Workaround for Black Screen on startup

[Jake]

Hi, a lot of folks have been experiencing an issue where the game will be stuck on a black screen. Through some troubleshooting with users on the official Discord server I've found several workarounds until the dev can fix the cause of the issue.

I recommend attempting these fixes in order, if the first one doesn't solve it, try the next one.

1. Go to your game's Appdata folder (Not the install folder) and find the Saves\Settings folder.
You can quickly find this on Windows by holding the Windows key and pressing R, and in the box that pops up, copy-paste the following and hit enter:

%localappdata%low\Studio Sai\Eternights\Saves\settings

2. In this folder will be a single file called "settings" - delete this file
3. Launch the game. The game should now generate a new settings file.

---

If the above doesn't work...

1. Go back to your game's appdata folder from the previous fix
2. open the settings file in a file editor of your choice (I recommend notepad++)
3. You'll see that the inside of the file is unreadable - if you're using notepad++ it'll be full of NULs. Delete everything inside the file.
4. Paste the following into the file:

{"IsFresh":false,"Gameplay_Combat_Easy":2,"Language":0,"Graphic_Global":2,"Graphic_SSAO":true,"Graphics_FPS":false,"Graphics_VSYNC":true,"Graphic_MotionBlur":true,"Graphic_ShadowResolution":2,"Graphic_ShadowSoft":true,"Graphic_TextureResolution":0,"Graphic_MSAA":3,"Screen_Resolution":6,"VoiceType":1,"Windowed":false,"Screen_Brightness":1.0,"Camera_Sensitivity_X":1.2200000286102296,"Camera_Sensitivity_Y":1.2200000286102296,"Camera_Invert_Y_Axis":false,"Camera_Invert_X_Axis":false,"Volume_Multiply_GLOBAL":1.880000114440918,"Volume_Multiply_SFX":1.6600000858306885,"Volume_Multiply_BGM":0.0,"Volume_Multiply_Voice":1.6600000858306885,"Camera_Shake_Mult":0.6000000238418579,"Gamepad_Vibration":1.0,"Last_Used_Save_Slot":8}

This is my personal settings file, so you will have to adjust the settings in-game to your liking once it's fixed.
5. Save the file, and launch the game.

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Finally, if that doesn't work, some users have claimed this has helped...

1. Open Registry Editor (Hold the Windows key, press R, and type "regedit" and hit enter).
2. Navigate to the following directory:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Studio Sai\Eternights

3. On the left side of Registry Editor, Right-click the Eternights folder and choose export. This is to ensure that if this step makes the matter worse, you can easily undo it. Save the file to the desktop, name it whatever you like.
4. Once you have ensured you have exported the registries, you can highlight every registry within the Eternights directory and delete it.
5. Close Registry Editor, and launch the game.
6. If this does not fix your issue, close the game and run the .reg file you exported in step 3 to return your registry to how it was before messing with it.

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The reason the game doesn't startup is because for reasons currently unknown, something is wiping the settings file and leaving it completely blank. When you launch the game, if there's a settings file present the game will try to read it, but because it's blank it gets stuck.
If you delete the file, the game will see there is no settings file and will create a new one.

Note: Unfortunately I don't think this will help with the black screen during cutscenes bug, but I'm currently trying to figure out what causes that one.

[Oruta]

This works, thanks!

[Azure II]

Didn't work for me. Game froze my entire PC and now will not launch even with reinstall and file integrity. What the hell is with these devs releasing broken ass games. I was having fun too

[Jake]

Originally posted by Azure II:

Didn't work for me. Game froze my entire PC and now will not launch even with reinstall and file integrity. What the hell is with these devs releasing broken ass games. I was having fun too

If the game is freezing your entire PC then it may not be the issue I'm describing in the post. I've never heard of anyone having it lock up the entire PC.

If you're in the Discord server, tag me in the support channel (I'm Jake) and we'll see if we can figure it out.

[野草ぎ]

this fixed my issue on getting stuck at the first calendar loading screen. I was about to refund the game. thanks!

[Azure II]

Originally posted by Jake:

Originally posted by Azure II:

Didn't work for me. Game froze my entire PC and now will not launch even with reinstall and file integrity. What the hell is with these devs releasing broken ass games. I was having fun too

If the game is freezing your entire PC then it may not be the issue I'm describing in the post. I've never heard of anyone having it lock up the entire PC.

If you're in the Discord server, tag me in the support channel (I'm Jake) and we'll see if we can figure it out.

What's the Discord? It initially crashed my PC but then it just stays on black screen.

[Jake]

Originally posted by Azure II:

What's the Discord? It initially crashed my PC but then it just stays on black screen.

It's .gg/studiosaigames - note I can't post the full url since Steam will likely block it.

[No Name Allowed :3]

That did't work for me. I fixed it by going to register editor(Win + R and type "regedit"), then going to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Studio Sai\Eternights and deleting the whole Eternights registry folder.

I also deleted the whole saves folder(of course I copied it to desktop before doing that to restore my saves afterwards) in %localappdata%low\Studio Sai\Eternights\Saves\settings but IDK if that matters cuz it only helped when I deleted regitry folder. Try deleting only registry folder first.

[Jake]

Originally posted by The Generalissimo:

That did't work for me. I fixed it by going to register editor(Win + R and type "regedit"), then going to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Studio Sai\Eternights and deleting the whole Eternights registry folder.

I also deleted the whole saves folder(of course I copied it to desktop before doing that to restore my saves afterwards) in %localappdata%low\Studio Sai\Eternights\Saves\settings but IDK if that matters cuz it only helped when I deleted regitry folder. Try deleting only registry folder first.

Okay, my theory is that when deleting the settings file does not work, the registry is causing it to regenerate the corrupt settings again. If we can find someone with the bug we can ask them to show us their registry to confirm this.

[Brown Bag Boy]

Originally posted by Jake:

Originally posted by The Generalissimo:

That did't work for me. I fixed it by going to register editor(Win + R and type "regedit"), then going to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Studio Sai\Eternights and deleting the whole Eternights registry folder.

I also deleted the whole saves folder(of course I copied it to desktop before doing that to restore my saves afterwards) in %localappdata%low\Studio Sai\Eternights\Saves\settings but IDK if that matters cuz it only helped when I deleted regitry folder. Try deleting only registry folder first.

Okay, my theory is that when deleting the settings file does not work, the registry is causing it to regenerate the corrupt settings again. If we can find someone with the bug we can ask them to show us their registry to confirm this.

This method fixed the black screen that occurred after freezing my PC. I just deleted the registry file and it is working fine now.

[Jake]

I have updated the main post with two additional potential workarounds.

[Twilight]

Nothing in Win + R works anymore for some reason says typed in the wrong code

[Jake]

Originally posted by Twilight:

Nothing in Win + R works anymore for some reason says typed in the wrong code

That is definitely an issue beyond the scope of this thread, I recommend troubleshooting that one yourself and then returning to this thread once you've fixed it.

[Twilight]

Originally posted by Jake:

Originally posted by Twilight:

Nothing in Win + R works anymore for some reason says typed in the wrong code

That is definitely an issue beyond the scope of this thread, I recommend troubleshooting that one yourself and then returning to this thread once you've fixed it.

I might know why it could be because I have my steam games in a separate volume from my local disk

[Jake]

Originally posted by Twilight:

Originally posted by Jake:

That is definitely an issue beyond the scope of this thread, I recommend troubleshooting that one yourself and then returning to this thread once you've fixed it.

I might know why it could be because I have my steam games in a separate volume from my local disk

That shouldn't cause your run box to error out, it has nothing to do with Steam.

[Twilight]

Nm fixed it