Greetings adventurer,

I'm sorry to hear that your friend has been experiencing crashes during startup. As they play the game via Steam, have they tried verifying the integrity of the game files through the Steam client? To do this, navigate to the Steam "Library" tab on the Steam client. From there, right-click on FINAL FANTASY XIV and select "Properties" > "Local Files" > Verify integrity of game cache". This will help verify that the game is installed properly. I would also recommend performing a clean boot on the PC by disabling everything within the 'Start Up' tab of the Task Manager. This will help rule out if there are any conflicting programs that might be running in the background.

We hope to be of assistance with this! Thank you for posting in the FINAL FANTASY XIV Technical Support Forums!