fallout 4 crashes to desktop when I try to launch the game.

[dharvinia]

when I try to launch, it gets as far as the fallout logo then crashes in other words about 1.2 seconds after I see the logo.

I have been on other forums and tried their suggestions, to no avail.

Usually when I ask for help here all I get are crickets. 

But, hope springs eternal, I am open to any and all suggestions

 

Edited May 8 by dharvinia
misspelled words

[RedHeadAngel]

If you've recently installed new mods, remove them and see if that helps. It'll usually mean that either a mod was corrupted upon installation, or one isn't playing nice with another.

Edited May 8 by RedHeadAngel

[travelmedic]

Or you're missing a master

[deathmorph]

3 hours ago, dharvinia said:

when I try to launch, it gets as far as the fallout logo then crashes in other words about 1.2 seconds after I see the logo

 

Right at the beginning, or when loading a save game?

[SirDuke]

These NVIDIA graphic feature about "bullet impact" or decals or whatever (straight in the graphic settings!) is also known to cause errors

[subaverage]

What you describe is very unspecific. So you might perhaps give some more information to:

 

Game version? If it's not AE is it downgraded or bought from GOG?

Do you use mods? If yes, modlist?

Did you make recent changes? If yes, revert.

How do you start the game? Through it's own exe or F4SE? If the latter F4SE creates logfiles under ..........\Documents\My Games\Fallout4\F4SE.

Is your problem only related to FO 4 and other games are running well?

 

If your game is not downgraded you can try to verify game file integrity and in case nothing helps you could consider a clean new install.

Edited May 8 by subaverage

[travelmedic]

7 hours ago, SirDuke said:

These NVIDIA graphic feature about "bullet impact" or decals or whatever (straight in the graphic settings!) is also known to cause errors

 

That bug is real and I've had it too, but it happens and causes crashes in-game, not during startup.

 

OP, in addition to the questions that @subaverage asked, and the valid suggestions posted by other users:

 

1 - what method or mod manager are you using to install mods?  

2 - if you're trying to start a new game and installed a big list of mods all at once without testing, you might need to do the 50/50 method

[PUSSMOUZ]

Had this problem after adding a bunch of mods. Couldn't find an answer to it so just started turning off mods. Had around 600, so it wasn't smart to go 1 by 1, also wanted to see what works and what not. Turned off all of them and then started turning on by groups. 50/40/30/20 whatever. Found a problematic group - stays turned off, while I check others. Had around 450 working fine and then divided the problematic groups into smaller ones and kept going untill I had a few mods that were not allowing me to play the game.

 

Also, found out that some main menu replacers either crash the game or make it so that u don't have the main menu buttons at all so u can't even start a game.

 

P.S. Method is time-consuming and plain stupid, but so am I and I cound't be bothered thinking at the time so I just bruteforced it. Recommend only as a last resort

[deathmorph]

Normally I'd guess it's +254 ESP or exceeding the BA2 limit, but with probably 10 years of gaming experience, I think he/she knows this. Let's see what information is available about the installation and the error itself.

[dharvinia]

I want to thank everyone who has answered this post.

On 5/7/2026 at 11:00 PM, RedHeadAngel said:

If you've recently installed new mods, remove them and see if that helps. It'll usually mean that either a mod was corrupted upon installation, or one isn't playing nice with another.

I did try this, it was my first assumption. Thank you for your suggestion.

[dharvinia]

On 5/8/2026 at 1:05 AM, travelmedic said:

Or you're missing a master

Something I did not consider, thank you for your suggestion

[dharvinia]

On 5/8/2026 at 1:58 AM, deathmorph said:

 

Right at the beginning, or when loading a save game?

Right at the beginning within Milliseconds after the logo appears

[dharvinia]

On 5/8/2026 at 3:35 AM, SirDuke said:

These NVIDIA graphic feature about "bullet impact" or decals or whatever (straight in the graphic settings!) is also known to cause errors

Yes, something to look into, thank you for your suggestion

[dharvinia]

@subaverage , @travelmedic  , @PUSSMOUZ , @deathmorph

The game we are referring to is Fallout 4, one version loaded from Bethesda, and one loaded from GOG, also effected Fallout London.

At first I suspected a virus because it started with the Game from Bethesda right after I downloaded F4SE at first just random crashes then failed to load 

So I started running the GOG version. worked very well then suddenly the same problem crashes on launch.

after that I was able to run Fallout London then it crashed too the same way

 

First thing I did was run the integrity file check everything came out clean.

Then I did a deep virus scan, again nothing detected.

So as per the suggestion from Bethesda, erased the game from my computer.

 

However, real life got in the way, and this is the first time I've had to check on LL.

 

My next step was going to be download the game again, but I plan to go into my disk and delete all remnants of the game first just in case.

Funny thing is I never thought to check for a missing master. 

I plan to load the game with no mods and start from scratch.

 Usually when I have a problem in game I am in far enough to load a different save