Game crashes to desktop on "Loading..." screen (The Cave)

Windows

We've become aware of a crash that can occur on some systems, where after the opening screen, while the 'Loading...' prompt appears the game will crash to desktop. For some users, this crash is intermittent, only happening some of the time. For others it happens more consistently. Unfortunately, this makes the crash very difficult to diagnose properly, and on top of that, we've found that workarounds that work well for some players with this issue don't necessarily work for others. However, we have managed to compile a number of potential workarounds that may possibly help you:

• Try playing the game in Windows 7 compatibility mode. We've confirmed this fixes the issue for some users and have been able to reproduce this workaround on one of our own machines:
  • Find where the game is installed and right click on Cave.exe and go to Properties.
  • Under the Compatibility tab, check the option to run game in compatibility mode and select Windows 7 from the drop-down
  • Apply those settings (after doing this once, Windows will remember these settings)
• Some players on multiple-monitor setups had some success by switching to just a single monitor by unplugging the others while playing.
• If you are connected to your monitor by a HDMI 2.1 cable, at least one play to swap this out for a 2.0 cable while playing
• If you happen to have access to a spare monitor, some users have reported that switching to a different monitor helps.

As you can see, the issue seems to be something to do with a compatibility issue with certain displays, but exactly how this manifests and what solves it can vary between setups, so it's hard to give a definitive fix, so you may have to experiment a little with your setup to find out what works for you. We truly apologize for the inconvenience! If you happen to find something that works for you, we'd be grateful if you let us know via our support email below, so that we can improve this article.