Dec 9, 2024 updates.
I went and upgraded to Win11, in place, save apps and data.
Civ5 stopped working.
Run as admin, betas "ineedlegacyaccess", run choosing DirectX9, nothing.

I read something about DirectX 11/12 not having 9 compatibility or something. Someone suggested downloading DirectX9, install, reboot.

It works now.

Redirecting

that's the message

This was the download

Download DirectX End-User Runtimes (June 2010) from Official Microsoft Download Center

The Microsoft DirectX® End-User Runtime installs a number of runtime libraries from the legacy DirectX SDK for some games that use D3DX9, D3DX10, D3DX11, XAudio 2.7, XInput 1.3, XACT, and/or Managed DirectX 1.1. Note that this package does not modify the DirectX Runtime installed on your Windows...

www.microsoft.com

Restarted machine, not shutdown, and it **WORKED**

When you run the DX installer, it asks where to put the extracted files. What did you tell it?

Nevermind, that's not actually the installer; it creates an install directory.

 

[billybgame]

I posted elsewhere as have been unable to play at all, besides the GOTM. Game was crashing. Then reinstalled and now won't get past "updating executable" screen. Not sure if same issue caused prior problems, but guessing not. So have spent hours trying all sorts of things here, but am at a loss. I see Steam has this 2k launcher removal...was this a fix or what? Was it autoinstalled? Or do we need to get this manually?

 

[Doggo]

I've been struggling with this problem for a few weeks at this point. I was enjoying Civ 5 until I had to upgrade to Windows 11 to fix some corrupted windows permissions as it was easier than fresh installing a new version of Windows 10. After I upgraded to 11, I started to have the infinite "Updating executable" bug occur with Civ 5. Nothing would work, no admin privileges, no turning off read-only, no validating files, no using legacy mode or any other version of DirectX. After a while of fiddling around with these solutions that got me nowhere, what ended up working was an awfully simple series of events. I launched Civ 5 through steam, chose DirectX 10/11, but simultaneously launched the corresponding .exe from the Civ 5 folder. Bam, it booted up completely normally, and even works without having to do this every launch. I cannot explain it, I cannot wrap my head around why this fixed it, but I'm not complaining. Try that and see if it works. Best of luck.

P.S. I made an account just to post this, so I hope it helps at least one person struggling with this problem.

 

[ottobismarck]

The issue is with drm certiicates and older games. microsoft said they rolled back and addressed this issue in the november patch but it didnt resolve on all games and it may never be resoved unless the devs of civ patch in a fix. This is why you need a supported tpm chip for windows 11. Without it one you will have these issues.

Digital rights management - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

So it seems to me like a forcing strategy from MS to get Windows 11 to a new PC. Nothing new for the last 30 years...

 

[billybgame]

FYI....my game somehow fixed itself. Unsure what made it work but the start up/hang up has not re-materialized and have started numerous sessions.

 

[mrenuy]

But DirectX9 seemed to be key.

Locating and installing DirectX9 resolved my 'updating executable' message. Now the game opens properly.

Thank you!

 

[Nr07ff3z]

I tried most suggestions but I did NOT turn on TPM. What solved it for me was to set compability mode "Win7" on the "CivilizationV.exe" file. When I started the game windows 11 started installing .Net3.5 but the game launched before the install was done.

EDIT: After this I got the "C:\Users\Nr07ff3z\Documents\My Games" folder .And the "Sid Meier's Civilization 5" inside this. ("My Games" were not present after install of win11). Win 11 was installed with the "English(World)" option in order to avoid the usual MS spam.

 

[speedhakke]

I've been struggling with this problem for a few weeks at this point. I was enjoying Civ 5 until I had to upgrade to Windows 11 to fix some corrupted windows permissions as it was easier than fresh installing a new version of Windows 10. After I upgraded to 11, I started to have the infinite "Updating executable" bug occur with Civ 5. Nothing would work, no admin privileges, no turning off read-only, no validating files, no using legacy mode or any other version of DirectX. After a while of fiddling around with these solutions that got me nowhere, what ended up working was an awfully simple series of events. I launched Civ 5 through steam, chose DirectX 10/11, but simultaneously launched the corresponding .exe from the Civ 5 folder. Bam, it booted up completely normally, and even works without having to do this every launch. I cannot explain it, I cannot wrap my head around why this fixed it, but I'm not complaining. Try that and see if it works. Best of luck.

P.S. I made an account just to post this, so I hope it helps at least one person struggling with this problem.

You are my HERO, my saviour!

I am on Windows 10 but was also unable to start Civ5 for the past few days and also tried everything and every combination of it until I found your post which actually fixed it for me.

Thank you so much for sharing this solution with us!

 

[zxcvbob]

On my Windows 10 laptop, the link for Civ 5 quit working recently; I think coinciding with changes Steam or Valve or somebody made to the launcher. I looks like it's launching, but the game never actually starts. But if I click on Steam in the system tray I can select Civ 5 from the library and launch it there, and that works. It's not quite as easy as starting it from the desktop icon, but almost.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

OMG...

Everyone seems to be really excited about Windows 11 because of the new UI, or are complaining about it because of the hardware requirements. But I have not seen much analysis on WHY these hardware requirements are this way.

It has occurred to me, that the reason why they want to require us to have the latest CPUs with TPMs is because these CPUs will lock Windows down tighter than an Xbox One.

The whole point of a TPM is to be able to 'trust' the hardware despite the user having physical access to it, because they are incredibly difficult to reverse engineer even with access to the hardware. It is impossible or almost impossible to access the innards of a TPM without destroying it.

Why would Microsoft do this?

Well it would appear that Microsoft have finally got around to addressing the issues with the Windows Store which have been keeping developers away, and they have decided that they actually want Developers to use the Windows Store now.

What is it that developers would want which involve the use of a TPM? DRM.

A DRM which is backed by a TPM is probably going to be much more secure than Denuvo. Denuvo is limited from requiring TPMs because TPMs are not common or are disabled by default, so this would shut out a lot of potential customers. But if TPM is made a hard requirement by the OS, then that market of devices with a TPM will become large enough that it is worth shutting out those who don't have TPM.

Unless Microsoft/Intel/AMD have made a big mistake in their implementation somewhere, which I doubt, the TPM DRM will most likely be next to uncrackable. Microsoft have many years of experience locking down the Xbox One quite successfully, and if it were possible to hack I'm sure that it would have been done by now. The only successful attack against PS4/Xbox One that I know of is being able to manipulate system memory externally, but CPUs now encrypt memory so that is no longer feasible).

Microsoft are luring us in with eye candy.

Windows 11 & the next generation of DRM, what is REALLY going on?

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