Guild Wars 2

A few days ago, my guildwars started to behave differently. This is the first time I’ve seen this effect.

• When I play, I see blocks of pixels (little squares) everywhere that don’t belong on the screen.
• They are all the same colour (sometimes cyan, sometimes cream, etc.)
• They appear/disappear rapidly, especially when I move my character (or the camera) around
• This results in constant flickering
• They seem to appear more (but not exclusively) when the game displays dark textures.

These blocks will not appear on screenshots (!) so I took photos with my phone, which I’ll attach below.

I am now panicking that my graphics card may be dying, or something equally horrible might happen.

Any ideas?

Here’s some info on my hardware:

System Information
—————————
Time of this report: 7/14/2013, 14:23:54
Machine name: BATCAVE
Operating System: Windows 8 Pro 64-bit (6.2, Build 9200) (9200.win8_gdr.130410-1505)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: System manufacturer
System Model: System Product Name
BIOS: BIOS Date: 08/20/08 13:38:55 Ver: 08.00.14
Processor: Intel® Core™2 Duo CPU E8400 @ 3.00GHz (2 CPUs), ~3.0GHz
Memory: 4096MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 4096MB RAM
Page File: 4601MB used, 1656MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: Using System DPI
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Disabled
DxDiag Version: 6.02.9200.16384 64bit Unicode

Display Devices
———————-
Card name: ATI Radeon HD 4800 Series
Manufacturer: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
Chip type: ATI display adapter (0×9440)
DAC type: Internal DAC
Device Type: Full Device
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_9440&SUBSYS_80301462&REV_00
Display Memory: 2296 MB
Dedicated Memory: 505 MB
Shared Memory: 1791 MB
Current Mode: 1680 × 1050 (32 bit) (60Hz)
Monitor Name: SyncMaster T220/T220G,SyncMaster Magic T220/T220G
Monitor Model: SyncMaster
Monitor Id: SAM03E5
Native Mode: 1680 × 1050(p) (59.883Hz)
Output Type: DVI
Driver Name: aticfx64.dll,aticfx64.dll,aticfx64.dll,aticfx32,aticfx32,aticfx32,atiumd64.dll,atidxx64.dll,atidxx64.dll,atiumdag,atidxx32,atidxx32,atiumdva,atiumd6a.cap,atitmm64.dll
Driver File Version: 8.17.0010.1129 (English)
Driver Version: 8.970.100.7000
DDI Version: 10.1
Feature Levels: 10.1,10.0
Driver Model: WDDM 1.1
Graphics Preemption: DMA
Compute Preemption: DMA
Driver Attributes: Final Retail
Driver Date/Size: 11/16/2012 22:49:04, 1081856 bytes
WHQL Logo’d: n/a
WHQL Date Stamp: n/a
Device Identifier: {D7B71EE2-D700-11CF-BB73-3AA0BEC2C535}
Vendor ID: 0×1002
Device ID: 0×9440
SubSys ID: 0×80301462
Revision ID: 0×0000
Driver Strong Name: oem5.inf:cb0ae41477478494:ati2mtag_RV7X:8.970.100.7000:pci\ven_1002&dev_9440
Rank Of Driver: 00E32001
Video Accel: ModeMPEG2_A ModeMPEG2_C
DXVA2 Modes:
D3D9 Overlay: Not Supported
DXVA-HD: Not Supported
DDraw Status: Enabled
D3D Status: Enabled
AGP Status: Enabled

i’ve seen this error before in other 3D softwares, it’s specific to radeon cards, it’s usually fixed with updating to the latest driver.

I’ll do that, thanks!

That would’ve been my suggestion too. Let us know how you go.

So far no luck.

Drivers were current to begin with, now I’m trying the latest beta release, but that didn’t change anything.

I ran gw2 -repair to be on the safe side.

We’ve created a support ticket with a description, game advisor report, speccy report and the photos – maybe the ANet team has more ideas.

The flickering starts 30 seconds into the game (sometimes it takes longer), so I’m thinking it might be heat related… although the fan appears to be working correctly, and 67 °C doesn’t sound “too hot” to me… ?

Artifacts can be caused by numerous reasons like:

• Drivers
• Temperature of graphics hardware
• Faulty graphics hardware
• Underpowered graphics hardware
• Overclocked graphics hardware

I would try to rule out as many of the hardware related problems first to make sure its not the graphics card itself causing the problem. Also some dedicated graphics cards require power directly from the power supply and will have a minimum requirement on the amount of Power(wattage) and Current (Amperage) needed for the hardware to operate properly.

another thing that can make a card not function properly is having it in the wrong pci slot.

Ricky.4706:

another thing that can make a card not function properly is having it in the wrong pci slot.

This would cause peformance to drop but I don’t believe it would cause artifacts to happen.

I’ve used the same video card in the same PCI slot for years… I didn’t change anything about the hardware or drivers, this stuff just started to happen out of the blue a few days ago.

Either ANet changed something so that GW now requires something different from my card – or my hardware’s simply failing me due to age… ?

i am having the same issue since the last patch. i also notice a lot of ppl having the same problem too.
check some of the screenshot from this thread

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Box-o-Fun-Screenshot

I know when I saw it happen in another software, it had to do with the radeon driver and how it rendered particle effects. So if this is coming from anets side, then either anet has to fix it or radeon needs a new driver.

you can try uninstalling and reinstalling your driver to rule out driver corruption. Then also monitoring your gpu temperature as many have posted about their systems running hotter. As for your card giving out, Have you tried any other games and had issues ?

Hi guys,

just a quick update. My issue has fixed itself! It came with the Bazaar release and it went with the Cutthroat Politics one.

Since the release of Cutthroat Politics, I haven’t seen artifacts a single time.

So I guess, thanks Anet.

Another quick update,

with the last patch, I am suddenly seeing artifacts again.

If not your ageing vid card it could be directx. The patch may be using more up to date directx than you have installed.

I’m guessing the patch is using directx 9 for cross platform compatibility.

Microsoft has a webinstaller that installs just the updated files missing.

I know it works with all windows as far as Win7 but you would need to check that it works with your Win8.

I will not provide a link for the webinstaller because I am not sure you can use it with Win8.

google is your friend

My directx is the up to datest it could be.

Long shot here, but try it with a different monitor and monitor cable. I’ve had similar looking artifacts appear and disappear seemingly at random because my monitor had gone bad. The fact that these artifacts don’t appear in screenshots supports this theory.

Aaaaand after last night’s patch, just like that, the artifacts are gone again.

At this point I just sit back and enjoy the show, but I do hope that ANet don’t unfix it again in September

Pixelpumpkin, usually this is a starting symptom of hardware failure. My previous GPU GTX680 issue, have a look.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1363965/graphic-square-dots-glitch-corruptions/0_20

Follow up thread: http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.aspx?m=1868800

RMA the card at the end.

A little update, the square disco light artifacts come and go, but always with a patch.

For instance, I’ve had them on my screen constantly (no exceptions) when looking at dark areas, since the April 15 feature patch.

As of this morning after patching my client to the latest update (update #2 after the four winds release), they’re gone again.

ANet, whatever it is that is different in the code that you rolled out in the last 24 hours, THAT’s the not-broken version of the game. Can we keep that, please?

Those are bad memory locations on your graphics card. Either overheating or going defective.

Nothing in Anet’s code can cause what you are seeing there….it’s a hardware failure issue in your system.

So can you explain to me why my graphics card magically fixes itself at the exact point in time an update is released… and magically breaks again a couple updates later?

This morning, my boyfriend said – “I saw in the patch notes that there was an update – go check if your disco lights are gone!”, and sure enough they were…

I know it’s the exact point in time because I log on GW2 every day, and during the last six months I have been paying special attention to this. Maybe I should have kept a diary. This never ever changes in between patches – and there is enough time in between patches that, were it on my end, it really really _should. At this point, I would know if it ever did.

(And I have yet to see these artifacts in any other game.)

Ok, looking closer at your images, I take back my original claim of hardware failure (tho it still could be a related as what you are seeing is some aspect of the games particle effect gone bad).

• Have you tried turning off all graphics effect (and turn them on one by one?)
• Also, have you tried repairing your GW2.DAT file? Maybe some of the particle effect models or textures are corrupted?

Updates do have a tendency to possibly alter settings (tho they shouldn’t) so maybe it’s a combination of the above 2 and repairing the DAT file will clear it up?

I’m pretty sure I did both things when they disco lights first appeared, but to make sure I can go through everything again… With today’s patch, they didn’t come back though, so I’ll wait until they do and report back. Thank you!

For completeness’ sake, the disco lights have been back as of the June 3/4 patch.

Could you post your graphics card’s temperatures when this starts happening?

You can use HWMonitor (http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/hwmonitor.html)