Hundreds ofHogwarts Legacy"players" are still unable to boot the game due to startup crashes more than six weeks since its release. Their pleas for assistance keep emerging as the newHarry PotterRPG continues to break sales records, with recent reports indicatingHogwarts Legacyeven managed to outsellEldenRingin one of its key markets.
The latest title from Avalanche Software has been met with vastly positive impressions from critics and fandom alike, though it didn’t manage that feat due to its immense technical polish, but despite a lack thereof. Like most ambitious open-world RPGs,Hogwarts Legacylaunched with many bizarre glitchesand other issues ranging from minor to game-breaking. The developers have, so far, put out four major updates for the game, averaging one every 11 days as of mid-March.
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One of the most severe issues that Avalanche is yet to fix pertains to startup crashes that many players have been experiencing sinceHogwarts Legacydebuted in early access on February 7. According to hundreds of reports filed via the official bug tracker, the affected systems will consistently experience crashes immediately after seeing the seizure warning, which is the first screen thatHogwarts Legacydisplays upon launch. The problem has been reproduced nearly 600 times since early February, and appears to persist even after thelatestHogwarts Legacyupdate that addressed numerous other problemson March 8.
While all submitted footage of the crashes were captured on PC, the official bug tracker also lists the issue as affecting the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S version of the game. On February 22, a WB Games representative suggested one potential method of circumventing the problem on PC by manually deleting the contents of the C:\ProgramData\Hogwarts Legacy folder. Doing so is meant to allow players to side-step the seizure warning screen altogether, but based on over a hundred responses to that suggestion claiming the game still crashed at the subsequentHogwarts Legacylogo, it would appear the problem has nothing to do with the notice itself.
Some of the more tech-savvy players suggested disabling all ray tracing options in theHogwarts Legacyconfiguration file, speculating that the root of the problem lies in some mismatched settings pertaining to this resource-intensive rendering technique, though others argued they should not have to modify installation files just so they are able to play a game they paid for. Nevertheless, the advice appears to have a greater success rate than the official suggestion of deleting the seizure warning source files, based on dozens of recent player reports, around half of which claim it works.
Anyone experiencing technical difficulties is encouraged toreportHogwarts Legacybugsvia the official tracker. The platform also allows players to vote on issues submitted by others, which is how these startup crashes finally got enough traction to prompt an official investigation that’s still in progress as of March 16.
Hogwarts Legacyis available now on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S, with PS4 and Xbox One versions launching May 5 and a Switch port releasing July 25.
