Safe mode didn't work for me. What did work was changing the Video settings. 1. at character select screen 2. click options -> Video 3. change the two sliders at the bottom to Speed (instead of quality) 4. OK/Apply 5. Login After login in, you may change your settings back to quality.
Same issue here. I don't know if patch .42 had something to do with it, but the game loaded properly after. Before the patch I got the game loading again by changing both the Video Sliders to Speed (lowest quality). While ingame changed it back, works fine now.
Solved! no problems since the recent .42 patch. For those who still encounter the issue even after patching, I got past the Cryptic loading screen by disconnecting all my USB devices. So I disconnected my external hdd, usb-stick, bluetooth receiver. Restarted the game and it loaded properly and that was before the .42…