Total War: Warhammer 3 players report crashes and infinite loading screens following the new patch

Update 29/04/26 – 4:40 pm (IST): Create Assembly has officially acknowledged the problem on Discord, saying that they’re aware of the boot issues and are urgently investigating. They’ve mentioned downgrading the game’s version and playing in offline mode as the present workarounds. Apologizing for the disruption, they claim they’ll share further updates.

Original article published on April 29, 2026, follows:

A new Total War: Warhammer 3 update is preventing some players from even getting past the loading screen. Reports indicate that booting the game leads directly to a black screen or an infinite load, usually followed by a full crash.

The game fails to connect properly to Creative Assembly’s authentication servers, and it never finishes loading. Many in the community suspect the issue stems from the game’s DRM software failing to communicate with Creative Assembly’s authentication servers. So people are annoyed that the anti-piracy measures are just causing severe inconveniences to paying customers.

It’s certainly not a user error or a local PC issue, since several players report experiencing the same thing at the same time. These people were playing fine just hours earlier. Others report that the game crashes after 30 minutes of playing.

There are some potential fixes that may help. Open Steam, and go to the “Offline” section. Launching the game directly from here bypasses the server check. Re-verifying the integrity of the files, downloading the latest update, checking graphics drivers, and clearing the cache don’t seem to help.

Another option is to downgrade the game by right-clicking on Warhammer 3 in Steam, clicking on Properties, and then selecting the previous build (April 21 hotfix). This lets you play the game, but you will be offline for multiplayer. Users confirm that this method works for them.

Players are understandably furious because they’re unable to complete their campaigns and play the game. Since this is a server-side bug on CA’s end, we’ll need to wait for a hotfix from them to solve the issue.

Creative Assembly has yet to officially acknowledge the problem, so players will likely have to wait. Do let us know whether you’re facing this issue in the comments, or if you’ve managed to fix it.

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