Blackscreen and game crash after a few minutes in game

[Zero1505]

Hi.
My problem is a black screen. I start the game, load my safegame and then I can play for 5-10 minutes until I get a black screen, then my GPU driver crashes and with it the game.

The game only crashes when I'm on my way to go fishing or another island.

I've checked all my drivers for updates, checked Windows for updates and tried lowering my graphics settings (just to make sure it's not my old graphics card, also tested other games, all run without problems).

I also verified the game data with Steam and tryed selecting the dedicated graphics card for the game in the Nvidia Control Panel which I read in another post , unfortunately without success, with this setting the game crashed immediately after leaving the port.

My Systeminformation: https://justpaste.it/cifr9

Hopefully I can get here some Help, I really like this game and want to play it :)

[Team17_Helper]

Hello Zero1505,

Thank you for getting in touch with us.

Can you please try the following and see if this resolves the problem - please note: when doing this, your original save will be deleted and you will therefore be required to start a new save game upon restarting.

Could you please first disable your Steam cloud saves by:

1. Going into your Steam Library, right-clicking on Dredge and select Properties
   
2. Under the General tab, the Cloud Synchronisation setting can be toggled - please uncheck this box to disable cloud saves

Then,

1. Uninstall the game.
   
2. Make sure all the files for Dredge are off your system.
   
3. Now reinstall Dredge back onto your system.
   
4. Once you have reinstalled the game please Verify the files of the game.

To make sure all files are off your system please use the following paths:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\DREDGE
C:\Users\%username%\AppData\LocalLow\Black Salt Games\Dredge\
C:\Users\%username%\AppData\LocalLow\Black Salt Games\Dredge\saves

Once you have done this launch the game and test to see if the problem continues.

Regards,
Team17 Support

[Zero1505]

Hello Team17,
thank you for the fast feedback. I did the reinstallation as described, unfortunately without much success. To test, I started a new savegame, skipped the intro and the game crashes with a black screen when I leave the port for the first time (first day).

Then I wanted to record the crash with OBS, but the game runs without any further incidents when OBS records the screen in the background.
This is currently an interim solution but I don't think it's the final solution.

[Team17_Assist]

Hey Zero1505,

Thanks for your reply.

That's odd!
At least you are able to play while we look into this issue.

Let's make sure that your computer is not attempting to run the game via your integrated graphics card, rather than your dedicated NVidia graphics card.

To run the game through your dedicated graphics card, you may need to refer to your graphics card manufacturer's documents. If you are still unsure of how to do this, please contact the manufacturer of your graphics card directly.

We are unable to directly offer you instructions on how to do this. However, if you are connected to the internet, you may find the following useful:

1. Right-click your desktop, and select NVIDIA Control Panel.
   
2. From the left, select Manage 3D Settings.
   
3. Select Program Settings and navigate to select the program. (If the program is not in the list, select Add > navigate to the folder ‘…\Steam\steamapps\common’, select the game name folder, and then select the .exe.
   
4. Click High Performance to select the higher-power graphics card to use for that specific application.
   Select Apply.

After the steps please retest the game to see if the problem still continues.

Regards,
Team17 Support

[Zero1505]

Hello Team17,

i tried it with the Nvidia control panel as described, I even deactivated the onboard graphics in the device manager so the game definitly runs on my Nvidia grapics card, unfortunately without success.
I tested with a new saved game, right after the intro during the conversation with the mayor, the black screen came up and the game crashed.


Edit: I don´t know if this information is usefull but while playing (with OBS running, so my game dosen´t crash) the game runs with 140 FPS


Greetings
Zero1505

[Team17_Assist]

Hey Zero1505,

Thank you for trying those steps.

Can you please try deleting the entire C:\Users\%username%\AppData\LocalLow\Black Salt Games\Dredge folder and then attempt to launch the game?

This has resolved the issue for some players recently.

If that doesn't help, to reveal any possible issues with your Windows system, we would like to recommend that you please attempt the following actions:

1. Open the Windows Start Menu
   
2. Type “cmd”
   
3. Right-click on Command Prompt > Run as administrator
   
4. Type “sfc /scannow” without the quotes
   
5. Press Enter
   
6. If the process has revealed/resolved any issues, please attempt to run the game again

Get back to us when you can.

Regards,
Team17 Support

[Zero1505]

Hey,

deleting the entire folder from didn´t work, still crashing.

And "sfc /scannow" "Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations."

[Team17_Assist]

Hi Zero1505,

Thank you for trying that for us.

Can you please follow the steps in the link to perform a clean boot?[support.microsoft.com]
A clean boot is being used to start your Windows device using a minimal set of drivers and startup programs.

1. Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc to open the Task Manager.
   
2. Click More Details.
   
3. Select the Startup tab.
   
4. Right-click on each item and select Disable.
   
5. Press Windows Key + R.
   
6. Type msconfig and press Enter.
   
7. On the Services tab click to select the Hide all Microsoft services checkbox, and then tap or click Disable all.
   
8. Click Apply and restart the computer.

Once this is done please launch the game to see if the issue still continues.

To re-enable your start-up programs:

1. Follow the steps above again but enable all of your programs and services.
   
2. Then click Apply and restart your computer.

Get back to us when you can.

Regards,
Team17 Support

[Zero1505]

Hey Team17,

after a clean boot, I didn´t get a black screen, but the game freezes after a few minutes and the Windows error message "DREDGE.exe is not responding" appears.

[Team17_Helper]

Hello Zero,

Thank you for getting back to us and confirming that.

Can we recommend when doing the clean boot to slowly enable each start-up program one by one whilst testing the game to see if we can find what may be causing the crash problem? Once you have done this please let us know if you find anything.

We look forward to your reply.

Regards,
Team17 Support