[Up: 1.09 patch] Elden Ring crashing issue on PC due to Anti-Cheat system & performance issues acknowledged; lighting bug surfaces

Here’s the crux of the article in video form:

New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….

Original story (published on February 26, 2022) follows:

Elden Ring is the latest From Software ‘Souls-like’ game which has been receiving critical acclaim since its arrival.

Elden Ring is available on various consoles and platforms. However, the PC version of the game has been experiencing noticeable issues since its release.

Currently, some Elden Ring players are facing a crashing issue on PC due to a fail in the Anti-Cheat system. Furthermore, there are performance issues and glitches with some graphical effects (such as the lighting effect).

For some Elden Ring players, the game is crashing on the initial loading screen or when creating a character. This is due to a bug on its Anti-Cheat system that conflicts with some processes on your PC (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12).

Game Crashing On Start Up

Just as the title says. My game is crashing on startup. It will get to the Bandai Namco screen then exit full screen and then freeze and crash moments later. Tried verifying files, and running as admin and even tried running in compatability mode, but to no avail. Nothing has worked so far. First launch got to the title screen then froze and crashed. After that it crashes on the Bamco screen every time.
Source

Some reports suggest that the Elden Ring crashing issue could happen mainly on Windows 10 OS, while on Windows 11 OS everything should work fine (1, 2, 3, 4, 5).

Some players who experienced the issue reinforce the previous suspicion by confirming that they are using Windows 10 OS. However, this has not yet been officially confirmed.

There are a couple of potential workarounds that could help mitigate the issue. The first is to disable the Steam Overlay:

The other workaround points out that the Epic Games Launcher is one of the elements that conflicts with the game’s Anti-Cheat system, which is curious since both software don’t seem to have anything to do with each other.

However, if you experience crashing issues and have the Epic Games Launcher installed, try disabling or uninstalling it.

Elder Ring players are also facing performance issues on PC. These include noticeable fps drops, excessive hardware resources usage, and more (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10).

PC performance made me refund the game

As majority of steam reviews are saying, this game is unacceptable on mid range PCs at the moment.

I meet all the recommended settings and I’m barely pushing 25fps, and that’s unplayable in a game where every half second counts in regards to reaction times. This is at 1080p. I refunded, checked reviews, and most people were saying same thing.

Holding off now until I can get my hands on a PS5 since it seems consoles are optimised much better with these games.
Source

For this problem there are also a couple of potential workarounds. The first is to change the Windows OS power settings from ‘high performance’ to ‘balanced’.

The second workaround consists of bypassing the Anti-Cheat system of the game through the following procedure:

The other recent reported issue is related to the lighting effects in Elden Ring, which are displayed incorrectly with strange black lines and screen flickering (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9).

Bug – Flashing light and black screen

I played the game for about an hour, game worked fine. Then when I restartedit after about another hour the game keep flashing with black lines across the screen and sometimes the whole screene goes black.
Source

As in the previous cases, there are also a couple of potential workarounds that could help resolve this bug. The first basically consists of updating your GPU drivers to the most recent version.

For the second workaround it is recommended to validate the game files if you did the pre-download process before official availability.

The company published an apology where they also confirm that they are working on a fix for crashing and performance issues, but there is still no estimated arrival date for it.

However, there is no official acknowledgment for the lighting bug yet. We will update this story once news related to the matter emerges.

Click/tap to view older updates

Update 1 (February 28, 2022)

11:08 am (IST): A new patch (1.02.1) is now available for Elden Ring players on PC and PlayStation 5. And it includes a fix for the crashing issue caused due to anti-cheating system on PC.

Moreover, this patch also brings various improvements. Below is the complete changelog of the update.

Patch 1.02.1 for PC and PS5 available now.

PC

– Start-up issues related to Easy Anti Cheat (EAC) have been improved.

– Mouse operation improved.

– Reduced number of files needed to load when entering a new area.

PS5

– Fixed a bug that caused certain unexpected game closures. (Source)

Update 2 (March 01, 2022)

02:58 pm (IST): Elden Ring on Twitter announced that their servers will be under maintenance for the next 24 hours (Feb. 28 – Mar. 01) to improve some multiplayer functions.

And we hope that this also fixes the ongoing crashing and performance issues.

Update 3 (March 02)

11:40 pm (IST): A new patch (1.02.2) is now available for Elden Ring players on PC and PS5. And it brings a fix for the graphics card issue which resulted in slow performance.

Here’s the complete changelog for PC players:

– Fixed an issue where the graphics card was not being used, resulting in slow performance.

– Fixed a bug that caused the game to quit under certain conditions during a battle with the Fire Giant.

– Fixed other bugs. (Source)

Update 4 (March 03, 2022)

05:12 pm (IST): One of the affected players suggested a workaround for the stuttering issue in Elden Ring. If you are still facing this issue, then you can try the potential fix given in the video below and see if it helps.

Update 5 (March 04, 2022)

03:15 pm (IST): Some Elden Ring players are still reporting (1, 2, 3) crashing issues on PC even after the recent patch.

Gamers say that the patch only mitigated the issue and while they still encounter crashing issues, the game just doesn’t crash the entire PC. Also, some pointed out (1, 2, 3) that the crashes occur when they try to equip a piece of armor.

Update 6 (March 05, 2022)

04:21 pm (IST): Here’s a workaround for the crashing issue that worked for users on PCs with AMD Ryzen hardware.

Update 7 (March 07, 2022)

03:21 pm (IST): One of the affected players suggested a workaround that fixes the stuttering issues in the game.

This workaround may provide you with a smooth gameplay experience, but it’s also risky and you should try it at your own risk.

Update 8 (March 17, 2022)

05:39 pm (IST): A new patch v1.03 is now available for Elden Ring players and it brings fixes and improvements for some performance issues that players have been experiencing.

Update 9 (March 19, 2022)

04:11 pm (IST): A couple of players (1, 2) confirmed that they managed to fix the crashing on startup issue by just closing RivaTuna.

Update 10 (March 22, 2022)

03:24 pm (IST): One individual claims they were able to fix the problem by essentially resetting their Windows PC.

I never figured out what the issue was, I just reset my pc (deleted all programs but kept all my files) and once I reinstalled steam and elden ring it worked (Source)

Update 11 (March 24, 2022)

09:40 am (IST): Many Elden Ring players are now reporting that the game is crashing after the recent update. Those affected have taken to Twitter and Reddit (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) to raise their complaints.

Unfortunately, the support team has not yet acknowledged the issue and we will report back as and when anything noteworthy comes up.

Update 12 (March 25, 2022)

12:49 pm (IST): One of the affected players suggested that removing Easy Anti-cheat may help gamers fix the crashing issue.

Update 13 (March 25, 2022)

Removing the Easy Anti-Cheat launcher might help I’ve seen it help a handful of people having similar issues, there’s a couple YouTube tutorials on how to do it. I think it might force you to play offline though (Source)

Update 14 (March 26, 2022)

06:55 pm (IST): One of the affected players suggest that turning off overlays might help mitigate the issue.

Update 15 (March 28, 2022)

05:45 pm (IST): Gamers are now suggesting that the affected players should try verifying the game files as a workaround for the crashing issue and to do so, head here.

Update 16 (June 14, 2022)

05:49 pm (IST): Elden Ring players on PC are still reporting (1, 2, 3, 4) performance issues with the game. This means that a definitive fix for the same is still awaited.

05:30 pm (IST): Some players report that the game is crashing for them after the v1.08 update (1, 2).

08:52 am (IST): According to multiple reports, Elden Ring is constantly crashing after latest v1.09 patch (1, 2, 3).

As a potential workaround, affected players can check for available GPU driver updates and install them. Alternatively, they can turn off Ray Tracing before loading a save file.

12:04 pm (IST): It seems that the v1.09 patch has also introduced a bug that is preventing players from participating in Co-op.

Both finding the co-op sign and being invaded by others are unsuccessful. Occasionally, the mode also crashes the game (1,2,3,4).

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