Witcher 2 crashes when tabbed to desktop and re-opened.

[Rynkar]

I have an issue occuring where whenever I tab out to the desktop and then attempt to reclick back into Witcher 2 it just closes the program. No crash or impact upon my computer.

I have tried verifying the game cache and re-installing but nothing seems to be working. I have searched online but I currently cannot find anyone else with this problem unless I am wording my query incorrectly.

Any help is appreciated. :)

[Noblesavage]

The Alt + Tab crash happens with games for a few reasons: the game is not properly coded, your computer has low memory, and/or the game is graphically intense like TW2. When you Alt + Tab Windows messes with its priority and when you try and retrieve that game it can crash because of the reasons mentioned above.

I'd suggest not Alt + Tabbing if you can help it and instead using the Steam overlay (Shift + Tab).

If you find yourself NEEDING to Alt + Tab, I'd recommend playing the game in "Window Mode" or "Borderless Window Mode" if the game allows it, this will let you minimize the game and do what you need to do and then get back to the game without too much trouble.

[AKLT]

I am experiencing the same problem.

How does using the steam overlay in-game allow access to other programs while in-game may i ask?

No the game does not have "borderless" window mode.

Anyone else have an idea how to fix this?

I've tried, running with minimal graphics, so its not my "graphic memory low" and if windows is messing with the priority how do i change that?

[Noblesavage]

Sorry, I should have been more specific with my advice.

The Steam Overlay lets you access a web browser, without having to Alt + Tab, allowing you to check your e-mail, social media sites, game sites, etc. It's clunky, but it works. Unfortunately, you cannot access other programs (Word, your favourite web browser, Ventrilo, etc.) with the Steam Overlay.

Doing a quick Google search of "Alt + Tab Crashes" yields numerous complaints across many video game message boards (DOTA 2, Battlefield 3, Awesomenauts, and many others that are both graphically intense and even graphically "low end" games) about their game clients crashing or their computers freezing after Alt + Tabbing. I'm making an (un)educated guess by saying that this is and will be a chronic problem for TW2 that will not be easily remedied or even ever fixed.

This may not be the answer you're looking for, but as further evidence as to why I believe that the crashes will not be fixed can be found in the Steam Forums under another game. In the forums I found direct feed back from the developers at Remedy Games for their game Alan Wake. While not TW2, a user also experienced the Alt + Tab crash and asked why their game became unstable after each Alt + Tab. The response is telling of the problem. One Remedy Games Representative made efforts to track and fix the crash by getting customers to send in reports from the game's debugger program so that they could narrow down the issue and find a solution. Shortly there after, another Remedy Games Representative by the name of samivRMD stepped in and responded with this:
"CoreSyntax - thank you very much finding this out. We have a 100% repro[duction of the problem] here [in our testing office].

The problem is:
- You are running in fullscreen
- You are running Windows Classic theme
- You Alt+Tab

The problem seems to happen also in American Nightmare, except it doesn't crash but your mouse still doesn't work correctly on the desktop (thus you can't use your computer...)

We'll try to get this fixed for the 1.06 patch.

SamiV."

If I could speculate for a moment, the problem of Alt + Tab crashes is fairly low on their (all developers, not just Remedy Games or CD Projekt RED) to-do list and while they found the issue and may even know the solution - it will be costly in both time and money to fix the problem promptly for a relatively harmless and avoidable problem. Instead, they've provided an answer (of sorts) to the customer that had the problem and swept the issue under the rug until they're able to fix it, if at all. However, it sounds like the bug was fixed in a later patch, but it is not a "show stopper" bug that needed to be fixed IMMEDIATELY.

TW2 has been out since May 17, 2011, and if people are still experiencing the Alt + Tab crash - it's pretty safe to say that this problem is not high on their priority list of things to-do.

TL;DR: Alt + Tab crashes are a First World Problem. You'll need to either live with the self-induced crash, or dig around to find a workaround or solution on your own.

[AKLT]

Ah, thanks for the elaboration Noblesavage, i tend to alt tab in games alot and its the first time encountering it. I was under the belief it was a easily remedied problem.

Thanks for the information, sad to know its something that cant be corrected easily, but glad to know it isnt my rig that is causing the issue.

[Rynkar]

I do thank you. I recently upgraded my PC you see and going from a previous PC that could "just" run TW2 on low to running it on very high I was excited and then nearly cried when this bug appeared thinking my HDD was corrupted or some form of issue. I shall get right on with putting your advice into practice. I too thank you very much for replying, I have been looking forward to playing TW2 for a long time so here's hoping! I'll get back to you soon on the outcome.

[Kamyker]

Hi, I find soultion for all Win8 users:
Right click on shortcut, properties and change compatibility to Win7

[Zimplex1]

hmm... Alt-tabbing works very smoothly for me... But I use Linux.

[funkynutz]

Could also be caused by graphics drivers... What graphics hardware/drivers are you running?

[Razor]

Originally posted by kamyker:

Hi, I find soultion for all Win8 users:
Right click on shortcut, properties and change compatibility to Win7

Thx a lot dude. It worked