WHY WB?? JUST WHY?? WTF DO Y0U INSIST ON BREAKING HL & MY SAVES WITH EVERY UPDATE?

[Alaric the Visgoth]

HL was launching with zero issues up to the last patch update. But thanks to UE4 in which HL was developed/designed, the game engine mandates shader processing EVERY. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. TIME. You have the misfortune of reinstalling or with every patch update.

So as a result, my high end 13th gen Intel Raptor CPU can no longer complete the shader processing. And so the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ game won't launch anymore. Which means I can't access the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ gate locked Potion Shop/quest content in Hogsmeade. After waiting for over A YEAR NOW.

For those players with Intel 13/14th gen Raptor CPUs and/or with Nvidia 4090 GPUs, did you use the Intel Extreme Tuning Utility to tweak the Performance Core Ratio? If so, what value did you adjust this to?

I noticed there are 3 features you can manually tune with the Intel app:

Performance Core Ratio: current setting 55x and I'm NOT overclocked
Efficient Core Ratio: current setting 43x
Core Voltage Offset: 0.000 V

My PC DxDiag:
Operating System: Windows 11 Pro 64-bit (10.0, Build 22621) (22621.ni_release.220506-1250)
Processor: 13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-13900K (32 CPUs), ~3.0GHz
Memory: 65536MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 65276MB RAM
Page File: 10700MB used, 58672MB available
DirectX Version: DirectX 12
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090

Any help in what the P-Core setting was adjusted to would prove very helpful.

[Denniss]

CPU probably already damaged, affected by Intel instability issue. Or overclocked/Undervolted too much.

[Kambien]

Either a damaged CPU or you need to update the firmware on your motherboard. Most people who buy a high end machine forget how to do proper maintenance. The firmware update on MB's has resolved the intel issues - unless you have toasted your's by not doing your research.

[DESLAND]

Toasted Intel CPU most likely, throw that into the garbage where it belongs, and join the red side, brother, our houses are never cold during winter

[Alaric the Visgoth]

Thanks to everyone for replying! TY especially Kambien, will check the BIOS again.

To be clear: I've never overclocked/under volted my CPU since getting my custom rig 2 yr ago (shortly before HL release). I also don't play competitive MMO PVP games like Fortnite or COD. I'm a PvE (Starfield, TES/Fallout, Stellaris/Elite Dangerous/SE/The Sims etc) single player gamer. The worst competitive game in my library is GTAO and I 100% do that in Solo Invite only LOL. So HL is the only max/high end CPU/GPU intensive game that would push my CPU to its limits.

Thing is I played/completed HL about a month after its release. And had ZERO shader issues before being able to launch the game. Only replayed the main quest with 2 other characters from other houses up to map room unlock. So I could get the Map room achievements. Then quit playing shortly afterwards.. This was long before WB was updating the game.

Fast forward a year later to the Potion shop DLC release/unlock from EGS. Right after the update, was able to successfully run shader and get to main menu. Created a new and final PC for Hufflepuff the last remaining house to unlock the Map achievement. Skipped the sorting intro and successfully loaded the game in the common room. Then saved this game with intention of playing later when I had time. IRL issues delayed this return until start of this New Year when I finally had some time.

TL DR
Played/beat HL successfully 1 month after launch. Haven't played HL for almost 1.5 years and it's the only game in my Steam library which pushes my high end rig to it's CPU/GPU limits.My system had the latest Intel BIOS update so don't think my CPU is cooked. The latest WB patch update DID overhaul performance settings both graphically & CPU wise. So that's what led me to think my CPU settings just need to be tweaked for PCore etc. And the reason for my original post/rant.

So anyone with a 13th gen who's still playing HL, what are your PCore settings?

[Savick]

I'm having the same problem. I could play just fine last year with no problems. Now the game won't launch. I don't understand what's wrong. Nothing on my machine has changed. I have an NVIDIA RTX 4080. It should be able to still play it.

[SassyAzura]

It's funny how the VERY FIRST response people tend to have is "it's your computer that is at fault get a new one" when it very well just could be the game itself that is the issue.... the people saying that must not realize that the game just very well could be broken and not working right for people

[cswiger]

Yes, it's funny that the failure rate of recent i7s + i9s is so high that they account for the majority of crash reports. Intel gets to say Ho! Ho! Ho! whenever someone has to RMA a broken 13th or 14th gen CPU.

[Khaziir Everflight]

Originally posted by Alaric the Visgoth:

Thanks to everyone for replying! TY especially Kambien, will check the BIOS again.

To be clear: I've never overclocked/under volted my CPU since getting my custom rig 2 yr ago (shortly before HL release). I also don't play competitive MMO PVP games like Fortnite or COD. I'm a PvE (Starfield, TES/Fallout, Stellaris/Elite Dangerous/SE/The Sims etc) single player gamer. The worst competitive game in my library is GTAO and I 100% do that in Solo Invite only LOL. So HL is the only max/high end CPU/GPU intensive game that would push my CPU to its limits.

Thing is I played/completed HL about a month after its release. And had ZERO shader issues before being able to launch the game. Only replayed the main quest with 2 other characters from other houses up to map room unlock. So I could get the Map room achievements. Then quit playing shortly afterwards.. This was long before WB was updating the game.

Fast forward a year later to the Potion shop DLC release/unlock from EGS. Right after the update, was able to successfully run shader and get to main menu. Created a new and final PC for Hufflepuff the last remaining house to unlock the Map achievement. Skipped the sorting intro and successfully loaded the game in the common room. Then saved this game with intention of playing later when I had time. IRL issues delayed this return until start of this New Year when I finally had some time.

TL DR
Played/beat HL successfully 1 month after launch. Haven't played HL for almost 1.5 years and it's the only game in my Steam library which pushes my high end rig to it's CPU/GPU limits.My system had the latest Intel BIOS update so don't think my CPU is cooked. The latest WB patch update DID overhaul performance settings both graphically & CPU wise. So that's what led me to think my CPU settings just need to be tweaked for PCore etc. And the reason for my original post/rant.

So anyone with a 13th gen who's still playing HL, what are your PCore settings?

sadly, you did not need to overclock your cpu for it to be potentially damaged due to the issues with the last two gens...