Server select screen blank, crashing when trying to enter game

[Autumnbow]

Sorry for having a bunch of threads here right now, I've just been running into more and more strange issues and I want the title to have something to do with my current problems :P

Okay, I was crashing:

I'm crashing, or something, when I zone or enter the game. The loading screen comes up, the bar loads and goes away, but the screen stays on that loading picture. I can't close eqgame.exe, even with task manager. When I try, it tells me "The operation could not be completed. Access is denied." And if I open up a new instance of EQ, it seems to think that I still have a character logged in and it tells me to wait a while. Each time it happens I have to restart my computer if I want to play the game :/

So I looked at the "crashing while zoning" thread, and tried some of those things. After playing for a short while with WinEQ2, it crashed again, and then I started crashing like above whenever I would select a character to play. Then I tried disabled my firewall, and after that the server select screen was blank, and each and every time I clicked play in the EQEmu launcher, it would patch the spells and delete the .eqg files. So I tried to reinstall the game, and ran the Duxa recommended thing (not playing with WinEQ2 at all, thinking it messed up the files somehow), and was able to get past server select into my characters. Then I selected a character, and the game just closed entirely, like right away. So I go back in, it downloads things and deletes things, and now server select is blank once more.

If I wait for a while at the blank server select screen, it says "Error - A timeout occurred".

I've taken a step back somehow, and I'm at a loss :/

[Autumnbow]

Okay, now for whatever reason if I try closing things when I'm at server select and re-logging in a few times, the server list shows and I can get to character select. I'm still unable to get a character in game though, as it loads and then stays on the Kunark image.

[Autumnbow]

Tried a fresh install of windows, to no avail. It's really looking as though I won't get to play :/

The really strange thing is I was able to play for a few days.

[Autumnbow]

So, for what seems to be absolutely no reason, I was able to log in fine on my first attempt today. Zoned three times so far, and everything is great... will update when I crash and can't get back in :P

[Autumnbow]

As far as I can tell, it depends on the number of people in a zone. Last night during peak hours I was unable to even get a character online, as both of mine were camped in gfay. Today, during the morning hours, I ran the mail quest enough times to get from level 3 to level 5 without crashing once.

[Swish]

If you can't close EQ via the Task Manager you need to set it to run as administrator... it's a weird thing because who out of all of us really has an administrator? lol. I guess its protecting the AOL crowd from themselves in case they try to shut down key Windows programs :D

Have you tried turning your graphics (and everything) down to "Low" in the options?

[Autumnbow]

If you can't close EQ via the Task Manager you need to set it to run as administrator... it's a weird thing because who out of all of us really has an administrator? lol. I guess its protecting the AOL crowd from themselves in case they try to shut down key Windows programs :D

Have you tried turning your graphics (and everything) down to "Low" in the options?

I have it set to run as administrator. Since reinstalling Windows, I've been able to kill it with the task manager. Haven't tried setting everything to low, guess I will do that now, if I can get back into game (just crashed zoning to gfay).

EDIT: Nope, cannot get back in. Interesting, I was able to play like all day without a single issue and when it does get to be around primetime, I can't log a character in.

[Autumnbow]

I made a halfling druid, and I can play that character.

[Autumnbow]

Actually, I think the issue might just be Gfay. I played tonight, zoning a lot, and ran from misty thicket all the way to Gfay, just to see if that character would crash too. My halfling didn't crash at all until I got to the Gfay zone, and now I have three characters trapped there that I can't log in, lol.

I don't know what it is about that zone. It can't be the number of people there, because I zoned into EC a few times without issue. Just so strange that I was able to zone in and out of gfay so many times until it got to be primetime.

Could my gfay files be corrupted somehow?