so yeah like the title says...i can no longer start nms.

i havent done anything different...no updates or anything. the symptoms are exactly like they were when the game was first released...i get to the splash screen...bam! ctd. every single time.

i did the verify/repair installation...it didnt help.

win7
phenom ii x6 1090t
gtx 970
12Gb ram

everything was fine until today...i cant think of what might be the problem.

for what its worth...event viewer is telling me this:

Faulting application name: NMS.exe, version: 0.1.0.0, time stamp: 0x57c938eb
Faulting module name: unknown, version: 0.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x00000000
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x0000000000000000
Faulting process id: 0x2310
Faulting application start time: 0x01d21ba0aacc99ec
Faulting application path: C:\GOG Games\No Man's Sky\Binaries\NMS.exe
Faulting module path: unknown
Report Id: f2bccb46-8793-11e6-b410-6c626dec939c

Whenever I've had that problem, it was caused by a corrupt shader. Try deleting everything in the SHADERCACHE folder (if you're paranoid about it, just move all the files to a different folder rather than deleting them) and starting the game again. You may then be on the starting screen a bit longer than usual, because it has to rebuild all the shaders the first time you run it. Just quoting this so you'll get a notification ;-)

thanks, that was the first thing i tried. i delete those all the time...i even have a bat file to make it easier.

i have since gone so far as to try a system restore to a time i know the game was working...no change though.

on a second look some of the info from event viewer points to the ntdll.dll file as being involved:


Faulting application name: NMS.exe, version: 0.1.0.0, time stamp: 0x57c938eb
Faulting module name: ntdll.dll, version: 6.1.7601.18247, time stamp: 0x521eaf24
Exception code: 0xc0000374
Fault offset: 0x00000000000c4102
Faulting process id: 0x1860
Faulting application start time: 0x01d21bb0141c66f5
Faulting application path: C:\GOG Games\No Man's Sky\Binaries\NMS.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\SYSTEM32\ntdll.dll
Report Id: 746afb69-87a3-11e6-94e4-6c626dec939c

ok...ive been trying to get this game to launch for like 3 hours now...im goin to bed.

Is your OpenGL at 4.5 (mine was at 4.4 and i had the CTD as soon as the scolling starfield screen started, updating my video card driver fixed this)?

Are you running the galaxy install or the standalone install? maybe try the other one?

Are you patched to the last version?

Are you running any mods, if so which ones and maybe remove the last few you installed?

That is all i got for now.

ntdll.dll is a windows library/msupdate candidate. Could literally be anything. But will guess it has to do with detection routines for determining program(nms) functionality, priority for cores, screen context stuff, etc.

Always fun when this sort of thing happens, because it can be anything. Literally. From trivial updates you can do locally, to some normally working function just croaking for no apparent reason. Can even be that user-access levels prevent the component from being registered at the right time, and no other program faults exists, etc.

This stuff is.. so fun to debug. Best thing everyone knows. So send HG a report. They'll love you for it.

Ah yes you bring up a great point about the windows update issues of recent times. I see the OP has Windows 7 still (as do i). Did you make sure to avoid all the windows 10 junk/spyware stuff that came onto the Windows 7 (and 8) update channel?

There is a decent thread on RPS about all that kind of thing, so yeah in that context it would seem you might have got a 'bad' windows 7 update that screwed stuff for you?

Here is the link on RPS about protecting windows 7 (just in case it helps):

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/forums/showthread.php?50161-The-Windows-10-Resistance-Thread

hmmm.....i have had windows updates completely turned off for at least 2 years. im fairly certain i dont have any win10 files on my computer at all...not sure how to check other than knowing i dont have the $windows.~bt folder those go in (or used to?)

sooo...i sent an email to hg support with the requested dxdiag and a .dmp file.

i wish i knew how to use the dmp file to figure this out myself.....merp derp. i guess ill just have to wait.

yeah stuff like this is very frustrating, especially if you had it working before. Hmmm did you add some of the later game patches? It might be they 'require' something that was not required before, thinking along the lines of stuff you might get from Windows Update (.NET stuff perhaps?) if you have not used that in a while?

You seem to have some sleuthing on your hands while you await an answer from Hello Games (or was it GOG you sent the info?).

nope..no new patch...1.09 like before. and thats just it...its super frustrating because i didnt change anything at all from the time it worked to the time it didnt.

well...this is frustrating.

its been 2 days...no reply from hello games.

grrrr