PC/Steam – Update 1.1.5 startup crash before reaching the main menu

Blivyy

22 de julio de 2026 02:22

Hi Bungie,

I'm reporting what appears to be a reproducible startup issue that began immediately after installing Update 1.1.5.

Marathon was working normally the previous evening with no launch or stability problems. After updating, the game now fails on every launch.

The sequence is always the same:

Steam launches the game normally.
BattlEye starts successfully.
Marathon opens to a black screen.
Before the intro cinematic or main menu appears, the game closes without displaying an error.
Steam returns to the green Play button.

The issue has now occurred on every launch attempt since updating.

I've spent several hours trying to isolate the cause before posting here because I wanted to rule out as many local issues as possible.

The following made no difference:

complete uninstall and reinstall of Marathon
Steam file verification (completed successfully)
BattlEye repair and reinstall
resetting Marathon's local preferences
multiple Windows restarts
disabling HDR
disabling both Steam and NVIDIA overlays
bypassing SteelSeries Sonar
disabling Nahimic components
temporarily testing without third-party antivirus real-time protection before restoring it

After every change, the game failed at exactly the same point.

Some additional observations that may help:

Steam consistently reports the installation as healthy.
BattlEye appears to initialise successfully every time.
The launcher starts correctly.
Marathon itself exits during early startup before the menu appears.
Windows Event Viewer doesn't generate a normal application crash for the failure.
DxDiag reports no display, audio or input problems.

System overview:

Windows 11 64-bit
Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 Laptop GPU
32 GB RAM
Steam

I appreciate that this may not be enough to identify the root cause on its own, but I wanted to provide a report after eliminating the most common local causes.

Game runs fine on my PS5 but sadly not my laptop which is where I want to play please.

Thanks :)

Comentarios

2 comentarios

Comentario oficial

Bungie Support
Marathon Support

22 de julio de 2026 13:02
Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out.

While it may be possible to play on certain laptop configurations, we do not officially support them per our Marathon Storage and System Requirements guide.

Because this is an unsupported platform, we’re only able to suggest basic troubleshooting steps here and can’t provide more advanced troubleshooting.

That being said, here are some steps to try:
- Update your GPU drivers to the latest version from NVIDIA, AMD, or Intel.
- Make sure the game is using the laptop’s dedicated GPU rather than integrated graphics.
- Set Windows and your GPU control panel to High Performance mode for Marathon.
- Disable overlays and background tools such as Steam Overlay, Discord Overlay, GeForce Experience overlay, MSI Afterburner, RivaTuner, and similar software.
- Remove any overclock, undervolt, or third-party performance tuning settings and test again at default settings.
- Fully restart the PC after driver updates, reinstalling, or verifying files.
- Make sure Windows is fully updated.
Blivyy

22 de julio de 2026 21:33
Hi,

Thank you for taking the time to reply.

However, I don’t believe my original report has been fully understood.

The response you’ve provided is a generic troubleshooting guide for PC and laptop users, but it doesn’t actually address the issue I reported.

This isn’t a question of whether my laptop is capable of running Marathon.

It already has.

Immediately prior to installing Update 1.1.5, Marathon was running on this exact machine without issue at native 4K on maximum settings, consistently delivering well over 140 FPS.

There were no crashes, no instability and no performance concerns.

Between that final successful session and the first failed launch:
- no hardware changed,
- no Windows updates were installed,
- no BIOS changes were made,
- no GPU driver changes were made.
The only change was installing Update 1.1.5.

From that point onwards, the game has failed on every launch.

That is why I described this as a regression rather than a performance or specification issue.

I also spent several hours completing the standard troubleshooting process before creating my forum post specifically to avoid receiving a generic checklist in response.

Those steps included, among others:
- updating graphics drivers,
- confirming the dedicated RTX GPU is being used,
- verifying the game installation,
- completely reinstalling Marathon,
- deleting the CVARS configuration,
- disabling overlays,
- testing without additional audio software,
- testing HDR on and off,
- restarting after every significant change.
None of those changed the behaviour.

The behaviour remains identical every time:
- Steam launches successfully.
- BattlEye initialises successfully.
- Marathon starts.
- The game reaches a black screen.
- Before the intro cinematic or main menu appears, the game exits silently back to Steam.
- Windows records no conventional application crash.
I completely understand Bungie’s position regarding laptop support and why that disclaimer exists within your documentation. However, that disclaimer does not explain why a game that was functioning correctly on the same hardware immediately before Update 1.1.5 is now unable to reach its own main menu.

I’m not asking Bungie to support every laptop configuration.

I’m asking whether someone can review the actual behaviour being reported rather than directing me back to troubleshooting that has already been completed and documented.

At the moment, it feels as though my report has been answered with a standard template rather than assessed on the technical details that were provided.

I’d appreciate it if someone could review the issue in that context.

Thank you.
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