game crashing upon launch (steam ver)

What is your EA ID or Console ID (PSN ID/Gamertag) - wholly unrelated, due to playing a steam version.
What platform are you playing on - PC, steam.
What is happening? (and what do you expect to happen instead?) - the game crashes few moments after launching; first there is a few moments of a black screen - and then it crashes. sometimes the purple loading sign displays in the bottom right corner, sometimes it doesn't.
Does this happen in a specific area of the game? - after launching.
Please share any steps you've tried so far to resolve the issue: tried clearing out the shaders cache. tried deleting shaders one by one. tried reinstalling. tried verifying file integrity. updated my OS and my drivers. tinkered with various GPU settings in my GPU control panel. tried tinkering with system registry irt app being higher priority for system resources.

attached is my dxdiag. also, people on steam forums are reporting the same issue as well.