crash before the game starts

Please try running the game with EAC turned off by selecting 'show game launcher ' after pressing the play button on Steam and unchecking 'Use EasyAntyCheat (EAC)'.

Hi chikorina, thanks for your comment. Unfortunately only I get the errormessage "invalid filename" when I try to start the game. The same happens when I start the game with the game launcher, even if I disabled EAC. Also the setting will not be saved.

Thank you.  

I would like a bit more information in order to pinpoint your issue.

1- Were you able to start and play the game before updating to A20.5 b2?

2- Can you run the game through the 7DaysToDie exe in your game folder? (your game folder is at C:/Program Files (x86)/Steam/ steamapps/common/7 Days To Die by default.)

3- Please upload the contents of your launcher log on pastebin,  located at %APPDATA%/7DaysToDie/logs 

 

 

Thank you for your support.

1- No. With A20.4 the game didn't start either. The last known successful start was with A20.3 b3

2- Yes. Through the 7DaysToDie exe in the game folder i can run the game.

3- There is no 7DaysToDie folder in the AppDate folder. In the AppDate folder is the Roaming folder, inside the Roaming folder is an 7DaysToDie folder. In that folder, there are the GeneratedWorlds folder, the Saves folder and the SavesLocal folder but no Logs folder.

 

I walked this path:

1. Right click your start menu button (bottom left) and click Run to open a Run window
2. Inside %APPDATA%/7DaysToDie/logs
3. Click OK, and you will be taken to your 7 Days to Die saves folder!

I see,  so you seem to have your logs file in the wrong place for some reason.

After updating to A20.5 b2,  try verifying your files 2 times and looking in your Roaming folder. 

It should look like this.

 

Hi chikorina, now I verifyed the files 2 times again but there still only the 3 folders inside. Should I reinstall the entire game?

 

 

Please try this after you are updated to the latest stable version of the game,  to make sure you have a clean slate.

Be careful,  because doing this will delete all your save data as well.

Backup any games you wish to save from Appdata and put them somewhere else, like on your desktop. 

 

After backing up any important save games : 

1. Navigate to your main game installation folder
2. Open the launcher executable
3. Click Tools, Clean game data, make sure ALL of the boxes are checked as in this picture:

 

Here is a video if you prefer a visual walkthrough (it does cover a bit more).

 

After that, verify the file integrity TWICE through Steam to ensure it catches any invalid files (sometimes it doesn't do it right on the first try). Three times to be sure.

Hello,

 

i just want to add, that a player on our dedicated server has the exact same problem.

Trying to start the game via Steam results in the above mentioned popup stating "invalid filename".

She can only run the game through the 7DaysToDie exe in the game folder.

It started with the version before A20.5 B2 Stable, which only fixed the EAC error that was mentioned in the patchnotes.
 

1. She is also running Windows 11
2. She was always on the stable branch
3. She cleaned game data with the launcher
4. She verified the file integrity twice through Steam
    

Here are some players, which seem to have the same issue:

 

• wont launch on steam
• Invalid file name
• invalid filename
   

Hello chikorina, hello Thunderbolt-GER,

 

first I tried to clean the game data by using the tool but after pressing the 'clean' button nothing happend. Nothing was cleaned, all save games and settings were preserved, no error message or anything else.

 

Next, I uninstalled and reinstalled the entire game, but even after reinstalling, the game didn't start.

 

Finally I was start steam and the game under a different Windows user account and ... it runs.

 

The name of the Windows user were the game do not start is 'Öffentlich'.

The name of the user were the game runs is 'Privat'.

 

Since the username is also included in the path, I assume that the game has recently had a problem with letters like 'ä' 'ö' 'ü' and maybe others.

But I'm not absolutely sure because I just tried it with one another Windows user, however this helped me.

 

@Thunderbolt-GER maybe this will help your teammate too?

 

@chikorina Thank you again for your help and support so far.

 

Oh no,  that should have been fixed in A20.5... 

I will reopen the ticket for not being able to start game because of non-latin characters in the username.

Thank you for reporting that.

I just tested it with the name Öffentlich and was able to launch the game without issue in Win10.  I'll ask a tester on Win11 to test this and see if we could get a repro.

8 hours ago, Equilibrium said:

Since the username is also included in the path, I assume that the game has recently had a problem with letters like 'ä' 'ö' 'ü' and maybe others.

 

@Thunderbolt-GER maybe this will help your teammate too?

 

Hi,

 

that is an interesting find. I will ask her, what her Windows 11 username is.

Thanks for sharing your discovery

I will report back, if she also has "special characters" in her username or not.

 

There was an issue in A20.4 that prevented players with non latin characters in their windows username from launching the game that has been fixed in A20.5.  Maybe that created a new bug with the characters you mentioned.

I will look into it and make a new ticket for this issue.

Thank you for reporting your find.

Hi,

 

i just want to report back, that the player on my server indeed has a "ü" character in her Windows username, as she told me today.

She is trying to figure out, how to rename her account and if she succeeds and the error is gone, i report back, although it already seems pretty clear what the problem was

 

12 hours ago, Thunderbolt-GER said:

Hi,

 

i just want to report back, that the player on my server indeed has a "ü" character in her Windows username, as she told me today.

She is trying to figure out, how to rename her account and if she succeeds and the error is gone, i report back, although it already seems pretty clear what the problem was

 

Thank you for reporting back.

I will write a ticket for this.  Renaming windows username is probably not a good idea. 

Is it possible to ask your friend for a launcher log (%APPDATA%\7DaysToDie\logs\launcher.log)?   I'd like to include it in my ticket.

7 hours ago, chikorina said:

I will write a ticket for this.  Renaming windows username is probably not a good idea. 

Is it possible to ask your friend for a launcher log (%APPDATA%\7DaysToDie\logs\launcher.log)?   I'd like to include it in my ticket.

Well, i don't know if changing the windows username will also change the profile name in the path, as i never renamed my account, so it might not even work. And if this issue gets fixed in the future, she surely can live with the workaround, to start the exe directly from the 7 Days Folder

I assume, she would have to start 7 Days from Steam, to make the error appear and then supply the launcher.log!?
I will ask her for that

 

15 hours ago, Thunderbolt-GER said:

I assume, she would have to start 7 Days from Steam, to make the error appear and then supply the launcher.log!?
I will ask her for that

 

Thank you. 

I have already opened a ticket for this issue,  but if I could get her logs to attach to it,  it would help.

- The launcher.log from attempting to launch the game through Steam.

- The ouptput_log from starting the exe from the folder. 

 

hint: starting the exe from the folder will not create an output log for you - unless you add the -logfile parameter yourself 😉

 

You could do that on the command line or with a seperate link. Here's an example:

 

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\7 Days To Die\7DaysToDie.exe" -force-d3d11 -logfile %AppData%\7DaysToDie\logs\output_log_client.txt

 

@chikorina

Well, the mystery continues.
 

After a long and painful process to guide the player to the launcher.log, we even had to resort to voicechat and screensharing, as she could not find it and i thought she was doing something wrong.

 

1. We found out, that the player indeed does NOT have a "logs" folder in %APPDATA%\7DaysToDie\
2. When she tries to open the savegame folder via the 7dLauncher.exe, nothing happens when she clicks the button. All the other buttons do work tho.
3. I also have to make a correction for one of my previous comments. The character ü i was refering to being in her Windows username, is only in her display name, not in her username (profile). The username (the one which is part of the path) is: Vicky´s PC
   And i am wondering if the character ´ or the space in her username causes some issues?
4. The output_log, we can't supply either, since the log folder is completely missing.

 

Unfortunately that's about all infos i can add for the moment.

 

52 minutes ago, Thunderbolt-GER said:

@chikorina

Well, the mystery continues.
 

After a long and painful process to guide the player to the launcher.log, we even had to resort to voicechat and screensharing, as she could not find it and i thought she was doing something wrong.

 

1. We found out, that the player indeed does NOT have a "logs" folder in %APPDATA%\7DaysToDie\
2. When she tries to open the savegame folder via the 7dLauncher.exe, nothing happens when she clicks the button. All the other buttons do work tho.
3. I also have to make a correction for one of my previous comments. The character ü i was refering to being in her Windows username, is only in her display name, not in her username (profile). The username (the one which is part of the path) is: Vicky´s PC
   And i am wondering if the character ´ or the space in her username causes some issues?
4. The output_log, we can't supply either, since the log folder is completely missing.

 

Unfortunately that's about all infos i can add for the moment.

 

 

Thank you for all your work on this.

I have found that using the file name 'Vicky's PC' failed in launching the game for me as well.

 

Temporary workaround : 

1 - Create a folder in C drive named 7DaysLogs

2 - Add this additional parameter in the 7 Days to Die launcher "-logfile C:\7DaysLogs\logfile.txt" (Without the quotes)

3 - Press  Run & Save as default.

So, it's the spaces 😀

 

I've tested it with \Vicky's PC\ and it's working - if you use quotes around the Path:

-logfile "d:\Vicky's PC\7DaysToDie\logs\output_log_client.txt"

 

and the original path is working too (the missing folder will be created automatically by the game):

-logfile "%AppData%\7DaysToDie\logs\output_log_client.txt"

 

1 hour ago, chikorina said:

 

Thank you for all your work on this.

I have found that using the file name 'Vicky's PC' failed in launching the game for me as well.

 

 

I need to point out, that i think you tested with a wrong character in the username. The character between the y and the s

 

The character is not

'

 

The character is

´

 

So since you tested with the wrong character, i would assume that the space is the problem, since a space is usually used to divide arguments.
And if this assumption is correct, q123's solution to enclose the path with quotes, would be the best one to get the log created in the correct folder.

Thanks to you two for the feedback. I'll see if i can get her to do the neccessary steps to create a logfile.

 

Hello,

 

ok, she put -logfile "%AppData%\7DaysToDie\logs\output_log_client.txt" into the launchers Additional parameters field and clicked Run & Save as default and the same error (invalid filename) appeared.

 

She also created the logs folder in %AppData%\7DaysToDie\ before that, but that didn't help

 

So, no progress here...

True, my game is also not starting if I add the -logfile parameter in the launcher. I just get completly no error message at all. lol.

 

I tested before only at command line and with a self created link. Both methods should work for her too.

On 6/5/2022 at 11:35 PM, Thunderbolt-GER said:

Hello,

 

ok, she put -logfile "%AppData%\7DaysToDie\logs\output_log_client.txt" into the launchers Additional parameters field and clicked Run & Save as default and the same error (invalid filename) appeared.

 

She also created the logs folder in %AppData%\7DaysToDie\ before that, but that didn't help

 

So, no progress here...

I got an answer from our programmer.  He said that he thinks that the "Invalid filename" could be about the installation location.

 

He would like a screenshot of the explorer window showing the 7Days folder.  E.g. from Steam library  right click 7 Days To Die → Manage → Browse local files, then make a screenshot of that window.