Black Screen at Start after NEARLY HALF-A-YEAR

[SuperFly]

When I launch the game, it appears in a centered window.
It will not go into Fullscreen.
The intro videos play, then it goes black and I can hear the 'Bladerunner Blues' and see my mouse cursor & the Steam Overlay pop-ups -- but nothing else.

I can see a brief frame of the character's portrait beside a main menu when I first Alt+Enter -- and hear a single click the first time I do this.
Other than that, nothing changes, except I no longer will hear a click or see a frame of graphics.
The centered, black windowed box is all that remains on my screen, playing the music -- forcing me to close through Steam or Windows Taskbar.

The game is running in DX11. (Vulkan isn't an option.) I am on Windows 7, 64-bit.
Using "-fullscreen +1" through Properties gives the same result -- with a distorted stretching of the image.
(I can then see my Steam FPS monitor over the black, but can't Shift+Tab.)
I DO NOT see the FPS monitor when the box is centered/windowed, and not stretched.

After waiting for half a year from the posting of this OP, and finally getting the latest patch -- nothing has changed for my game.

I am not satisfied with playing anything but the Enhanced Edition, complete with its QoL updates & Steam Achievements. I paid for this product, and expect it to function as advertised.

Please help.

[awg]

Make sure you have these packages installed:
Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable (x64) - 14.31.31103
Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable (x86) - 14.31.31103

I think they are necessary for the game to work properly.

Also make sure you're antivirus program (if you have any) didn't block any files from installation.

[SuperFly]

Originally posted by awg:

Make sure you have these packages installed:
Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable (x64) - 14.31.31103
Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable (x86) - 14.31.31103

I think they are necessary for the game to work properly.

Also make sure you're antivirus program (if you have any) didn't block any files from installation.

Thank you. Antivirus isn't an issue in this, for sure.
The game is running, just not displaying the main menu.
I can get one mouse-over sound effect, one time, and that's it.

I appreciate the heads up on the VC++, and upgraded accordingly (I was on 14.28) -- but could only find installers that would give me 14.32, from here:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/cpp/windows/latest-supported-vc-redist?view=msvc-170

Sadly, even with the 14.32 update, there is still no joy.

[ShadowNate]

Is there anything in the "stdout.txt" and "stderr.txt" files that could indicate what is the cause of this problem on your PC?
These files are in a "Saved Games\Nightdive Studios\Blade Runner EX" subfolder under your Windows user path along with a "kexengine.cfg" file, which you might want to also check out and maybe do some minor test edits (especially for the obvious display resolution values and vsynch on/off (1/0) toggle and v_windowmode toggle (1/0)).

[SuperFly]

Originally posted by ShadowNate:

Is there anything in the "stdout.txt" and "stderr.txt" files that could indicate what is the cause of this problem on your PC?
These files are in a "Saved Games\Nightdive Studios\Blade Runner EX" subfolder under your Windows user path along with a "kexengine.cfg" file, which you might want to also check out and maybe do some minor test edits (especially for the obvious display resolution values and vsynch on/off (1/0) toggle and v_windowmode toggle (1/0)).

Thanks for the thorough suggestions!

I checked the associated folders...
'stderr.txt' is a blank page & 'stdout.txt' reports no errors -- ending on one of many successful "CompileProgram" processes.

I will try directly troubleshooting from the 'kexengine.cfg' and report here if anything changes. If there are any other direct toggles you could recommend I would definitely like to hear them.

My v_windowmode was already toggled off.
When toggled on, all it does is remove the borders from the centered 4:3 window.

[SuperFly]

Originally posted by SuperFly:

...
I will try directly troubleshooting from the 'kexengine.cfg' and report here...

The kexengine.cfg for this game is an absolute mess!

All previous Nightdive KEX .cfg's I have dealt with (DOOM64, System Shock, Blood) were professional-looking, and included line breaks for every option.
This is just a lump of perpetually unbroken string.

What a dogpile.

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/2018211695508819541/66A0A0B465F916AC07D89E4018C46679F3002890/

[awg]

Try to open the kexengine.cfg file with Notepad++ application.

[SuperFly]

Originally posted by awg:

Try to open the kexengine.cfg file with Notepad++ application.

...I'm good without having to download a third party piece of software, thank you.

The basic nature of Notepad doesn't do ANY of the work for them, so it betrays all under-performance & corner-cutting. Auto-ordering with a smarter program might make it look legible -- but they didn't do that work themselves, obviously to the detriment of the product.

Their other, much more successful releases were on point with the syntax -- so it's no coincidence their latest belly-flop stems from half-assed authorship, and resulted in a 'Mostly Negative' reception.
Being too lazy to make an extra keystroke to break a string was their decision, and it aided the cascading failures on delivery of BR:EE.
Things might improve, too, if the boss notices that kind of thing.

If Nightdive is comfortable throwing out embarrassing compilations that are easily contrasted against their more professional endeavors, that's their folly.
I just hope they make it right by their customers, and continue to update the product -- and I want my copy to operate as advertised.

[awg]

That's a fair point, I give you that.

[SuperFly]

This game will STILL not produce anything but a blank screen with the Enhanced Edition.

The game is running, so it must be in DX11 mode (my card does not support Vulkan).
It remains in a centered, windowed black box. I see the in-game mouse pointer in the box.
Alt+Enter does nothing but give me a brief flash of the menu, once, and the music continues to play over a blank, black box.
I hear a clicking noise the first time I Alt+Enter.

My system meets all requirements.
Why is my game not working after many months waiting for this update to fix this issue?

[The Dude :)]

The game runs in vulkan so if your card doesn't work on vulcan, then it's probably a no go.

[SuperFly]

Originally posted by The Dude:

The game runs in vulkan so if your card doesn't work on vulcan, then it's probably a no go.

MINIMUM:
Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
OS: Windows 7 (64-bit required)
Processor: Intel or AMD Dual-Core at 2.0 GHz
Memory: 2 GB RAM
Graphics: GPU with DirectX 11 or Vulkan 1.1 support
Storage: 10 GB available space
Sound Card: 100% DirectX compatible sound card or onboard sound

As seen above, it runs on both -- so understand that you are mistaken.
The ATI/AMD Radeon 5870 is a DX11 API video card.

[Equation™]

Have you tried the original version of the game rather than the "enhanced version" - Curious to know if it's just the enhanced version causing issues for you

[SuperFly]

I already played through the original game.
I also own the ScummVM version on GOG.com.
I have no interest in replaying that version.

I want to play the EE version I paid for, as I stated in the OP.
Only the EE has errors -- but the QOL, enhancements, & the Steam platform-based achievements are what I paid for, want to pursue, and am owed as a customer.
It needs to be made functional under the minimum requirements it is sold by.

[Galdere]

Which graphics driver are you using?

The last compatible one is the 16.2.1 beta I think...

https://www2.ati.com/drivers/beta/non-whql-win8.1-win7-radeon-software-crimson-relive-16.2.1-sep20.exe

[SuperFly]

Originally posted by Galdere:

Which graphics driver are you using?

The last compatible one is the 16.2.1 beta I think...

https://www2.ati.com/drivers/beta/non-whql-win8.1-win7-radeon-software-crimson-relive-16.2.1-sep20.exe

No, the Crimson driver is the series that literally throttled the fans on this card series -- and fried many of them over a long weekend -- immediately after AMD/ATI "dropped support" for the 58/9xx & retired the Catalyst series & recommended the Crimson roll-over as the "last supported driver".

That 16.2.1 Crimson Beta was rolled out well after this """accidental""" error killed so many of these beastly cards.
I will not be rolling over into "Crimson" for an un-supported/autheticated/verified Beta, that sabotaged the entire line.

I use the last officially released 15.2 Catalyst drivers -- because the only reason my card is still alive is that I didn't update to Crimson in the first place.

A "Beta" driver is, by design, not the "latest official driver".
"Fully updated" for this card is driver 15.200.1062.1004.
Beta is "use at your own risk".