Can't play, game crashes when start

[BrunoHenriques]

Hello, I can't play the game anymore since yesterday. When I try to enter my vault the game just closes. Anyone else having this problem too?

[SM4Rk0]

Same on my side, it crash at 100% @JessBethesda ?

[BrunoHenriques]

I think maybe the save files of my vault are corrupted. I created a new one and it works. The game usualy crashes a lot and maybe one of the crashes damaged my savegame files. I won't start playing it again, I will just stop playing this game for good because I was already with 110 dwelers and some of them with level 50 and SPECIAL at max.

[Tanaka Khan]

Verified game files?

[Mardoin69]

Along with previous post....^....try disabling Steam cloud saving on this game. That feature tends to corrupt save files for a lot of games. Maybe not this one? but, might disable it to be sure. Then just go into your user folders under \AppData\Local\FalloutShelter and make copies of your saves once in while. You can also delete the current save and rename the identical one to remove the 'backup' designator on it. Then try loading your vault again using that backup copy.

[SM4Rk0]

You talking about Save Files but on my side, I trying to launch the game for the first time on PC and I can't play.

[Tanaka Khan]

Originally posted by SM4Rk0:

You talking about Save Files but on my side, I trying to launch the game for the first time on PC and I can't play.

Have you verified the game files?

[askobilv]

same here, crashes and not starting 100% of the attempts
verified files, uninstalled and reinstalled, disabled cloud and deleted local saves - did not work

[i do games]

game crashed last few days, now wont start without crash

[Mardoin69]

Go into users\ your user profile name\ AppData\Local\FalloutShelter....and copy your save files over to your documents or wherever you want for safe keeping. Next, completely uninstall the game. Then go through your system and delete ALL 'Fallout Shelter' folders. Now use a registry cleaner......something like the free version of CCleaner for example.....and clear registry values of anything to do with Fallout Shelter. Restart PC. Load Steam. Select Game and install. Then go to the game's 'manage' button (looks like gear icon) select properties. Check through each tab to be sure settings are correct and under 'files' do 'verify files' check.

Now, go into your Anti-virus software and be sure it's not trying to block the game. Then launch it and be sure it's working correctly. Start a new vault for testing. If so, copy your saves back into the appropriate folder. You'll overwrite the new save you created when testing it.

[Badun]

i startet the game (last time 2 houirs ago), some kids growed up and walk to different locations, then game crashes, and everytime i try to load this vault it crashs again... to many vault peoples now inside? can i fix the savegame anyway?

i found the falloutshelter.log in appdata/local with an error:

-> 1: 57:08.56 A Exception
errorCode: 1.91.0.2782295565.3344069262.0.3414852447.2876478434.0.3414852447.1320441829.0.3414852447.82428434.0.4255010436.155921989.0.2531747612.4231872978.0
InvalidCastException: Cannot cast from source type to destination type.
Stacktrace:
SerializeHelper.TryGetStringArray (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 dic, System.String name)
WastelandTeam.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 wastelandTeamDict)
Wasteland.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 wastelandDict)
Vault.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 dict)
SerializeHelper+<LoadGameEnum>c__Iterator0.MoveNext ()
UnityEngine.SetupCoroutine.InvokeMoveNext (IEnumerator enumerator, IntPtr returnValueAddress)

[Icarus Tactic]

Originally posted by Badun:

i startet the game (last time 2 houirs ago), some kids growed up and walk to different locations, then game crashes, and everytime i try to load this vault it crashs again... to many vault peoples now inside? can i fix the savegame anyway?

i found the falloutshelter.log in appdata/local with an error:

-> 1: 57:08.56 A Exception
errorCode: 1.91.0.2782295565.3344069262.0.3414852447.2876478434.0.3414852447.1320441829.0.3414852447.82428434.0.4255010436.155921989.0.2531747612.4231872978.0
InvalidCastException: Cannot cast from source type to destination type.
Stacktrace:
SerializeHelper.TryGetStringArray (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 dic, System.String name)
WastelandTeam.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 wastelandTeamDict)
Wasteland.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 wastelandDict)
Vault.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 dict)
SerializeHelper+<LoadGameEnum>c__Iterator0.MoveNext ()
UnityEngine.SetupCoroutine.InvokeMoveNext (IEnumerator enumerator, IntPtr returnValueAddress)

InvalidCastException: Cannot cast from source type to destination type seems to be a common unity engine error. Not programmer, but I believe it could be caused by a dweller being corrupted and not being rendered correctly by game.

1) First make a new vault in 2nd slot and see if it loads correctly. This is to rule out something like a game registry corruption or graphics driver incompatibility. If a brand new vault works then you can be pretty sure it's your old vault that's corrupted.

2) Backup your steam save folder from C/users/(username)/appdata/local/Fallout Shelter to separate location. Within that folder, you should have vault1.sav and vaul1.sav.bkp. Delete vault1.sav and rename vault1.sav.bkp to vault1.sav and try to start the game. You're just using the ingame backup and hope the corruption didn't override your backup.

3) If that doesn't work, you'll have to manually check each object aka dweller in your vault. You can use https://rakion99.github.io/shelter-editor/ to start deleting dwellers from your vault and checking periodically to see if it'll load properly. I'd first remove all dwellers from the vault and try to load it to see if it works. If it does load then you can revert save and gradually work your way to the root cause.

Edit: As a specific check. I know one cause of dweller corruption is a newborn being given "improper" stats. Normal dwellers have 12 combined stats across the board distributed as 1s, 2s, and one 3 stat. A corrupt dweller might have 1s across all 7 stats so that's a dead giveaway.

[So.tequila]

Originally posted by Icarus Tactic:

Originally posted by Badun:

i startet the game (last time 2 houirs ago), some kids growed up and walk to different locations, then game crashes, and everytime i try to load this vault it crashs again... to many vault peoples now inside? can i fix the savegame anyway?

i found the falloutshelter.log in appdata/local with an error:

-> 1: 57:08.56 A Exception
errorCode: 1.91.0.2782295565.3344069262.0.3414852447.2876478434.0.3414852447.1320441829.0.3414852447.82428434.0.4255010436.155921989.0.2531747612.4231872978.0
InvalidCastException: Cannot cast from source type to destination type.
Stacktrace:
SerializeHelper.TryGetStringArray (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 dic, System.String name)
WastelandTeam.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 wastelandTeamDict)
Wasteland.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 wastelandDict)
Vault.Deserialize (System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2 dict)
SerializeHelper+<LoadGameEnum>c__Iterator0.MoveNext ()
UnityEngine.SetupCoroutine.InvokeMoveNext (IEnumerator enumerator, IntPtr returnValueAddress)

InvalidCastException: Cannot cast from source type to destination type seems to be a common unity engine error. Not programmer, but I believe it could be caused by a dweller being corrupted and not being rendered correctly by game.

1) First make a new vault in 2nd slot and see if it loads correctly. This is to rule out something like a game registry corruption or graphics driver incompatibility. If a brand new vault works then you can be pretty sure it's your old vault that's corrupted.

2) Backup your steam save folder from C/users/(username)/appdata/local/Fallout Shelter to separate location. Within that folder, you should have vault1.sav and vaul1.sav.bkp. Delete vault1.sav and rename vault1.sav.bkp to vault1.sav and try to start the game. You're just using the ingame backup and hope the corruption didn't override your backup.

3) If that doesn't work, you'll have to manually check each object aka dweller in your vault. You can use https://rakion99.github.io/shelter-editor/ to start deleting dwellers from your vault and checking periodically to see if it'll load properly. I'd first remove all dwellers from the vault and try to load it to see if it works. If it does load then you can revert save and gradually work your way to the root cause.

Edit: As a specific check. I know one cause of dweller corruption is a newborn being given "improper" stats. Normal dwellers have 12 combined stats across the board distributed as 1s, 2s, and one 3 stat. A corrupt dweller might have 1s across all 7 stats so that's a dead giveaway.

oh... thank you for this link "https://rakion99.github.io/shelter-editor/ "
It's helped me, but the way was hard.
.bkp was also broken.

I converted vault3.sav to vault3.json. Then I started new game and also .sav converted to .json

use " https://rakion99.github.io/shelter-editor/SaveDecrypt.html "

I used Notepad++
Next, replaced "wasteland" from new vault to old vault.
It's located in "vault" - "wasteland".
And converted back .json to .sav

My vault works again))) 163 dwellers

[Zini]

Hey Tequila, it seems like you found a crafty fix! I've tried most other solutions, and I think yours might be the one to crack the case. Could you please specify which lines to replace in the old .json with the new one? Is it all the lines containing "wasteland"? If so, is there a quick way of replacing them? Would much appreciate your help

[BlackbeltBeavis]

Same startup crash here. I just noticed that my current vault claims 0 dwellers. That's not good!

[BlackbeltBeavis]

My #2 vault was crashing.

So here's what I did:
*rename Vault2.sav to Vault2.save.bkp2
*rename Vault2.bkp to Vault2.sav
...and it works.

Sometimes, the simplest solution blah blah...