I’m having a really strange problem with the Battle.net Launcher when I try to play Overwatch, this morning and in early afternoon everything was fine, the game started correctly, I even played a few games and everything was good. This evening I tried to launch Overwatch, but the game wouldn’t launch, no window and not even appearing in the task manager, while on battle.net in the play button there was written “Playing Now”, I closed the launcher and I couldn’t open any other program on my laptop, I couldn’t even open Task Manager or even shut down my laptop. I tried updating to the latest Windows patch, I tried to use the Additional command line argument to put it in “Windowed” mode, I even tried to uninstall and reinstall Overwatch, but it keeps not opening and saying “Playing now”. What should I try?
Update 1: I tried to look if I had any corrupted files and I found nothing strage, I also tried to use the repair tool in the launcher and it said there was no problem or corrupted files, also tried to turn off Antivirus/MalwareDefence didn’t work and in the end I tried to wait, after some minutes it opened but before it opened it freezed all my system, after Overwatch eventually opened up the system unfreezed and opened also the programs I tried to open meanwhile waiting.
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I have run into the same issue. I’m sorry I don’t have a solution to the problem but its nice to know its a more common issue that will make Blizzard aware of it. I hope I can get it resolved by tomorrow, I have done all the steps that Blizzard suggested on there Overwatch 2 doesn’t launch thread. I have to ask, do you use AMD Adrenaline? Its a drive for the GPU. Its the only this I’ve messed with since this issue occurred, so I’m curious.
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Just had this happen to me and came to see if it was just me. What’s going on?
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Same issue here unfortunately… done the same as you, nothing seems to work. My brother is experiencing the same issue. Hopefully someone can give an explanation/solution.
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Something like an OS update, permissions issue or anti-virus/anti-malware program may be stopping the Overwatch executable from executing or game files may have been corrupted during the downloading/installation/patching process so you have a non-functional game installation.
Disable any realtime anti-virus/anti-malware including Windows Defender.
Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Battle.net and give the Battle.net Launcher.exe and Battle.net.exe administrator permissions.
Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Overwatch and give Overwatch Launcher.exe administrator permissions.
Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Overwatch_retail_ and give Overwatch.exe administrator permissions.
Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Overwatch\data\casc\data there should be a number of data.0xx where xx is two differing numbers, these are the archives that contain the bulk of the game data. Each archive should be exactly 1,048,576KB except for the last numbered archive.
If you see a different archive size for any of the archives except for the last, let’s say data.010 is 1,046,445KB that archive is corrupted.
Sometimes the Blizzard Launcher doesn’t pickup corrupted and/or incomplete archives so you could try deleting the offending archive, in this example data.010 then try verifying the game again in the Blizzard Launcher.
Also check the other folders under C:\Program Files (x86)\Overwatch\data for any file(s) that are 0KB, these may be corrupted files and you can try moving said file(s) to the recycle bin then verify the game again in the Blizzard Launcher.
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Hello, yeah same issue here. Also my system sorta freeze up for few minutes as well. Updating drivers reinstalling game didn’t work. Windows 10, Nvidia graphic card.
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You are sounding like a bot. I know you are trying to help but cmon man get some context here, and stop posting random stuff not related to issues here and sending people on goose chase. Not everyone will be using same antivirus and im sure people prob tried repairing the game files which should fix corrupt date.
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I and many others in the past have had issues with the launcher not verifying game files correctly.
If you want no help or suggestions to try why bother even posting, people like you are one reason developers don’t engage with their communities.
Goodluck resolving your issues.
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The issue is from blizzard side as its happening to multiple people at once, nothing to do with user error and the issue is temp fixed by giving it time to load. Thank you very much for you issue solving skills.
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nop I don’t use AMD Adrenaline, first time earing about it as well, dw if you don’t have a solution, it’s “comforting” knowing I’m not the only one having this issue lol
n1cholas every time I see u reply. u reply the same comment over and over again,
disable this, disable that if u have amd/intel CPU
disable av, disable blah blah blah
Please stop this, your comment doesn’t even fix anything. stop your nonsense. for goodness sake
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Same problem here… i have been lucky couple of times lauching task manager first then killing battle.net during overwatch launch…
I just want to add that there is no point reinstalling the game, as i already did and didn’t make any difference.
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Yeah, it was one of the first things I tried, it was worth giving it a chance lol
Another thread on this. I think it’s safe to say that this is a fairly common problem. Happened to me yesterday too, I was running Bit Defender and as per the last post, uninstalling it allowed me to load the game up properly.
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Well seems i got a common issue here as im running bitdefender too.
Yes, I have the same issue.
For me, I can let it sit there for literally 3-5 minutes and it will eventually launch.
If you open task manager (before trying to launch OW) you can see Overwatch launch ‘under’ the Battle.net process, but it doesnt claim sufficient resources for a long while.
During this long while, “cmd” commands cannot run, you cannot Shut Down from the Start menu, you cannot launch mmc (eventvwr), new tabs (at least in chrome) are not able to send/return data, task manager cannot start, and pressing Ctrl Alt Del does nothing.
That is, until the 3-5 minute period has run it’s course and the game launches.
Warcraft III experiences similar symptoms, but that game is at least able to launch a window while I wait.
I have tried Diablo III on a different account that that opens fine.
The game worked fine on the morning of March 14, but the issue started the morning of March 15.
I have tried the following, all without correcting the issue with Overwatch, with reboots throughout:
-Updated video drivers to latest (nVidia 3060 ti driver dated March 14)
-Scan and Repair Overwatch
-Uninstalled and reinstalled Overwatch
-Reinstall Battle.net app
-Added Antivirus exception for the \Overwatch\ folder (AV: Bitdefender)
-Completely disabled the Antivirus
There is no Documents\Overwatch\Logs\ file written for this event, nor are there any Application, Security, or System events citing any issue.
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I have Bitdefender. I had the same issues, but I was able to launch the game after turning off “Exploit Detection” in the “Advanced Threat Defense” settings.
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Well I am Glad to see isn’t my pc the issue. I had this issue time ago as well and it went away by it self but sadly yesterday came back. Same on warzone, I have noticed that overwatch.exe goes in deadlock over a thread, not sure if this might help. If you check the wait chain while the game hangs you will see. I am no expert so I wasn’t able to get much from this info. Hope you guys might find something.
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This resolved it for me! Thanks myrtensasterr