Can't start a game

[Sir Patrick de Graham]

I saw NMS was on sale, and I've heard good things about it for years. I bought it, and I can't even start a new game - it always crashes on the loading screen.
My drivers are updated, my files are validated, and my specs are well above minimum.
What a great first experience to a game I was looking forward to playing.

[Zak]

Bad timing. An update just came out couple of days ago and a lot of people are having problems. It was running fine before that though. When did you get get? This would be really bad time for a new player to get into NMS. Are you still within the refund period? Might want to consider returning it and waiting until the dust settles down. However, they WILL fix it. Issues are getting fixed one by one but the decision is yours as you may not be able to play it for a while.

[Azure Fang]

Try swapping to the Experimental branch. It's not a guarantee, but it has 4 days of crashfixes that haven't been ported to main yet.

[Blacksmith]

I've been playing the game since Nov 2019 without performance issues... but the FRACTAL update 4.1 broke the game so badly I cannot even log in completely. I have a top-of-the-line GPU and massive RAM, and elements are up-to-date on drivers. I can only hope that the infinite 'powers that be' at HG see fit to undo some degree of the insanity and madness which this update has brought about. I'm in my 70s, fully disabled, and while some may find the game 'boring', it is one of my only escapes from the difficult realities of chronic pain. I've reported the particulars to the ZENDESK... but there wasn't even a nomenclature or code to accompany the crashes... just an insipid note saying THE GAME HAS STOPPED WORKING which appears before loading my SAVE is completed.

[STATIK]

Yep, Fractals is the first time my game has crashed in two years. I'm able to login, but once in a while taking off from a planet freezes up my PC. I think it's mod related...

To OP:

Just give it a few more days, I think you have two weeks to return a game. Hello Games should have this running perfectly smoothly by next Tuesday/Wednesday. It doesn't usually take them very long for post-patch fixes.

In the meantime, try turning off all overlays, close down unnecessary programs, don't alt-tab. I've heard some people have issues with MSI afterburner but it works fine for me... Make sure your page file/swap file is big enough... I set mine to 20gb.

[King Crimson]

First time crash after playing for four years. First I couldn't launch the game. I updated the graphic's drivers and that got the game to launch. Might get a few hours play before the controls freeze and I have to re-boot. Went from Xperimental and back after the new updates to Fractal and even re-installed the game. It actually saves right at the point of freezing so you can start where you left off. The game was freezing every 4 to 5 hours but now its freezing every 15 minutes. I will be patient and wait for HG to sort it out. Zendesk message sent but....

[Geegoat]

I'm crashing here too!!

[DamnGrandma!]

sad face.......
just started getting into it, was excited to see this update till it didnt wanna start

[Krontyrr]

I'm crashing too. I got to enter my save once among several tries, but the game crashed after a few seconds ingame.

[Krontyrr]

Btw, starting a new game doesn't help either; that crashes the same way too.

[Shadelin]

Same issue at first... I did go to border mode and it cut down on my crashes... Or better yet, I could log in... in full screen mode it crashed even before it did a full start of the game... Now it crashes like ever 40-50 minutes...

[LilBigMan]

After downloading fractal update, i tried to play but it froze at beginning where going through stars. Went to options and selected border and lowered everything to enhanced in graphics. After that i was allowed to get in and play. No crashes, but a very small amount of stuttering. At least i can play till patches come.