Forum Discussion

shunyaxgl's avatar
6 years ago
Solved

[PC] - Mass Effect 3 Crash Right After Launch

I'm having a problem with my ME3 installation through Origin. After clicking on Play, the Origin client vanishes for a second, then immediately appears again without the game itself ever starting. In the task manager I can see that the MassEffect3.exe process is running for about a second before it's killed again right away.

I get no error messages, no black or white screen or any indication that the game crashed, other than the fact that it's simply not starting.

The game is in its vanilla state (no mods, no DLCs, just the base game installed through Origin).

I have both Origin and ME3 installed on my P: drive.

I tried to start it in window mode - didn't work.

I tried disabling cloud saves and moved the Mass Effect 3 folder away from `Documents/BioWare` - didn't work.

I replaced the awc.dll file in the game's `Binaries/Win32/Core` folder with https://download.dm.origin.com/usertest/awc.zip (awc DLL from another thread with the same ME3 problem) - didn't work.

I tried a simple reinstall and the repair option from within Origin - didn't work.

I executed both vcredist installer files in the game's `__Installer/vc/vc2008sp1/redist` folder - didn't work.

And didn't work means: nothing changed about the error. The process is still killed after about a second and nothing happens visually.

I'm running out of options here and I'm hoping anyone can help me with this. I have attached the Origin Client logs and DXDiag Information. I can see that Origin is trying to launch the game but I cannot see the error when it's crashing. The latest start of ME3 in the log file is on line 20153 (at least I think that's the start).

Maybe important information: Mass Effect 3 is the only game I had Origin transfer from my old origin account to my new one just a few days ago. Could it be that the ME3 license maybe still refers to my old Origin ID and that check simply fails now with my new Origin ID? Not sure if that could be the cause here...I have ME1 and ME2 installed and they run perfectly fine (those two were originally on my new account to start with).

I'd appreciate any help or pointers on where to look for an error.

  • shunyaxgl's avatar
    shunyaxgl
    6 years ago

    I finally got around to calling EA Support about two weeks ago (kudos to those support staff people still working in these times, hopefully from home or another safe environment).

    The solution makes me think I wasn't so far off with my initial theory of some kind of game/purchase ID being carried over from my old account which then resulted in that ID being checked against my new Origin account ID and that check failing.

    As a last resort I asked the support to completely remove the game from my library, including all DLCs, and then re-add it as a new purchase. And that worked, I could start the game normally.

    One last note: apparently ME3 is not being supported anymore (or support being very limited), so if anything goes wrong beyond just simple ini file settings, chances are they aren't allowed to help you anymore. It's sad for me to see that a company, which has the game available for purchase in their store, not supporting a game anymore despite the fact that you can't launch it without their service as a middle-man. In other words, if you have a problem with a game of Origin that's old enough, you're pretty much screwed.

18 Replies

About Mass Effect Franchise Discussion

The fate of the galaxy lies in your hands. Join the Mass Effect community forums and tell us how you'll fight for it.19,173 PostsLatest Activity: 3 days ago