Civilization 5 woes: nothing happens after "preparing to launch" (tried many fixes)

[blorgpulkfplork]

I don't reach the screen that allows you to select which version of direct x to use (let alone the cinematic / black screen etc).


Here's what I've tried so far:

-reinstalled from cd
-reinstalled from cloud through steam
-updated video card drivers
-updated vc++ 2008
-updated direct x
-many reboots (just in case)
-tried deleting random files (according to various posts) from the game (steam) folder and verifying the game cache to rdl (tried verifying many times under different circumstances)
-changed some settings in the config folder (in my documents/my games) (when i reinstall it doesn't come back though, if i delete the folder, which seems odd)
-checked dxdiag (everything seems to be in order)
-checked event viewer (no errors/warnings)
-looked extensively for an answer before posting


my specs: xp sp3, q9450 with 33% oc (stable), radeon 3850, p5e3 prem mobo, 4 gb corsair dominator ddr3 2000
(every other game/app works fine)

Actually though, I had a bsod (error on ati2dvag) the first time I tried writing this post (for the first time in ~2 years), so I might roll back the video drivers.

If nothing else works, I suppose I could put 7 on a vm and try from there; this solution, though, is a ☺☺☺☺ty workaround (and performance would take a huge hit, if it worked at all) (the game does run fine on my laptop under 7).

 

[The_J]

Welcome to CFC .

I don't reach the screen that allows you to select which version of direct x to use

What happens instead?
Nothing? Crash?

 

[blorgpulkfplork]

nothing...no (at least ordinary sort of) "crash" in the sense that the "preparing to launch" window pops up and then merely goes away.

 

[The_J]

should have read the thread title .


Can see you in the taskmanager, if steam + civ5 are still running?

 

[blorgpulkfplork]

steam continually runs; civ5 only pops up for a bit (while the preparing to launch window is open), and is subsequently removed from the task manager

 

[The_J]

mmhh...on your desktop, make a right click on My Computer, then click on manage/administrate/however this is named in english (right below under search), then system -> event viewer -> system. Does there in the log any error appear in the time you want to launch Civ5?

 

[blorgpulkfplork]

no errors (under system or application)

 

[blorgpulkfplork]

Rolling back the ati driver to the next most recent fixed the bsodding issue, but was no help with getting civ5 to work : (

I feel like I've tried almost everything at this point... (minus the vm idea, but I don't want it to come to that)

 

[Petek]

Have you tried turning off the overclocking?

 

[tokala]

If nothing else works, I suppose I could put 7 on a vm and try from there; this solution, though, is a ☺☺☺☺ty workaround (and performance would take a huge hit, if it worked at all).

It won't, unless the latest VMs are able to provide 3D acceleration, and even then it would be horribly slow.

 

[timtofly]

I would try another Graphics Card.

 

[The_J]

Radeon 38 should be fine, and the graphics card is probably not anything which would affect the loading at this stage...i think, unless someone can explain it to me .

 

[timtofly]

Radeon 38 should be fine, and the graphics card is probably not anything which would affect the loading at this stage...i think, unless someone can explain it to me .

If his card cannot handle an upgrade, that means something in the card is defective or the motherboard and OS cannot correctly address the card with the upgrade. Either way changing the card will rule out the card as being defective, if the same thing happens with a new one. Maybe whatever affected the card with a newer driver, is the same thing the game is running into when it tries to access the card. It is possible that at the point the install starts doing nothing is when it is trying to figure out the capabilities of the card. It might run some kind of diags and then stop, since it will not even let him choose between DX9 or DX10/11

 

[stoirtap]

I'm having the same problem and the weird part is the game worked fine until one day, I would get this problem. Do you think it's steam related?

 

[timtofly]

Only if the game works fine when you are "properly" in offline mode.

I would say a faulty graphics card is more likely. I used to have a problem similiar when the computer had no hard drive space for resource memory allocation. Having freed up a couple gig of hard drive space seemed to help. Either that or some other pogram has become unstable and is gobling up needed resources. If you close windows and find some file or application that pops up and says that it is not closing properly do a google search and uninstall that program and reinstall it to see if that clears up the problem.