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Launcher stuck in an autoupdate loop

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  • huwinator#2382 huwinator Member Posts: 1 Arc User
    Got the same issue today when I tried to login and complete my daily event stuff on Risa... Keeps looping through trying to download a launcher update and eventually gives up stating that it can't connect to the server... Was soo close to claiming the ship too

    I run STO via Steam and this is the first time i've ever encountered this issue
  • ironman7#2509 ironman7 Member Posts: 38 Arc User
    They're aware of the issues with the launcher and stuff and are looking into it. I'll let you guys know if I hear anything else I can pass along. right now i'm stuck in the loop like you folks are so added motivation to pester them a bit XD

    They are aware of the issues with the launcher? They are surely cryptic in their communication on this issue.... well that is why they are called cryptic for a reason(!). They better extend the summer event, no but.
  • xuaedanxuaedan Member Posts: 11 Arc User
    I've been having this updater loop bug since last night. Today I just used a free VPN app before launching the Star Trek Online.exe and it was able to update. it updated slowly but at least I can play now.
  • ironman7#2509 ironman7 Member Posts: 38 Arc User
    xuaedan wrote: »
    I've been having this updater loop bug since last night. Today I just used a free VPN app before launching the Star Trek Online.exe and it was able to update. it updated slowly but at least I can play now.

    Please can you tell us what is your current region (West Europe, Central USA etc), and what region did you switch to (via VPN)? that could be helpful for some of us to try this fix? Thanks!
  • eizaeiza Member Posts: 38 Arc User
    edited July 2023
    I am having this same issue, running windows 10 here. Not sure which version of 10, but yah 10.
    Mine is saying "unable to contact Patch Server, please try again"
  • baddmoonrizinbaddmoonrizin Member Posts: 10,891 Community Moderator
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  • sapphiro#3585 sapphiro Member Posts: 2 Arc User
    edited July 2023
    Having same issue all day. Cryptic Launcher Autoupdate startd downloading 130 mb, downloads 50, vomits back 30 and then gives up with message of "Unable to contact patch server."
    I remember having this exact issue few months ago. Should i add this to the long list of bugs that repeatedly appear and dissapear as devs recycle content (apparently with entire game build included)?

    Edit:Oh yeah, region Europe. Dont know if it further split and currently cant look since... you know... launcher doesnt work.
  • xuaedanxuaedan Member Posts: 11 Arc User
    xuaedan wrote: »
    I've been having this updater loop bug since last night. Today I just used a free VPN app before launching the Star Trek Online.exe and it was able to update. it updated slowly but at least I can play now.

    Please can you tell us what is your current region (West Europe, Central USA etc), and what region did you switch to (via VPN)? that could be helpful for some of us to try this fix? Thanks!

    All I can tell you is I live in Canada, East Coast. And I'm using the free version of Hotspot Shield VPN which does not let you select a region. It is set to automatic.
  • xuaedanxuaedan Member Posts: 11 Arc User
    xuaedan wrote: »
    xuaedan wrote: »
    I've been having this updater loop bug since last night. Today I just used a free VPN app before launching the Star Trek Online.exe and it was able to update. it updated slowly but at least I can play now.

    Please can you tell us what is your current region (West Europe, Central USA etc), and what region did you switch to (via VPN)? that could be helpful for some of us to try this fix? Thanks!

    All I can tell you is I live in Canada, East Coast. And I'm using the free version of Hotspot Shield VPN which does not let you select a region. It is set to automatic.

    I just found this on their website

    Hotspot Shield Basic versus Premium
    Hotspot Shield free VPN users by default only have access to one VPN server (United States). To access all VPN server locations, you need to subscribe to Hotspot Shield Premium.
  • crusty8maccrusty8mac Member Posts: 1,381 Arc User
    I'm having this problem, also. All day yesterday, and all day today. I guess I'm not going to be able to sign in all weekend.
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  • setadoonsetadoon Member Posts: 37 Arc User
    edited July 2023
    (Trolling comments moderated out. - BMR)
    Post edited by baddmoonrizin on
  • ravensky20#0887 ravensky20 Member Posts: 5 Arc User
    The problem started after 7/13/23 update. When starting the launcher via game directory, The Cryptic Launcher Autoupdate starts, saying "Trying to update the launcher. Please be patient" and shows how much MB remain to download starting with 113.0MB.

    However, when reaching 97.0-80.9MB it just restarts for anew after showing "Tried connecting[/i nth time]" message. After 13th attempt a new window pops up saying "Unable to establish connection to Patch Server. Please check your internet connection. If problem persist, please contact Technical Support." and that's all. No matter how many times I start the launcher, problem still persists. It's all happening while I have stable internet.

    Is it possible to fix this issue?
    Also sending tracert and pathping data on patch server as recommended in this forum section.
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    U.S.S. Springfield NCC-1560, Pioneer-class frigate
  • baddmoonrizinbaddmoonrizin Member Posts: 10,891 Community Moderator
    threads /merged
    GrWzQke.png
    Star Trek Online Volunteer Community Moderator and Resident She-Wolf
    Community Moderators are Unpaid Volunteers and NOT Employees of Gearbox/Cryptic
    Views and Opinions May Not Reflect the Views and Opinions of Gearbox/Cryptic
    ----> Contact Customer Support <----
    Moderation Problems/Issues? Please contact the Community Manager
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    Want the latest information on Star Trek Online?
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  • dsosebeedsosebee Member Posts: 24 Arc User
    The problem started after 7/13/23 update. When starting the launcher via game directory, The Cryptic Launcher Autoupdate starts, saying "Trying to update the launcher. Please be patient" and shows how much MB remain to download starting with 113.0MB.

    However, when reaching 97.0-80.9MB it just restarts for anew after showing "Tried connecting[/i nth time]" message. After 13th attempt a new window pops up saying "Unable to establish connection to Patch Server. Please check your internet connection. If problem persist, please contact Technical Support." and that's all. No matter how many times I start the launcher, problem still persists. It's all happening while I have stable internet.

    Is it possible to fix this issue?
    Also sending tracert and pathping data on patch server as recommended in this forum section.

    This is pretty much the exact situation I am having, although the MB values are slightly different. I haven't been able to log into STO for 2 days now because of this. Anyone know if there is any chance of a fix anytime soon?

  • gladeusex#1475 gladeusex Member Posts: 3 Arc User
    Had this problem for the first entire day it popped up. I have however, been able to eventually start the game. I'm not sure how helpful this is (or if my situation was anyway similar to everyone else), but I might as well share it;

    - Enable -console in the Steam options
    - Reinstall STO
    - Allow the game to update.
    - Assuming it completes the 112~mb, click within console window and press ENTER
    - Assuming that works, you'll temporarily see two console windows but the login screen will show up
    - Everything was normal from there

    Hope this helps, and if it doesn't, that the problem is fixed in time for everyone to finish the Risa event
  • georgedpgeorgedp Member Posts: 113 Arc User
    same issue here, anyone got something different than complete re-instal? I d prefer to avoid that... :/
  • lordmalak1lordmalak1 Member Posts: 4,681 Arc User
    Whats the story with the patcher ? I've been unable to connect for 3 days now because the patcher is stuck in an update loop. I don't want to lose ANOTHER event grand prize because of a broken patch. PLEASE FIX THIS !
    KBF Lord MalaK
    Awoken Dead
    giphy.gif

    Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
  • eazzieeazzie Member Posts: 4,222 Arc User
    lordmalak1 wrote: »
    Whats the story with the patcher ? I've been unable to connect for 3 days now because the patcher is stuck in an update loop. I don't want to lose ANOTHER event grand prize because of a broken patch. PLEASE FIX THIS !

    As per the last tweet on this .... Follow up to this: apparently the longer you let the patching loop go, the more likely it is to succeed.

    Which is still a terrible solution, but might be better than uninstalling and reinstalling. We're working on a better solution.

    Just let it run it's course. (may take a while. took me about 30 minutes. but everything was fine after that. I know it may be frustrating but letting run the course seems the only way till a solution is found.
  • xastirxxastirx Member Posts: 71 Arc User
    My Launcher update doesnt do the whole looping opening new threads thing, it just slowly works its way down to having like 85.5 MB left before it can load the launcher before i get a popup saying that there was no way to establish a connection to the update server and to try again later. I try later and same thing. Starts at like 112 MB or something all over again, makes it down to 85.5 remaining before saying, again, cannot establish connection to update servers.

    I did the task manager thing and nothing out of the ordinary there.
  • lordmalak1lordmalak1 Member Posts: 4,681 Arc User
    eazzie wrote: »
    lordmalak1 wrote: »
    Whats the story with the patcher ? I've been unable to connect for 3 days now because the patcher is stuck in an update loop. I don't want to lose ANOTHER event grand prize because of a broken patch. PLEASE FIX THIS !

    As per the last tweet on this .... Follow up to this: apparently the longer you let the patching loop go, the more likely it is to succeed.

    Which is still a terrible solution, but might be better than uninstalling and reinstalling. We're working on a better solution.

    Just let it run it's course. (may take a while. took me about 30 minutes. but everything was fine after that. I know it may be frustrating but letting run the course seems the only way till a solution is found.

    Yes, I've watched it time out almost a dozen times over the last 3 days, so letting it loop isn't a solution- it's luck that it managed to fix itself.
    As for uninstalling and reinstalling the game- IF the patcher cannot patch itself, how do you think it's going to patch the game after you've wiped the 50 or gigabytes from your hard drive ? "Might" and "likely" don't instill confidence that they are solutions to the problem, it's more guesswork and probably wont do anything other than waste your time and keep you off the forums complaining about this issue while they try to figure out how to really fit the problem.
    KBF Lord MalaK
    Awoken Dead
    giphy.gif

    Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
  • tom61stotom61sto Member Posts: 3,671 Arc User
    Some ideas from here: https://old.reddit.com/r/sto/comments/14znzz4/if_youre_stuck_in_the_launcher_patching_loop_this/

    You need some sort of replacement Star Trek Online.exe file, I found I had a slightly older install saved to a drive to copy to another system, and after grabbing that one it worked for me.

    You can also do a partial install from another store/launcher, like the Epic Games Store if you usually use Steam or Arc and grab that file with only a few hundred megabytes downloaded instead of gigabytes (as it only downloads a partial install from the store and then downloads the rest with the Launcher.) You can also use the same downloader you do now, but just move/rename the folder with your game, and then download from the store again, then move your old install back after you have a new Star Trek Online.exe copied over.

    German STO forum also has an older download from 2012 that is supposed to work: https://forum.arcgames.com/stode/discussion/comment/4323831 (try the second link.)


    You can also turn off auto-updated to the Launcher, but you'll likely end up needing to remove that option, as eventually your Launcher will go out of sync and probably not be usable.

    From /u/TheMidichlorian "[...]For the sake of clarity the actual solution is to right click your STO shortcut/properties and add -noautopatch to your target file.

    Additional help for the people who keep downvoting this: https://www.lifewire.com/command-line-parameters-video-games-3399930 "
  • xastirxxastirx Member Posts: 71 Arc User
    So, for now, after going through the loop, and the crash where i have to start looping over again, and so on and so forth, I have been able to get it to go through more loops by going into the task manager and giving StarTrekOnline.exe a priority level of High. Where before it always went through loops for about 7 minutes before saying that after 13 attempts at connecting it shuts down and has to start again from scratch, with the high priority level, it has been looping for 30 minutes straight without the crash. So far, that is.
  • xastirxxastirx Member Posts: 71 Arc User
    Update: With the priority still set to High in taskmanager it made it to 40.7 MB remaining before showing the failed to connect error. So allocating more resources to try and brute force your way through with maximum firepower gets it farther though still not quite all the way.
  • xastirxxastirx Member Posts: 71 Arc User
    edited July 2023
    Final Update: so i decided to try uninstalling and reinstalling fresh, and the download is actually stable and not studdery at all. If you have fast internet but your getting trapped in a loop, my uninstall/reinstall went faster than going through this looping process even once. 30 minutes going through the loop each time it crashed and was repeated vs 1.3 minutes redownloading the game. 1.3 minutes being about 1 minute and 19 seconds.
  • lordmalak1lordmalak1 Member Posts: 4,681 Arc User
    Probably related : I still use the standalone launcher (NON-ARC) and I remembered I still had an intact launcher in my windows 7 install, so I copied it over the W10 patcher install, and it works- launches FAST like it used to, got me to the login screen, then patched the game files. Seems like a reinstall of JUST the patcher should fix it (you ARC users might get away with an ARC reinstall), reinstalling the game itself isn't necessary.
    KBF Lord MalaK
    Awoken Dead
    giphy.gif

    Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
  • lordmalak1lordmalak1 Member Posts: 4,681 Arc User
    UPDATE : yup, problem solved. Force verify found nothing wrong and game ran just like it always did, never even lost my settings. Did my daily grind, exited game, and relaunched a few times never seeing the patcher loop again.
    Issue RESOLVED.
    Tell Cryptic I won't bill them for the two hours it took ME to fix this.
    KBF Lord MalaK
    Awoken Dead
    giphy.gif

    Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
  • scutofo#1689 scutofo Member Posts: 13 Arc User
    edited July 2023
    I just found a solution that worked for me. I'm posting it here in case it helps someone else;

    1. Rename the Install Folder (I added BAK onto the end of mine)
    2. Press Play on Steam and hope it throws an error (you renamed the right folder if so)
    3. 'Uninstall' on Steam
    4. Install to same place as original install (not the renamed folder though)
    5. Press Play, launcher should hopefully update.
    6. Close launcher when it's at login, ignore further patching
    7. Copy and replace Star Trek Online.exe from new folder to old folder.
    8. Delete new install folder
    9. Rename Old folder back
    10. Launch Game

    Renaming the original install folder is done to ensure that Steam doesn't nuke the folder and make you lose all of your downloaded game data. This process worked for me and enabled me to fix the problem without having to reinstall the entire game. Hopefully it helps someone else too.
    Post edited by scutofo#1689 on
  • smokebaileysmokebailey Member Posts: 4,668 Arc User
    Still trying to load it up, crashed after about 13 attempts.

    We better get something done to make up for this, I still gotta get the summer ship and stuff.
    dvZq2Aj.jpg
  • fred26291#2759 fred26291 Member Posts: 1,303 Arc User
    For those who it keeps crashing on, go into your windows task manager look for the sto game client and kill all the crashed instances, they do not clear out on thier own in some cases :). THEN retry the launcher again.
    This solution helped me 3 days ago when it started to happen here.
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