Troubleshooting: Game doesn't start / Crashes on start

[Flashback]

Some intro text first, for those who care:

First of all, if you're experiencing an issue like this, I'm sorry to hear that (I really do - I've spent a lot of time customizing and modernizing the engine, so prestigious club of hardcode RPG players could enjoy the game). Still, in the world of PCs and its countless hardware/software/drivers combinations, something can always go wrong. If it happened for you - worry not, we'll figure it out. Maybe it will take some time and your input, but we will.

So, if you have troubles starting up the game, it means there is most likely a conflict between your OS and the game engine, as the gameplay code hasn't been reached yet, so it's not a thing we could break for you because we're lame or something =) Needless to say, it's still something we're most interested to fix for you. So, let's go through the troubleshooting steps.

TL;DR - Troubleshooting Steps

1) Please update your DirectX, downloading the file from here:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8109

I know you may have done it recently, I know Steam installed something automatically, I know that a hundred of other games did it before for you. Still, DirectX is a large collection of libraries, and if installed from a different package, a couple of files may be missing. So better spend an extra minute and try that.

2) Update C++ runtime libraries:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=30679
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=48145

Pick a x86 version for each (vcredist_x86.exe).

We've configured Steam to do this for you, but maybe you have a different version installed and Steam didn't recognize it properly? Who knows. It's a small file, just download and install it. It won't hurt, and may be useful to have for some other applications too.

3) Update your videocard drivers

It just sometimes helps, even if you're sure you have fairly recent ones. In any case, trying that first is much faster than figuring out the problem step-by-step later, so it's worth the time spent. And, again, it won't hurt to have up-to-date drivers anyway.
I won't post a link here, because it depends on your videocard. I'm sure you know where to get them from, usually it's NVIDIA or AMD website.

4) Try deleing prefs.cs file from your Documens/My Games/Age of Decadence folder, if it exists there.

It may remain there from an old AoD version and have incorrect settings.

5) Try compatibility mode. Right-click AoD.exe in the game folder, select Properties. In Properties window, go to Compatibility tab and set the next settings:

[v] Run this program in compatibility mode for:
Windows 7

[v] Run this program as an administrator

6) Uninstall and reinstall the game.
Additionally, before reinstalling, go to your Steam library folder and delete the "Age of Decadence" folder manually, so no traces of it are left. After that, go to your Documents/My Games/ folder, and if you don't have any saves, delete "Age of Decadence" from there too. If you have, temporarily move them (*.sav files) to a different folder, then delete "Age of Decadence". You can move back your saves later, when the game starts for you.

It helped a lot of people. Be it just corrupted files or junk from previous versions that wasn't cleaned up by Steam for some reason, having a clean installation is always a good thing in a case like this.

7) Opt out of Steam client beta, if you're participating in one.

8) Post the contents of your console.log file to this thread. It may help us figuring out what kind of error do you get, or at what stage of loading does the game stop working.

The file's location is your Documens/My Games/Age of Decadence/console.log

9) Finally, if nothing from above helps, feel free to describe your issue here. If it crashes for you and suggests to send a crash report to us, please do so, but also state your email or Steam username in that window, so when you post here about your problem, we could find your crash report among others.
Then I'll examine the crash dump personally and will try to figure out what's going wrong there from code point of view.

[wardoc]

when i attempt to start the game in steam nothing happens. nothing, no error message or anything. when i attempt to open with the aod.exe file it says im missing 2 different .dll files. msvcr.dll and msvcp.dll but those files are not missing i located them in my system32 folder. ive also tried all the steps above with no sucess please help with this I really want to try this game out. its the demo by the way. thanks for your time

[wardoc]

where can i find the console.log file?

[Flashback]

Files you mentioned are C++ runtime libraries, please follow step #2 in this guide:

Update C++ runtime libraries:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=30679

Download x86 version (vcredist_x86.exe), it should help.

[wardoc]

the 86 version worked thanks alot

[Clown Reemus]

Originally posted by Flashback:

Files you mentioned are C++ runtime libraries, please follow step #2 in this guide:

Update C++ runtime libraries:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=30679

Download x86 version (vcredist_x86.exe), it should help.

Did anyone encounter an issue with madly moving mouse? My wireless mouse is going in the direction I last move it. Makes it unconfortable to play.

[Flashback]

Originally posted by Clown Reemus:

Did anyone encounter an issue with madly moving mouse? My wireless mouse is going in the direction I last move it. Makes it unconfortable to play.

This is kinda offtopic for this thread, but try opening a console window ( ~ button ), typing "lockMouse(0);" (without quotes) and press enter. It should enable hardware cursor and maybe solve your issue.

[Clown Reemus]

Thank you, it did solve the issue.

[Shikton]

For me, going into the settings of AoD.exe -> Compatability and checking the Run as Admin box seemed to do the trick.

[kazereal]

Crash report:

//-------------------------- 10/5/2015 -- 04:29:42 -----
--------- Loading DIRS ---------

--------- Parsing Arguments ---------
Client preferences file found: C:\Users\...\Age Of Decadence\prefs.cs
Importing client prefs...
Importing client prefs done.
Current game version: 990009
Prefs from game version: 
Video mode after loading prefs: 1920 1080 true 32 60 0
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - applying a new language: english
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - language applied successfully.
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - installing fonts.
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/CharlemagneStd-Bold.ttf".
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/KAMN.TTF".
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/kokilabi.ttf".
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/MyriadPro-Regular.ttf".
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - reloading localized scripts.
Binding server port to default IP
UDP initialized on port 0
Attempting to create GFX device: AMD Radeon R9 200 / HD 7900 Series (D3D9)
Device created, setting adapter and enumerating modes
Win32Window::setVideoMode - invoking curtain
   Failed to create hardware device, trying mixed device
   Failed to create mixed mode device, trying software device
   Failed to create software device, giving up
Error, a DecalManager (55e4238) isn't properly out of the bins!

Immediately on launching (directly from exe) I get error dialog about pixel shader 1.1 support..

AMD FX-8370
16GB RAM
AMD Radeon 7970 3GB
Windows 7 SP1 64-bit

Error dialog:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=530076384

Identical problem with Dead State..

[Vince]

My apologies for the inconvenience. Our programmer will take a look at this problem shortly.

[Flashback]

It doesn't look like you've completed all the steps from the original post. These lines say that outdated prefs.cs file exists, while step #4 suggests to delete it:

Client preferences file found: C:\Users\...\Age Of Decadence\prefs.cs
Importing client prefs...
Importing client prefs done.
Current game version: 990009
Prefs from game version:

Please try deleting it and let us know if it helps. If not, try the solution from this thread:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/230070/discussions/0/666826251086282088/

...or other steps from this thread's first post.

[kazereal]

Originally posted by Flashback:

Please try deleting it and let us know if it helps. If not, try the solution from this thread:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/230070/discussions/0/666826251086282088/

Same result after deleting it.

It looks more like problem in Torque 3D code and initialization of graphics than anything related to installation or preferences.

//-------------------------- 10/5/2015 -- 18:52:59 -----
--------- Loading DIRS ---------

--------- Parsing Arguments ---------
Client preferences file not found: C:\Users\...\Age Of Decadence\prefs.cs
Current game version: 990009
Prefs from game version: 
Video mode after loading prefs: 1024 768 false 32 60 0
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - applying a new language: english
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - language applied successfully.
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - installing fonts.
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/CharlemagneStd-Bold.ttf".
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/KAMN.TTF".
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/kokilabi.ttf".
Added font resource "core/fonts/source/MyriadPro-Regular.ttf".
Info: GameLanguage::switchLanguage - reloading localized scripts.
Binding server port to default IP
UDP initialized on port 0
Attempting to create GFX device: AMD Radeon R9 200 / HD 7900 Series (D3D9)
Device created, setting adapter and enumerating modes
   Failed to create hardware device, trying mixed device
   Failed to create mixed mode device, trying software device
   Failed to create software device, giving up

[kazereal]

I opted out of Steam client beta which allows starting AoD again.

On a hunch (other programs have had trouble with Steam beta) I tried that and it worked.

So that might be worth looking into.

[Cryoned]

When I try to use 2560x1440 resolution it doesn't work, anything above 1920x1080/1200 doesn't change the window size to what is expected. When I manually change the resolution on prefs.cs to 2560x1440, the game boot up at that resolution but when the menu is loaded, the game is resized and prefs.cs change the resolution automatically to 1920x1200

Also, the menu UI font sizeis very small on high dpi screens.

[Flashback]

Are you trying to launch it windowed or full screen? Because in windowed mode, the resolution *has* to be smaller than your desktop resolution. If it's equal or larger, the engine will reduce it to fit the desktop.