The game client encountered an unexpected error and had to close.

I started playing FFXIV in open beta and since then an error message randomly pops up and Final Fantasy closes. The message says "The game client encountered an unexpected error and had to close." Sometimes I can play for a couple of hours without the message popping up, and sometimes it pops up every five minutes. It's starting to get really annoying especially with error 1017. I don't want to wait an hour to play just to get kicked out from the error message and put back into the waiting line. Please help

I have this problem, as do many others.

There appears to be no fix and has been happening to the game (also in 1.0) for years. There have been suggestions it's linked to drivers, updates, corrupted files, and all sorts - however any fix could work or perhaps won't. I've tried them all and it still does it. The best I had was a 4 hour run yesterday. Today though, I had 4 crashes in an hour. Totally random. It's just going to have to wait until someone who knows a lot about PC's has the problem themselves and decides to release a fix to the public.

Either way, I wouldn't bother registering your retail code just yet!

I'll keep searching for a resolution. I wouldn't expect to hear much from SE about this problem just at the moment.

(Shame as I'm lovin' the game).

Next time it stops working do these steps.

Press Windows + R
Type eventvwr expand Windows logs and then select Application

Look for any errors that relate to FFXIV:ARR
If none appear, try System logs and looks for any errors there.

Post the errors here and I'll try give you a solution.

The one I see that keeps popping up says
"Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Faulting module name: nvumdshim.dll, version: 9.18.13.1144, time stamp: 0x51414e1a
Exception code: 0xc0000005"

Same issue I'm having. Sometimes it'll be fine for hours upon hours, but then today I've gotta a "client not responding" crash every 5-10min for the past 2hrs. Its really annoying!

Could you all please post your technical details? I'm having this incredibly annoying issue as well and would like to find the common thread with all of our systems. Here's some of my info:

Windows 8
Dual Monitor
ATI 6970 X2 in CF
Running the game in windowed mode with graphics turned up nearly all the way

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: ffxiv.exe
Application Version: 1.0.0.0
Application Timestamp: 521be282
Fault Module Name: ffxiv.exe
Fault Module Version: 1.0.0.0
Fault Module Timestamp: 521be282
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 000e6416
OS Version: 6.2.9200.2.0.0.256.103
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: 5861
Additional Information 2: 5861822e1919d7c014bbb064c64908b2
Additional Information 3: f3d5
Additional Information 4: f3d5be0cad2787556264647dc02181c3

I was told by a friend who had a similar problem to uninstall my graphics card drivers and re-install them, then to do the same for the game client. I'm doing that now so if it works I will post and let everyone know.

Well I've been playing for a good 3 hours and haven't had a problem, so hopefully that was the fix for it.

I've recently been having this issue, as well... I have been playing the game since BETA P2 and it has never happened, but today it has happened 2 times in the last hour. Real annoying! Especially with the 1017 shit going on. I viewed my logs and this is all I can find related to FFXIV... maybe it will help debug this issue.

Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Faulting module name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Exception code: 0xc0000005

Hi guys,

Totally weird, it could be 1 of 2 things, your drivers for your graphics card (are they up to date?)
Or it could be your install.

What I want you to do is uninstall ARR and reinstall it.

Please let me know if this resolves your issue.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by VegaNovus

Hi guys,

Totally weird, it could be 1 of 2 things, your drivers for your graphics card (are they up to date?)
Or it could be your install.

What I want you to do is uninstall ARR and reinstall it.

---

Drivers are up to date always but reinstalled them anyroad, reinstalled the game too and its actually crashing more now...doh!

OK here's what I'm seeing in my log:

Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Faulting module name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x009443f9
Faulting process id: 0x17f0
Faulting application start time: 0x01cea5ae32d1da37
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Program Files (x86)\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Report Id: ad1dd3b4-11a8-11e3-be86-60a44cea26f4
Faulting package full name:
Faulting package-relative application ID:


I'm running Windows 8 64-bit, dual monitors, running FF XIV in Full Screen Windowed Mode, or whatever it's called (windowless windowed mode, so I can mouse over to the other monitor).

I wasn't having this problem until I installed a new video card yesterday. It was a modest upgrade (GTX 660 to GTX 760) so I didn't re-install graphics drivers. I'll try that and a client re-install.

Here is how I fixed my issue with my Radeon 6950, as it seemed to be a driver issue.

1. Completely uninstall video driver (13.8 Beta)
2. Reboot PC
3. Download 13.6 Driver, NOT 13.8 Beta.
4. Install driver
5. Reboot
6. Play Game

Before this, I tried everything from re installing FFXIV, changing graphics settings, and re installing driver. As soon as I went down one version and didn't use the beta driver, it worked perfectly and I haven't crashed since EA. For those with other brands and models of video cards, I would suggest the same thing. Downgrade the version of your driver or upgrade depending on which your on.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Khalus

Drivers are up to date always but reinstalled them anyroad, reinstalled the game too and its actually crashing more now...doh!

---

Uh-oh.

Did you restart your PC between uninstalling and re-installing the client?

So yesterday I nuked my FF XIV client, uninstalled my video drivers, uninstalled my video card (from device manager, not physically), cleaned the registry, rebooted. Then I reinstalled the video drivers and finally re-installed the FF XIV client.

And after an hour or so of playing today, the client crashed again. :( So the procedure didn't help in my case.

Looks like the same error to my un-trained eyes:

Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Faulting module name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x521be282
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x00ed32d0
Faulting process id: 0xb84
Faulting application start time: 0x01cea65bde975d4c
Faulting application path: D:\Games\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Faulting module path: D:\Games\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Report Id: be10bba9-125a-11e3-be89-60a44cea26f4
Faulting package full name:
Faulting package-relative application ID:

So after having the error since beta I went and
1. uninstalled graphics driver
2. Restarted PC
3. Installed graphics card driver
4. Restarted PC
5. Uninstalled FFXIV
6. Reinstalled FFXIV

I'm on day 3 of no problems now so whatever the problem was, it had something to do with either my graphics card driver or the game client, so by re-installing both I managed to fix the problem. I really hope this helps with everyone else having this problem, I know it was getting super annoying for me before.