Black screen startup crash - How to Fix?

[Kalgert]

So I decided to reboot the game after not playing it after a few months (That is, reinstall it and then try playing it again), and I am having some difficulties with that. Namely, having a black screen when trying to load in to my save game, or start a new one.

I deleted the shader cache folder, didn't work. Tried restarting the computer, also didn't work. Did both of the above with running as administrator, and still had no luck. Also playing on a Windows 10, if that's by any chance important.

So.... What other options do I have?

[japp_02]

If you have an AMD card, install the driver 18.11.02.
Also if you play on laptop (which I don't recommend, this game will eat-up your hardware with time), start the game with right-clicking on the game shortcut and chose your main GPU to start.

[ZomBeGone]

What are your system specs?

[japp_02]

Originally posted by ZomBeGone:

What are your system specs?

His specs must be ok, he played monthes ago as he said.

[japp_02]

OP, go to your savegame folder and delete the content of the 'cache' folder. If you did change drivers, then delete the 3 files in your game SETTINGS folder and restart.
Re-installing game is a waste of time as I have said many times, it only helps if you have deleted files by error. Update the game and make a integrity file check instead.

[Kalgert]

I've updated the drivers, and did what Japp suggested, and I am still not having any luck with starting up the game, and I unfortunately have no other ideas as to what I could do. Anyone else have other ideas what I could do?

[ZomBeGone]

Are you using an AMD GPU? if so, then you do NOT want the most updated driver. You want what japp_2 recommended ^.

[Kalgert]

But that was the driver that I had before I updated :(

[japp_02]

Originally posted by Kalgert:

But that was the driver that I had before I updated :(

I know it's an older driver, but this older one works better and avoids many crashing scenarios as reported by other AMD players. Consult the forums here using the 'Search' in the Technical Support Discussion (see links on the right). I even guess that installing the newest driver is the reason for your problems. This is purely NMS related, and doesn't apply for other games, usually the latest driver is the best, NOT SO FOR AMD CARDS WITH NMS.
You really want to install it (18.11.02).

[Lyrancat]

I'm glad this thread got started, not for the OP, but anyone else having this issue. I am also having a similar issue if not the same. I would sign in to Steam, and then NMS, and then the game I want to play, then there's a black screen. It doesn't seem to go away...until I click my mouse a few times, then the black screen turns to the screen with the moving stars. As far as I know, all the extra shader cache files were deleted. That was done a month or 2 ago.
I looked into how to update drivers and I did notice the "display driver"( I think it's called?) with NVidia hasn't been updated for awhile, so I downloaded the latest drivers and installed them. We'll see how it goes when I start playing the game later this evening. I did check into the AMD part of my computer and it didn't need any updates.

I havn't had just that problem but a few others. I just don't say much and then I put up with the problems until I can't stand it any longer. I could inquire more about them in the "tech support" and or "bugs/glitches" sections.?

[japp_02]

@Lyancat,
reading your post I see you get confused. My posts above only apply for players which have a AMD grafic card. If you have a Nvidia card, all this doesn't apply to you. Install the newest driver for Nvidia and you should start and play without problem. If not, then you don't meet the minimal requirements for the game - or your problem is definitly elsewhere. Your grafic card must support OpenGL 4.5, otherwise the game won't start. Check this, or publish here your card specifications if you want any help.

[ZomBeGone]

^this.

Posting your graphics card model AND the amount of video RAM that it has, will help a lot.

Interesting about hitting the mouse. Did the game play after that?

Also you should only have ONE video card plugged in your system, should be either Nvidia OR AMD. Did you change video cards at some point?

[Lord Dickinson McCheddar]

If you use tipex you can make your screen white again.

[Lyrancat]

Originally posted by japp_02:

@Lyancat,
reading your post I see you get confused. My posts above only apply for players which have a AMD grafic card. If you have a Nvidia card, all this doesn't apply to you. Install the newest driver for Nvidia and you should start and play without problem. If not, then you don't meet the minimal requirements for the game - or your problem is definitly elsewhere. Your grafic card must support OpenGL 4.5, otherwise the game won't start. Check this, or publish here your card specifications if you want any help.

Thanks for responding back about my issues. I know originally it was meant for the other person, which started the question. Anyways, sorry I got sort of confused what you were explaining to the other person about on the video card. I just looked into what I have for the video card and it is a "Nvidia GeForce GT-430". Also, the OP asked me about what the video memory is. I'm not sure if I'm reading this right, as I'm reading this from the Direct X diagnostic tool" off of my computer which says: Display Memory(VRAM)1989 MB. It also gives the Total memory and the shared memory of that card which is a lot more in the number. I can give that info. later on if you like. I have a hunch that that amount of video memory isn't enough for today's games especially this one.? Maybe I'm wrong.? This card didn't come with the computer which I bought brand new back a few years ago. The computer came with some other video card and the guy that helped me to getting my new computer asked me if I was going to do any serious gaming. I said probably a little. So, he suggested I have a much better video card installed that would be better for gaming, so I had that done. I wasn't much of a gamer back then let alone now. Anyways, I hope that the upgrade on my drivers today works out that problem and maybe some other smaller issues.

[japp_02]

GT-430 will not run the game, you need a card that supports OpenGL 4.5. This is the minimum, and the card must have 2GB VRAM at least. The 'recommended' specs have cards with at least 4gb+ VRAM, 16GB system RAM and a i7 4.0+ ghz processor. All this by judging the feedbacks in the forums here.

[Lyrancat]

Originally posted by japp_02:

GT-430 will not run the game, you need a card that supports OpenGL 4.5.

Hmm, ok. Thanks again for the advice. A rude awakening for me, after all this time of several months to a year of playing this game and then to find this out. I have really loved this game above all others and it's been the only lately that I play. Ok, I may see if I can get another card installed in this computer, if that is even feasible. Otherwise, I guess I just won't play this game anymore. It's too d----- bad that most games these days require so much memory and processing speeds to perform. Yeah, I just started this game again this evening and had that same black screen for about a minute or 2 again and then to the moving stars. The biggest thing that happened is I got completely knocked out of the game. I would have to start again. This happened to me last night or the night previous. I'm not very happy about this, and that can get old fast. I think more than likely, I need a higher processor speed for this game too.?