Europa Universalis 4 Emperor PC players are experiencing errors like Game Not Launching, crash at launch, Small UI, JavaScript Error, Paradox Launcher not starting, and more. Here I have compiled a list of errors and issues with the game along with their fixes and workarounds.
Europa Universalis IV Black Screen, Stuttering, And Fixes
Europa Universalis IV is an empire building game launched back in 2013 and is still going strong. With the launch of Emperor expansion, players have more content to enjoy. However, a lot of PC players are unable to play the game due to errors like JavaScript Error, Paradox Launcher not starting, crash, SteamInitializationFailed, Disk Write Error, and more.
The following are the Europa Universalis 4 Emperor errors that players are experiencing along with their fixes and workarounds.
Legacy Graphics Card Fix
Europa Universalis 4 players are reporting that when they launch the game on their laptop and despite having a powerful discrete GPU, the game pops up a message telling them that the Legacy GPU isn’t powerful enough or doesn’t meet the minimum requirement.
This is just a classic case of the game not switching to the discrete GPU. For Nvidia GPU users, open Nvidia Control Panel > Manage 3D Settings > Program Settings > select the game. Select the “High-performance Nvidia processor” under the preferred graphics option.
As for AMD GPU users, open Radeon Settings > Preferences > Additional Settings > Power > Switchable Graphics Application Settings. Select Europa Universalis 4 from the list and assign “High-Performance profile” to the game under Graphics Settings.
However, even doing this, a lot of players have experienced that the game doesn’t run really well or start. If that is the case with you then go to the game’s install folder > right-click eu4.exe > select Run with graphics processor and select “High-performance Nvidia processor”. Set it to default and the issue will be fixed.
Game Not Launching, Crash At Startup Fix
A lot of Europa Universalis 4 Emperor players are reporting that the game doesn’t launch or just crashes at launch. Here are a few fixes and workarounds to fix the issue. Before starting with the fixes, if you have Onedrive, then disable it and see if that fixes the issue.
The first thing players need to do is disable fullscreen optimizations. Go to your Steam library > Manage > Browse Local Files > right-click eu4.exe > Properties > Compatibility tab > disable fullscreen optimizations. Apply the change and the game won’t crash at launch. Furthermore, the Europa Universalis 4 crash at launch issue can also be resolved by running the game in borderless fullscreen instead of Fullscreen.
While it sounds ridiculous but, one reason for Europa Universalis IV Emperor to crash if you installed another Paradox Entertainment game or used to play it. Look in other drives if there is an empty Paradox folder. Delete that folder and the game will start working.
The game not having admin rights can also cause it to crash at launch. Go to the game’s install folder > right-click eu4.exe > Properties > Compatibility tab > check “Run this program as an administrator”. Apply the change and launch the game and the issue will be fixed.
If the above fixes failed to resolve the issue, then your anti-virus/Windows Defender might be blocking the game. Either disable it or exclude the game’s install folder from it. Then verify game files and Europa Universalis 4 not launching issue will be fixed.
Small UI Fix
Some of you might experience that the game’s UI becomes smaller after applying the fix mentioned under “Crash At Startup” in which you have to disable Fullscreen optimizations for Europa Universalis 4. To fix that, right-click eu4.exe > Properties > Compatibility tab > check “Override high DPI scaling behavior”. Here you need to see which value will resolve the small UI issue for you.
Or go to “Documents/Paradox Interactive/Europa Universalis IV/settings.txt”. Increase the gui_scale to fix the small UI issue.
Crash Fix
Players are reporting that when they exit to the main menu, Europa Universalis 4 crashes to desktop and restarts. This is intentional as the devs had to do it to avoid a serious bug with the game. There is no fix for it.
Could Not Start Paradox Launcher, JavaScript Error Fix
Some Europa Universalis 4 Emperor players are reporting that they the following errors when they launch the game.
Could Not Start the Paradox Launcher at C:\users\(username)\Appdata\Local\Paradox Interactive
CreatFile C:\users\(username)\Appdata\Local\Paradox Interactive\bootstrapper-v2.exe: The system could not find the file specified
or
A JavaScript error occurred in the main process”
Uncaught Exception:
Error: Cannot open C:/Users/user/AppData/Local/Programs/ParadoxInteractive/launcher-v2.2019.10.4/resources/app.asar/dist/main/microworks.node: Error: Access is denied.
or
{“messageId”:”game.steamInitializationFailed”}
These particular Europa Universalis 4 errors are caused by the game’s broken launcher. This can be fixed by deleting the launcher. First, use the Windows uninstall function to delete the “Paradox Launcher v2” if it’s there. Then navigate to the path mentioned below and delete the launcher directories.
C:/users/
C:/users/
C:/users/
Documents/paradox interactive/.cpatch/
Delete every directory in Documents/paradox interactive/ that starts with launcher-v2
Once you’ve done this, launch the game from Steam and it’ll automatically download and install the Launcher. Give the game’s exe admin rights, see under “Crash At Startup Fix” to see how to do it.
For Linux users, delete the directories ~/.paradoxlauncher and “~/.local/share/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2/” and the file “~/.local/share/Paradox Interactive/launcherpath”.
As for Mac users, delete the directory “~/Library/Application Support/Paradox Interactive”. This will fix these errors and you’ll be able to play the game.
Disk Write Error Fix
Europa Universalis 4 Emperor players are experiencing the Disk Write Error which doesn’t allow them to play the game. According to players, they are unable to download the update or the game itself as they get the following error.
An error occurred while updating EU4 (disk write error)
The following are the fixes for this error.
- Right-click on eu4.exe and select “Properties”. Go to the “Compatibility” tab and check “Run this program as an administrator”. Apply the setting and error should be resolved.
- Open CMD and run it as an administrator. Use the following commands and press enter after each of them.
diskpart
list disk
select disk # (# is the number of the hard drive in which the game is installed)
attributes disk clear readonly - Go to Steam/logs/content_log. Scroll down and look for “failed to write”. Open the file and it has paths to some corrupted files. Follow the path and delete these files and the game will install.
If the above-mentioned fixes haven’t worked then you need to do a clean re-installation of Europa Universalis 4. If you don’t have cloud-synchronization enabled, then backup your game’s save files.
Manually delete all files and folders left under Steam\steamapps\common\EU4 and Documents\Paradox\EU4. Reinstall the game and the Disk Write Error will be fixed.
Missing .dll Files Fix
Players are reporting that they are getting the error telling that they are missing certain .dll files or these .dll files aren’t detected in the system. These .dll files include:
MSVCP140.dll
VCRUNTIME140.dll
MSVCP100.dll
The fix for these missing .dll errors is simple enough. First, delete all of the Visual C++ Redistributables from your PC. Then, download and install the latest Visual C++ Redistributables. This will fix the missing .dll file errors.
Black Screen Fix
This is a common issue with PC video games. According to players, when they launch Europa Universalis 4, they get a black screen with audio. To fix this, start the game and when the black screen appears, press “Alt + Enter”. The game will go into Windowed mode and will start to display.
Access Error to Game Data Fix
According to Europa Universalis 4 players, they get the “Access Error to Game Data” when they launch the game. On Windows, this issue is probably being caused by your anti-virus or Windows Defender. Either disable the anti-virus/Windows Defender or exclude the game’s folder and the Documents folder from it.
For Mac OS, some times users deny the game access to the Documents folder. Go to Apple menu > System Preferences > click Security & Privacy > click Privacy > select Files and Folders. Look for Europa Universalis IV” and the Paradox launcher in the list and select the checkbox next to them to allow them access. This will fix the “Access Error to Game Data” error with the game.
Stuttering, Performance Fix
Performance is a common issue with PC games and apparently, Europa Universalis IV is no exception. Players are reporting stuttering and low FPS issues with the game.
First, make sure you have installed the latest GPU drivers and there is no background process using too much of your system’s CPU, GPU, or HDD. Also, make sure the game is using the dedicated GPU is you are playing on a laptop with discrete graphics.
Open Nvidia Control Panel > Manage 3D Settings > Program Settings > select Europa Universalis 4. Make the following changes.
Set Vertical Sync to “ON”
Set “Power Management Mode” to “Prefer Maximum Performance”
Set Texture Filtering- Quality” to “High Performance”.
Disable in-game v.sync and the game’s performance should improve. If that stuttering or FPS issues continue to bother you then follow the steps mentioned above but set Vertical Sync to “Fast”.
That is all for our Europa Universalis 4 fixes for errors like Access Error to Game Data, crash at startup, the game not launching, Disk Write Error, Small UI, and more. If you are facing errors and issues with other PC games or your PC then also see our hub for commonly occurring PC errors and their fixes.