Black screen after launching the game

[TeskoLove]

This is happening to me as well. Closing Steam after logging in works, but renaming the dll did not.

[GamingStitcher]

New patch same issue with a little FLAIR

None of the provided solutions work. Closing Steam after logging in doesn't work. Deleting or renaming the dll will ensure that steam doesn't even load the launch page. It just closes itself. Thanks Square!

EDIT: Wasn't following the directions of the first post correctly. Force closing Steam did the trick.

[Drannaos]

Experiencing this same issue, started last night. After roulettes I was walking around Limsa, and everything except chat locked up. When attempting to quit, I received "An unexpected error has occurred. Exiting FINAL FANTASY XIV.16a." Since then, I am unable to launch the game. Windows 11 (22631.3296), AMD 24.3.1, Steam version 1709846872. This only started after patch 6.58 for me, but I have all of the same symptoms as described from some posts in 2022.

[LostHope_Saki]

Yeah, simply renaming the .dll doesn't work anymore for me as well.

An alternative to closing Steam that is working for me is to keep the .dll-filename like it was installed, open the launcher, enter the credentials and verify your login data BUT DON'T CLICK TO START THE GAME YET, open your installation folder, rename the .dll to something else, click the play button, wait for the game to start und rename the .dll again (so that the launcher is working the next time). Quite a hassle to just play the game...

[Galadrhiel]

Steam User here!

"Unable to complete the version Check"
Before patch , played normaly

[Drannaos]

Not sure exactly what did the trick, but here's what I generally did - I'm up and running again.

1. Made sure Windows and my GPU drivers were up-to-date.
2. Ran "DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth" and "sfc /scannow" because why not.
3. Restarted my workstation.
4. Uninstalled the game from Steam.
5. Completely deleted the folder C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\FINAL FANTASY XIV Online.
6. Disabled all overlays (Discord, Steam, Windows Game Bar).
7. Completely deleted the folder C:\Users\<USERNAME>\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn.
8. Reinstalled the game from Steam.
9. Allowed the game and patches to download over night.

Hope this helps someone else get back into Eorzea.

[ZeroRaziel]

Not sure exactly what did the trick, but here's what I generally did - I'm up and running again.

1. Made sure Windows and my GPU drivers were up-to-date.
2. Ran "DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth" and "sfc /scannow" because why not.
3. Restarted my workstation.
4. Uninstalled the game from Steam.
5. Completely deleted the folder C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\FINAL FANTASY XIV Online.
6. Disabled all overlays (Discord, Steam, Windows Game Bar).
7. Completely deleted the folder C:\Users\<USERNAME>\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn.
8. Reinstalled the game from Steam.
9. Allowed the game and patches to download over night.

Hope this helps someone else get back into Eorzea.

Thanks for sharing, but I believe this has already been done before as mentioned by other players in this thread (plus someone even made a complete windows reinstall) yet the issue usually comes back a few weeks later.

As also been mentioned by someone who got a response from tech support this is an old bug/issue with FFXIV client that SE still was not able to fix. Seems that only steam users are affected.

!!! Could anyone moderating this Technical Support forum branch please pass along a message to Tech Support that last update broke only semi-reliable fix for this issue by making "steam_api64.dll" (FFXIV "boot" folder) mandatory during launcher start-up !!!

[Jorin]

Got the exact same problem after todays patch completely out of nowhere, whats strange is that when i logged in right after updating the game it worked fine, came back later again tried logging in and got the blackscreen. Im not even sure what fix still works.

[Studdly_Nerd]

Same issue as everyone else. Renamed the DLL file and it was working until this latest patch not i have to jump through hoops just to play the game. Would be nice to transfer accounts to a non steam one or just have this issue resolved as it has been ongoing for years now

[bobharris]

Same issue.
Have been doing the steam_api64-bak.dll for a month now.
A fix would be great.