BTW, turning off the ASUS AI Suite II software that sits in the tray definitely cuts down on the crashes.

If I remove the DLC the game will not let me continue with my save as I do not have the beard and hair style set installed (free DLC)

After deactivating it, it reactivates itself and I still crash afterwards
So, not working for me

Well, found something that works!

After the game is started, just close Galaxy completely!
No more crashes

As mentioned above you should only remove the "Game Overlay DLC", you can keep the other one.

I have 100+ hours in this game and the regular crashing started yesterday for me. First time it crashed was when the minor update (33 or 35mb I guess) showed up. Then, the game crashed every 5 minutes until I installed the damned update. Then it crashed every hour or so. Don't remember a single crash before. "Game Overlay DLC" was never installed

So, I booted the game and shut Galaxy down and I've been playing for the past 2 hours with no crash. Will test more tomorrow

Hello everyone,

I had to create a new account to post here, I don't know why mu actual account can't post on the forums.

I've contacted GOG Support, but still no answers, so I ask for help here.

Sice January, 6th 2016 I can't play The Witcher 3 (v1.11)
There was an update (minor patch v1.11 01/07/2016).

Once the patch installed, I've launched the game, the Main menu displays, I click on "Continue" ; the loading screen with Jaskier speaking appears, and once in the game, it crashes.

I launch again TW3, "Continue", loading screens, and crash.

I deactivate my mods :

Increased LOD - modLodAll_1_5_2
The Witcher 3 HD Reworked Project - The Witcher 3 HD Reworked Project 2.2
Lore-friendly Witchers - True Mutantism
All Quest Objectives On Map - modMapQuestObjectives-1.11-v5.zip

I launch the game, "Continue", loading, crash.

I go on the forums, I see "deactivate Game Overlay" in "Installed DLCs" on Galaxy client.
I go there, no "Game Overlay", so I uncheck Heart of Stone, "Game Overlay" appears unchecked.
I activate "Heart of Stone" (without it, save not compatible), Galaxy downloads HOS.
Then I got the screen on "TW3GOG.png".

Once the download is over, I launch TW3, "Continue", loading, crash.
I go in Galaxy settings, I see in the options coming soon "In Game Overlay", i deactivate it (never seen it).
Launch, "Continue", loading, crash.


For each of these crashes, I got a Windows 10 error window (TW3Memory.png)

For almost one crash out of 2, i got a black screen and I can't use my computer anymore, I have to reboot it.

I can't cancel the minor update (Rollback), because it's the same version number. ANd according to what I read on the forums, it'd crash anyway.

For information :

i5-4460 3.2GHz
8 Go RAM DDR3
GTX 970 4Go
W10

No problem until January, 6th 2016.

The game was in Ultra Settings, with the 4 mods. And I've played without getting a single crash (82 hours).

I've tride "Minimum" settings : crashes anyway, without any error message.

So, actually I can't play TW3 and it's really sad that it's not possible to have a real information about this.

I hope somone able to help me will come here.

Thanks.

I'm sorry for the double post, but I found a solution which seems to be working well.

In Computer > Properties > Advanced Settings > Performances > Advanced > Virtual Memory > Modify :

I've set a "Custom (size I guess)" : 2047 - 2048
For my SSD (C:\), and for my HDD where all my games are installed.

And since I've altered this, I haven't got any crash.

I reactivated my mods, and I've activated "Game overlay" in TW3 DLCs on Galaxy Client.

I hope this will help other players.

Bye !

Wanted to post here for anyone who's still experiencing crashing as this is the longest running thread on the issue that I can find and seemingly the most prominent for the GOG version of the game.

Up til yesterday I was still getting a crash to desktop with fully updated game and GPU drivers (Win 10). I'd tried everything other than down-clocking my card. I'd deleted Galaxy.dll, got rid of Nvidia GeForce experience, fiddled with all manner of settings and tried all types of screen configs (fs, borderless, windowed). I got the random crashes no matter what.

As a last resort yesterday I set up my Precision X software to down-clock my GPU Clock and Memory Clock on my 2GB 770 (which I usually run stock and not OCd) by -50hz each. So far I've been crash free for about 6 hours of game-time whereas my longest run prior without a crash would have been about an hour and the shortest, about 2 minutes.

I'd seen a few people raise a mild downclock as a fix, but thought it sounded unlikely to help so held off. I just figured it would be worth mentioning adding my 2 cents just in case anyone else out there hasn't tried downclocking yet.

Any other updates on potential fixes for this?

I finished the core game before the holidays last year, took a break so I could play through both expansions back to back, so just picked it back up preparing for the release of Blood and Wine next month... Initially I finished out a few other missions just so i could get the second good ending of the game, that went fine, but then I purchased the expansion pass and installed HOS and started a new game plus, now I cannot play for 30 minutes straight without a crash. Have over 100 hours in this game before this though and didn't have this problem until now.

Did anyone else have this problem mainly after installing the expansion? From the date on a lot of these posts, some of these issues started in the core game, so I'm not sure all these issues are the same as the one i'm experiencing since initially my game ran fine and is only just now crashing. The game appears to run smooth as butter then out of nowhere CRASH. It's random too. One time, it will just crash to desktop, then it will freeze my whole rig and i have to force restart, then it blue screen, then it will crash and i have to CTRL+ALT+DEL to get out of it and get back to desktop. It can run for 2 minutes or 30 minutes, then CRASH.

I'm thinking about uninstalling the entire game and reinstalling it, because I just can't figure out what changed between now and then that is making it crash every few minutes.

Anyone have any other ideas? I've tried most of the ideas posted on here including downclocking my video card and memory clock, cutting off Geforce Xperience, uncheck the Game Overlay in GOG, cut off GOG completely after the witcher starts, cut off all my other programs when Witcher is running, tried borderless, FS borderless, and fullscreen, updated drivers, rolled back to really old drivers, etc... I'm just not sure what else to do, it's so frustrating, this is one of my favorite games and I was super stoked about playing the expansions, so this is really frustrating.

Been perusing the crash fix guides for days now, finally landed something... It's going to sound outlandish, but I just played about 6 hours straight on ultra without crashing, after about a week of consecutive crashes. The one where the video freezes and the audio and game continues running (you can hear Geralt running around if you move but the screen is frozen.)

turn off "Automatically Restart" in Start-up and recovery...

Cheers... Sounds a little out of context in traditional crash fixes but I just played for more than 20 minutes for the first time since installing it on this machine! :O.


Spread it around, I found it by coincidence in an archaic thread from August last year.


Instructional image attached.

Thanks Waystorm!

I reverted to some old drivers from October'15 (about 8 before the most updated ones, was as far back as ESI had on their main site - had already tried reverting to a couple before the most recent with no luck) and was able to play for about 15-20 mins last I tried (but it was about 4am at that point so I just went to bed). I'm about to see if that was just a fluke though and really push it. If it does crash though, I'll definitely try the fix you outlined below with the "Automatically Restart" options. And no worries, about 10 of the 50 things I've tried sounded like there would be less than zero chance of them actually working, but at this point, it sounds like even some of those off the wall items worked for some, so I'm willing to try pretty much try whatever to get it going at this point.

Thanks again for the info and for the great screenshots of where that option's at.
Thanks for letting me know what you found out Gendalf. Like I said to Waystorm earlier, I just reverted to about 8 drivers ago (had tried the last 3 or so without luck) and was able to play about 15-20 minutes the other night (but was falling asleep so went to bed before I could really determine if that stabilized it). About to give it another go now, really hope this works, but if not Waystorm posted another potential fix that I haven't seen yet, so will try that as well if this doesn't go well. Thanks again.

Ok, so no luck on anything so far. Just posted the following on CD Project Red's Witcher 3 support forum. I think I'm going to open a ticket with them. Not that it will help, but I wasn't having ANY issues until I installed HoS, so worth a shot. Very frustrated right now...

Below is my post on the CDPR Witcher 3 Forums (has more info on what all I've tried and the error itself as well as system specs):

So very frustrated right now. Have over 103 hours in this game and have been putting off playing any of the expansion content so I could get both good endings of the game prior to doing so as well as kind of wait for closer to the release of the second expansion so I could play both HoS and B&W back to back.

So, because B&W is rumored to come out next month I went ahead and purchased the Expansion pack, installed that, now I cannot play the game for 20 minutes without a crash..SOME type of crash, as it is completely random.

It DOES NOT matter what I'm doing in-game this happens (being in a load screen/inventory/etc... it is irrelevant, it will simply do it while I'm walking around with the game running as smooth as butter...just CRASH). I played for HOURS to get the second ending just last week before I went ahead and installed the Expansion pass, but now, I can't do anything....CRASH.

When the game crashes is about as random as how as well...It may: give me a blue screen, freeze the PC and force me to do a manual restart (i.e. hold the power button), freeze the game (but allow me to kill via the control panel), go black and not totally freeze though (will not recover however and I can still hear Geralt getting killed in the background or other random game noises - until eventually that dies too), sometimes it just goes to the desktop and without any error at all, sometimes I'll get a Witcher 3 has stopped responding... I mean it's all over the place.

I have tried almost every fix I've read about, including: setting my pc and graphics card back to factory settings (no overclocking anywhere),downclocking my video card and power on it, reverting back to Feb drivers, then Jan drivers, then said hell with it and went all the way back to last ones they had (Oct'15), turned off Auto-Restart in my system settings for when Windows crashes, turned off GOG in-game overlay in the DLC area, ran without GOG client on (directly through the .exe), ran through Steam as a non-steam game pointing directly to the .exe, cut off Geforce experience, removed MSI Afterburner and RivaTuner from pc entirely (just in case), checked and verified the game files via GOG, ran in windowed borderless, full screen, and any other option it offered, and some other things that I know I'm forgetting to mention... and STILL get the crash.

This OBVIOUSLY has something to do with the update, as just last week it was FINE, ZERO crashes...then downloaded and installed HoS, and BAM, can't run it for 20 minutes (and that's the LONGEST I can get it to go...often it may crash within 2 minutes). I have no issues getting into the game. It actually loads very fast and seems to run flawlessly. There is no obvious performance issues occurring when this happens, it is literally out of nowhere.

Below are some system specs for my rig:
Windows 7 Home Premium Service Pack 1
Intel Core i7-2600 CPU @ 3.40GHz
16GB RAM
64 Bit OS
Nvidia GeForce GTX 980Ti with latest drivers (10.18.13.6451)

Unfortunately not all of my game crashes produce a crash report in the bin > x64 folder. As a matter of fact neither crash from today has (one it crashed back to desktop - just stopped running) the other was a blue screen, neither triggered a crash report. However, 8 of my crashes from 3/17 triggered a report, so I've attached one of those for reference (they all appear to be the "Exception_Access_Violation (3221225477) error"). I have also attached an image of my blue screen error which references a "DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL" error. I like to note however, that I have used my PC for HOURS during this time and not once had issues...until I try to play Witcher 3, so just want to clarify the blue screen ONLY occurs while playing the game.

Blue Screen Error:
(attached - couldn't figure out how to insert into the GOG forum)

Crash Log from Gog Games > Witcher 3 Wild Hunt > bin > x64 is actually below, as I couldn't upload it, so having to paste it in and it's really LONG.

Any help or advice would be appreciated as I am at my wits end and so frustrated as this is one of my favorite games, and I was really stoked to start in on a new game plus and tackle the expansions. Was really looking forward to logging another 100+ hours on this game, so this recent upset definitely has me wanting to throw my desktop through my monitor ... think I may have turned hulk-green due to this a couple of times as a matter of fact...

PLEASE HELP!!!

Below is part my crash log from Gog Games Witcher 3. The GOG forums will not post my response when I input the whole message and I can't attach it....

Red Engine Crash Log
--------------------------------------
Build: Not Set [ Compiled Jan 15 2016 ]

User: Big Al

Crash reason: EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION (3221225477), Error writing location 0x28d35058

Crashed Thread:

Thread ID: 5340

callstack:
<Unknown Symbol>() + 0x0 - <Unknown File>(0)
<Unknown Symbol>() + 0x0 - <Unknown File>(0)
<Unknown Symbol>() + 0x0 - <Unknown File>(0)
<Unknown Symbol>() + 0x0 - <Unknown File>(0)
<Unknown Symbol>() + 0x0 - <Unknown File>(0)
<Unknown Symbol>() + 0x0 - <Unknown File>(0)

Debug Information
================================================================

Commandline: "C:\GOG Games\The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt\bin\x64\witcher3.exe"

Thread ID: 4816

callstack:
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0x1038cc - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0x6b7434 - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix2x4<float>::Prepend() + 0xc4e36 - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0xe1d22 - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix2x4<float>::Prepend() + 0xbf99a - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0xe2007 - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0x9f6 - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0x38cdd - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0xe3d - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix4x4<float>::SetIdentity() + 0x11ec - <Unknown File>(0)
Scaleform::Render::Matrix2x4<float>::Prepend() + 0x22d778 - <Unknown File>(0)
BaseThreadInitThunk() + 0xd - <Unknown File>(0)
RtlUserThreadStart() + 0x21 - <Unknown File>(0)

....plus lots more of Thread ID's and Unknown file>(0) reports (all on the same log).

Getting the same issue never had this back to nov. I could play fine now with new update it crashes as I go in to talk to someone the current scene crashes it for me, does this only happen for those who are using GOG?