Chronos: Before the Ashes is an action-adventure role-playing souls-like video game that offers pretty good graphics. However, it’s worth mentioning that the reviews are mixed on Steam that should be improved in the future by developers, Gunfire Games & THQ Nordic. Though the gaming experience is quite appreciable, several PC users are having issues with the Chronos: Before the Ashes Crashing at Startup, Won’t Launch, or Lags with FPS drops. So, if you’re also one of the victims, check out this article to fix this issue by yourself.

It’s known to all that most of the PC version games do come with multiple bugs or errors that not only relies on the development but also happening from the player’s end. Now, if you’re also experiencing the same, try following all the possible workarounds below to resolve the issue. If in case, restarting your computer doesn’t fix the crashing or lagging issue then make sure to jump into some of the possible reasons below that may cause this problem.

Why Does Chronos: Before the Ashes Keep Crashing?

  • Chances are high that your PC configuration isn’t meeting the system requirements of the game. You can check out the ‘Chronos: Before the Ashes’ system requirements below.
  • Some of the temporary glitch or cache-related issues can occur on your PC which can be fixed by restarting the system.
  • It may possible that the game files are either corrupted or missing.
  • Maybe your PC is running an outdated Windows build or graphics driver version.
  • It can also possible that your DirectX version is either outdated or maybe your outdated GPU card isn’t compatible with the Direct3D Hardware Feature Level 11.0 GPU.
  • Maybe your game or its launcher is outdated that’s why the game crashes randomly.
  • Some of the apps are running in the background that may have higher CPU/Memory consumption.
  • Windows Defender Firewall protection or any third-party antivirus program is most probably blocking the game files.

Minimum System Requirements:

  • Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
  • OS: Windows 7 / 8 / 10 64 bit
  • Processor: AMD FX-8320 (3,5 GHz) / Intel i5-4690K (3,5 GHz) or better
  • Memory: 4 GB RAM
  • Graphics: GeForce GTX 660 / Radeon R7 370 with 2 GB VRAM
  • DirectX: Version 11
  • Storage: 8 GB available space
  • Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
  • OS: Windows 7 / 8 / 10 64 bit
  • Processor: AMD FX-8320 (3,5 GHz) / Intel i5-4690K (3,5 GHz) or better
  • Memory: 8 GB RAM
  • Graphics: AMD Radeon RX 480 / NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 with 4 GB VRAM
  • DirectX: Version 11
  • Storage: 8 GB available space

Fix: Chronos: Before the Ashes Crashing at Startup, Won’t Launch, or Lags with FPS drops

Now, without wasting any more time, let’s jump into the steps below. Keep in mind that both the Nvidia and AMD graphics drivers are well optimized for the Chronos: Before the Ashes game. So, if in case, you haven’t updated your graphics driver yet, do this first.

1. Update Graphics Drivers

If you’re using the Nvidia graphics card then update the GeForce Experience app on your PC from the Nvidia official site here. But if you’re using the AMD graphics card on your system, then update the latest AMD Drivers from here.

2. Disable Steam Overlay

  • Open Steam on your Windows.
  • Head over to the Settings > Click on the In-Game.
  • Click on the checkbox to disable Enable the Steam Overlay while in-game.
  • Once the checkbox mark is removed, click on OK.

3. Adjust Discord Settings

  • Launch Discord > Click on User Settings.
  • Select Voice & Video from the left sidebar.
  • Scroll down a bit and click on the Advanced.
  • Next, disable OpenH264 Video Codec provided by Cisco System, Inc.
  • Then disable Enable Quality of Service High Packet Priority.
  • Now, go to Overlay.
  • You can also turn off the in-game overlay.
  • Next, head over to Appearance.
  • Go to Advanced.
  • Disable Hardware Acceleration.
  • Once done, restart the system.

4. Adjust Nvidia Control Panel Settings

  • Click on Adjust image settings with preview under 3D settings.
  • Select Use the advanced 3D image settings.
  • Next, launch the Nvidia Control Panel.
  • Click on Manage 3D settings> Go to Global Settings.
  • Additionally, you can also adjust some of the other options:
  • Disable Image Sharpening
  • Enable Threaded Optimization
  • Use Maximum Performance for Power Management
  • Turn off Low Latency Mode
  • Set Texture Filtering Quality to Performance mode

5. Change AMD Control Panel Settings

  • Go to Global Graphics.
  • Turn off Radeon Anti-Lag
  • Turn off Radeon Boost
  • Use Application settings for Anti-Aliasing Mode
  • Set Anti-aliasing Methodto Multi-sampling
  • Turn off Morphological Filtering
  • Disable Image Sharpening
  • Turn off Anisotropic Filtering
  • Use Performance mode for Texture Filtering Quality
  • You can also enable Surface Format Optimization
  • AMD Optimization for the Tesselation Mode
  • Wait for V-sync– Turn it off
  • Use AMD optimization for the Shader Cache
  • Disable OpenGL Triple Buffering
  • Turn off Maximum Tesselation Level
  • Set Graphics for the GPU Workload
  • Turn off the Radeon Chill
  • Disable Frame Rate Target Control

6. Verify Game Files via Steam

Chronos: Before the Ashes gamers on Steam client can follow the below steps:

  • Disable Image Sharpening

  • Enable Threaded Optimization

  • Use Maximum Performance for Power Management

  • Turn off Low Latency Mode

  • Set Texture Filtering Quality to Performance mode

  • Turn off Radeon Anti-Lag

  • Turn off Radeon Boost

  • Use Application settings for Anti-Aliasing Mode

  • Set Anti-aliasing Methodto Multi-sampling

  • Turn off Morphological Filtering

  • Disable Image Sharpening

  • Turn off Anisotropic Filtering

  • Use Performance mode for Texture Filtering Quality

  • You can also enable Surface Format Optimization

  • AMD Optimization for the Tesselation Mode

  • Wait for V-sync– Turn it off

  • Use AMD optimization for the Shader Cache

  • Disable OpenGL Triple Buffering

  • Turn off Maximum Tesselation Level

  • Set Graphics for the GPU Workload

  • Turn off the Radeon Chill

  • Disable Frame Rate Target Control

  • Open the Steam Library by logging into the account

  • You can find Chronos: Before the Ashes game

  • Right-click on the game and click on Properties

  • Select the Local Files tab

  • Then click on Verify Integrity of game files

  • Wait for the process and then restart the game to check whether the Chronos: Before the Ashes Crashing issue has been fixed or not

7. Uninstall Recent Windows 10 Update

A couple of days ago, Microsoft has released a new update for Windows 10 with KB4535996. So, this particular cumulative update for Windows 10 is quite buggy and causing so many errors or problems.

  • Go to Start menu > Click on Settings
  • Next, go to Update and Security
  • Click on View update history
  • Now, if you can see that there is an update having KB4535996 has been already installed. Make sure to uninstall it.
  • Here you will see the Uninstall updates option on the top of the page.
  • Click on it and select the mentioned cumulative update version.
  • Right-click on it > Select Uninstall.
  • It may take some time to delete that update and your system may restart automatically.
  • Have some patience and you can also manually reboot your Windows PC (if required).

8. Remove Temporary Files

  • Press Windows key + R on your keyboard to open the RUN program.
  • Now, type %temp% and press enter.
  • You will get a bunch of temporary files on a page.
  • Select all files by pressing Ctrl + A on the keyboard.
  • Next, press Shift + Delete on the keyboard to remove all the files.
  • Sometimes some of the temporary files can’t be deleted. So, leave them as it is and close it.

9. Set Default CPU and Graphics Speed

As most of the users always want to use ultra-high performance from the CPU and GPU from the very first day. So, most of the users either buy an overclocked version or manually increased the overclocking speed. So, if you’ve also overclocked your GPU speed and after doing that you’re experiencing bottleneck or lagging or crashing related issues, just set it to default mode.

You can also use the MSI Afterburner tool or Zotac firestorm application in order to lower the clocking speed. Once done, you can run the Chronos: Before the Ashes game to check whether it’s crashing at startup or not.

That’s it. We hope this guide was useful to you. You can comment below for any queries.