Ark Survival Ascended “Keeps crashing/not launching” error: Possible fixes, reasons, and more

Ark Survival Ascended’s early access is now live for PC, but not all players are able to enjoy the game due to some performance issues with crashing, game launches, and black screens.

While it’s understandable that there are issues in the game due to the fact that it’s still in early access, many players wanted to make the most of the period before the official release.

Unfortunately, for the crashing issues, there are permanent fixes that players will be able to try out. The more permanent fix will be a patch or a hotfix that fixes launch errors on Steam.

However, there are a few temporary workarounds that you will be able to try to make the game a bit playable and reduce crashing to some extent.

Today’s Ark Survival Ascended guide will therefore go over some of the steps that you can take in order to deal with the crashing and launch errors that it is facing.

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How to fix “Keeps crashing/not launching” error in Ark Survival Ascended

As mentioned, there are no permanent fixes that you will be able to try out when it comes to dealing with the crashing issues in Ark Survival Ascended, but there are a few temporary workarounds that you can tap into:

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1) Update graphics drivers

The game might be crashing on your system because you might not have updated your graphics drivers to the latest version. To be able to correct this, you might want to download the desktop application for the card that you are using.

Both Nvidia and AMD have their respective software, which will allow you to automatically detect and download the latest driver versions for your GPU.

Alternatively, you can wish to do it manually by going to their respective websites and then downloading the version from there:

• Nvidia users can click here.
• AMD users can follow this link.

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2) Verify file integrity

Ark Survival Ascended might be crashing because of some corrupt or broken files in the installation directory.

To be able to fix it, you will need to make your way to the Steam Client library, select the game, and then click on “Verify File Integrity”.

This will start a process that will automatically go over the files in the installation directory and fix the ones that may have been damaged or corrupted.

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3) Check system requirements

You might not be running the required or minimum system requirements for Ark Survival Ascended. Here is what you need to run the game:

Minimum system requirements:

• OS: Windows 10/11 with updates
• Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 2600X, Intel Core i7-6800K
• Memory: 16 GB RAM
• Graphics: AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT, NVIDIA GeForce 1080
• DirectX: Version 12
• Network: Broadband Internet connection
• Storage: 70 GB available space
• Additional Notes: SSD Required

Recommended system requirements:

• OS: Windows 10/11 with updates
• Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 3600X, Intel i5-10600K
• Memory: 32 GB RAM
• Graphics: AMD Radeon RX 6800, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080
• DirectX: Version 12
• Network: Broadband Internet connection
• Storage: 70 GB available space
• Additional Notes: SSD Required

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4) Lower your graphics settings

Higher textures and resolution settings might be crashing the game on your system. So if you are frequently seeing lag and black screens, then you might want to tone down the settings in order to improve performance.

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5) Re-install the game

While it may seem like a rather drastic step to take, many in the community have stated that re-installing the title seemed to have fixed a fair bit of performance issues with the game. So if the above fixes don’t work, uninstall and re-install Ark Survival Ascended from the Steam client.

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6) Wait for a patch

The best and most permanent fix to the crashing issue will be to wait for a patch that deals with it. With the number of performance issues that the game is having, the developers are likely to ship an update that deals with the frequent crashes and launch errors.