Hi, basically what the title says, every time I hit the play button, the Steam client will look like it's launching the game, and very quickly goes back to the "play" option, like I never hit the play button. No window opens during this process, suggesting the game tried to start, and there is no crash report whatsoever afterwards. FYI: Never modded XCOM Enemy Unknown, but did mod XCOM 2.
The only thing that I've noticed is that every time I try to verify the integrity of game files in "properties" -> "installed files", it always says "1 file failed to validate and will be reacquired". No matter how many times I try to repair it, it will always show me this message, and the game will not launch as usual.
(Don't know if that matters, but here are my rig specs: I have an approximately 1yo custom build running Windows 11, with an XFX Radeon RX7900 GRE gpu, AMD Ryzen 5 7600x cpu, 32go of ddr5-6000 CL36 ram and a 2tb nvme ssd, all drivers are updated regularly, and I try to do a clean install every 6 months. lets just say I don't think the build is the issue here.)
Here is all the stuff I tried doing to fix the issue, which did not work :
- deleted and redownloaded the game
- tried deleting the folder in SteamLibrary/steamapps/common
- updated all my AMD drivers
- deleted my modded XCOM 2 files
- browsed local files
- installed the "AMD dual core optimizer setup" app
- same for "DXSetup"
- repaired Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 x86 through "vcredist_86"
- tried installing it on a different drive
- tried flushing the Steam cache and running it as admin after restarting the PC
- tried downloading vanilla XCOM 2 (someone said in this post https://www.reddit.com/r/Xcom/comments/1gjnqre/enemy_unknown_not_launching/ that it could help repair the game's library, did not work for me)
- tried opening a 2K ticket a couple of times, no response yet
edit:
- disabling antivirus, VPNs, firewalls, Discord overlays, also did not work
Nothing has worked yet. I tried downloading it on my brother's Steam Deck, and the game worked perfectly, so I'm completely lost on this issue now. It seems like I have one eternally corrupted file specifically on my rig. Any help will be greatly appreciated! (sry for English errors, I'm very unfortunately fr*nch)
So I had this problem it's a serverside steam issue my only advice that works is refund it and buy on GOG honestly it doesn't have the drm
Unfortunately can't do that. I bought Xcom years ago and have way too many hours on it to refund sadge
There is a rare issue that my friend and I both had back in the day with the Steam version of the EU/EW: launching the game caused it to display "Validating files" and then closed after a couple seconds. After browsing the net I found a post that described the same issue and the solution there was just... waiting. Apparently, you have to give your game time to "become familiar with your PC" or whatever. My explanation only can be that there is something that Steam integration causes the executable (or other game files) to be confused about the launching environment and I still don't know what causes it to resolve in the end. And indeed, the issue has evaporated and never came back after TWO WEEKS of simply waiting.
Sometimes, I think that this game is really special because of unknown things happening within the game and even its structure. Truly "That's XCOM, baby" experience.
only thing i know of is verifying files
also for XCOM2 recently it seemed like unsubscribing and resubscribing to mods fixed an issue i was having
I have this problem with Long War 1 whenever Windows 11 updates the non-security stuff on my machine. It takes a rollback of all non-security items on Win 11 and then a clean deletion and re-install of XCOM, Long War 1, and all the 35+ other mods I use in order for me to get my game back up and running.
I hate auto-updates from Windows. And I have to run Steam in offline mode so that it doesn't do a file verification and bork up my LW + mods setup.
I got stuck in an endless loop of trying to get EU working earlier this year. After a week of no luck I ended up having to sail the seven seas for an executable that didn't need steam or the firaxis launcher. Annoying as hell to do just to replay the game.
Guess I'm gonna do that as well... kinda sad that it's the only fix
I had this issue as well last year, tried reinstalling and verifying game files, nothing worked. I tried to launch the game last week and it worked. Maybe the GoG version doesn't have this issue?
How about renaming %USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\XCOM - Enemy Unknown\
and %USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\XCOM - Enemy Within\
find for older post. this was a huge thing around release date.
Huh. Strangely enough, this sounds like the old issue XCOM 2 had with the 2K Launcher (especially after it was removed). With that, you would go to the game's Steam Properties page, General, and under "Selected Launch Option" it would give you a dropdown with stuff like "Play XCOM 2, Open New Mod Launcher, Open Original Mod Launcher, Etc." Enemy Within doesn't have that though, as far as I remember.
This might sound stupid, but have you tried manually starting the launcher from the files? If it is Steam, sometimes loading the game manually will connect the dots it needs to launch things next time. If it is not steam...well, trying to launch it manually will tell you.
Go to Steam\steamapps\common\XCom-Enemy-Unknown\Binaries\Win32 and manually double-click the XComGame.exe file. If you have Enemy Within, go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\XCom-Enemy-Unknown\XEW\Binaries\Win32 and hit the XCOMLauncher.exe file.
Let me know if manually launching works, and fingers crossed.
Disable Discord Overlay for the game
Try OpenXcom
Wrong X-Com.