FIFA 23 has been eagerly anticipated by soccer fans as the latest evolution of EA‘s genre-defining sports franchise. Boasting the new HyperMotion2 animation technology and women‘s club teams, expectations were sky high for this installment. However, the launch has been marred by reports of a stubborn black screen crash on PC that‘s preventing many from even accessing the game.
Here‘s everything we know about the FIFA 23 black screen bug on PC, including likely causes, the latest troubleshooting steps, and when to expect an official fix from EA Sports. I‘ll also dive into the fascinating context around this year‘s extra-ambitious release and the Frostbite engine‘s growing pains.
What is the FIFA 23 black screen issue?
The dreaded FIFA 23 black screen rears its ugly head early in the launch process. You‘ll usually make it past the initial EA and FIFA 23 logo screens, but as soon as the main menu tries to load, the game will abruptly cut to an unresponsive black screen. No error message or crash dialog appears – FIFA 23 simply hangs indefinitely until you force close it via Alt+F4, Ctrl+Alt+Delete, or the Task Manager.
In many cases, the EA Anti-Cheat engine briefly appears before immediately closing itself, sending you back to the desktop or Origin launcher. Subsequent attempts to relaunch FIFA 23 result in the same crash loop. The game is essentially unplayable for affected users.
This black screen crash has been reported by a significant number of PC players across EA forums, Reddit, and social media. While not universal, it seems to impact a variety of hardware configurations with no immediately obvious pattern. Some have been able to play normally for days before suddenly hitting the black screen while others crash on their very first launch.
Source: EA Forums
Curiously, the black screen doesn‘t appear to affect players on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, or Stadia to nearly the same degree as PC. This suggests the issue lies in some PC-specific aspect of FIFA 23‘s architecture or a hardware interaction rather than a fundamental game engine bug.
What‘s causing the black screen in FIFA 23 on PC?
After digging through hundreds of user reports and technical analyses, two main potential culprits have emerged for the FIFA 23 black screen:
- Conflicts with racing wheel controllers
- Compatibility issues with the new Frostbite engine version
Let‘s break each one down further.
Racing wheel conflicts
The most commonly reported and conclusively proven trigger for the FIFA 23 black screen crash is having a racing wheel controller connected to your PC. Users have flagged crashes caused by Logitech, Thrustmaster and Fanatec wheels in particular. Even if you don‘t intend to use a wheel for FIFA 23 gameplay, simply having one plugged in via USB seems to cause the black screen for many.
The exact nature of this conflict is still being investigated, but it may be related to how FIFA 23 is enumerating connected USB devices on startup. Some users have reported seeing a "Firmware Update Failed" message from their wheel‘s configuration software around the same time as FIFA 23 crashes to black screen.
Strangely, FIFA has supported racing wheel controllers in the past for its Volta Football mode. There were scattered reports of wheels causing issues in FIFA 22 as well, but not to the scale of FIFA 23‘s black screen epidemic. It‘s possible changes to FIFA 23‘s input device handling, anti-cheat checks, or hardware APIs are conflicting with wheel drivers and firmware in new ways.
Frostbite engine issues
A more complex but very plausible theory points to FIFA 23 being the first FIFA title built on the latest version of DICE‘s Frostbite engine. EA has touted this "next-gen" Frostbite as enabling cutting-edge features like HyperMotion2 and graphical upgrades – but it may also be the source of new technical headaches.
The in-house Frostbite engine has a bit of a mixed reputation within the game industry. While gorgeous and powerful, it‘s also notoriously difficult to work with for developers. Frostbite was originally built for first-person shooters like Battlefield before being adapted to support everything from RPGs to sports games, resulting in a highly complex codebase.
FIFA made the jump to Frostbite with FIFA 17 and has been iterating on it with each entry since. However, FIFA 23 looks to be a more substantial leap, described by EA as "the most technologically advanced FIFA ever" under the hood. A major version change for Frostbite is bound to come with unforeseen bugs and compatibility quirks that will take some time to iron out post-release.
It‘s telling that similar black screen crashes have plagued other recent EA games like Madden NFL 23, Need for Speed Unbound, and Battlefield 2042 around launch – all of which are also built in Frostbite. While the specifics of each issue vary, there seems to be a pattern of games on the bleeding edge of this engine suffering from hard crashes until the wrinkles are smoothed out.
What does this mean for FIFA 23‘s black screen specifically? The new Frostbite version may have introduced changes to how it handles PC hardware, graphics APIs like DirectX 12, or anti-cheat processes that are leading to conflicts not seen in previous FIFAs. It‘s no surprise that EA‘s internal QA teams wouldn‘t catch every possible permutation before release.
How widespread is the FIFA 23 black screen on PC?
So just how many PC players are seeing their FIFA 23 experience cut short by a black screen? The short answer is: it‘s hard to say for sure. EA doesn‘t release detailed platform-specific sales data or crash telemetry. But based on the volume and intensity of community reports, it‘s fair to estimate this is impacting a significant chunk of the PC playerbase at the moment.
On the FIFA subreddit, which has over 500,000 members, posts about the black screen dominate the frontpage daily. Popular threads begging for a fix have racked up hundreds of upvotes and comments from players saying they‘re shelving the game until it‘s resolved. Over on the official EA Answers forums, the largest thread about the PC black screen has been viewed over 50,000 times.
Source: SteamDB
Looking at the top user reviews for FIFA 23 on Steam, 54% specifically call out frequent crashes as a reason for their negative rating. The overall Steam reviews are only 33% positive as of January 2023, an abysmal rating for such a high-profile release. It‘s safe to assume a big chunk of those pertain to the black screen and other crashes on PC rather than gameplay complaints.
We can also glean clues from EA‘s own actions. The fact that they‘ve acknowledged the black screen as a high-priority issue and committed to fixing it in upcoming patches suggests the scale is significant. If this was an isolated fluke, it‘s unlikely it would be seeing this level of official response.
While the total number of affected players is uncertain, the black screen seems to be one of the most serious and widespread technical issues to hit a FIFA launch in years. Not what EA was hoping for from their next-gen debut.
Troubleshooting the FIFA 23 black screen
If you‘re one of the unlucky souls staring at a black screen instead of scoring sick goals, there are a few troubleshooting steps worth trying while we wait for an official fix:
1. Disconnect all USB devices aside from a controller. Unplug racing wheels, joysticks, fight sticks, etc.
2. Update graphics card drivers. Grab the latest release from Nvidia or AMD.
3. Verify FIFA 23‘s game files via the EA app or Origin.
4. Run FIFA 23 in administrator mode and disable any overlay apps like Discord.
5. As a last resort, try a full uninstall and reinstall of FIFA 23.
Frustratingly, even this gauntlet of troubleshooting doesn‘t seem to work for everyone. If you‘re still crashing after exhausting the DIY fixes, you‘ll want to contact EA Help to report your case.
When can we expect an official fix for the black screen from EA?
The million-dollar question is when EA will get this black screen fully squashed so affected PC players can finally enjoy FIFA 23. While there‘s no definitive ETA, we can make an educated guess based on a few key factors:
- EA‘s public acknowledgment of the issue and stated commitment to fixing it
- The inclusion of crash fixes in FIFA 23‘s first big patch, Title Update #1
- The severity of the black screen completely blocking players from the game
- EA‘s turnaround time for major post-launch bug fixes in previous FIFA titles
Putting all this together, I expect we‘ll see a concerted effort from EA to resolve the primary causes of the black screen within the next few weeks as they roll out the next couple patches. It‘s such a high-priority issue that affects such a core part of the game (i.e. launching it at all) that EA can‘t afford to let it languish.
Community manager EA_Aljo posted on September 30:
"The team is aware of the crash issues that some of our PC players are experiencing and we are investigating these reports. We want to get everyone back into the game as quickly as possible. We will continue to provide updates on this issue through this thread as they become available."
As frustrating as the wait is, this kind of direct communication and ownership is reassuring. You can bet there are some stressed engineers at EA Vancouver and Romania working on reproducing and analyzing crash logs to pin down the culprits.
The recently released Title Update #1 includes a fix for an "Anti-cheat launcher error". While it‘s unclear if this resolves the main black screen, it at least shows that PC crash fixes are in active development. I‘d expect the upcoming Title Update #2 to take even more direct aim at the remaining crash scenarios.
What does this rocky launch mean for the future of FIFA 23 and EA Sports FC?
In the grand scheme, the black screen debacle probably won‘t crater FIFA 23‘s sales or drive away a massive number of players in the long run. The FIFA brand is a juggernaut, with FIFA 22 selling 9.1 million copies and the Ultimate Team mode raking in billions of dollars. The gameplay improvements in FIFA 23 are getting rave reviews from critics and fans alike, which should outweigh the rough technical edges for most.
That said, it‘s not a great look for one of gaming‘s most important franchises to stumble so hard on the technical side at launch. The longer the black screen persists unfixed, the more likely it is to erode goodwill and leave a sour taste for loyal fans. We‘ve already seen review scores tank on Steam and social media sentiment turn ugly.
With the impending rebrand to EA Sports FC next year, EA has even more reason to prove they can deliver a polished product out of the gate. They‘ll need to earn players‘ trust that switching to a new identity doesn‘t mean compromising on basic functionality and technical chops. Especially on PC, which represents a major growth opportunity as cross-play becomes the norm.
The elephant in the room is also the renewed competition EA will soon face in the soccer sim genre from rivals like UFL. If FIFA/EA Sports FC can‘t get a handle on launch stability, it risks giving upstarts a nice PR layup. No pressure!
Realistically, I don‘t see the black screen (or even a delay in fixing it) as much more than a minor speedbump for the FIFA juggernaut. Most casual fans will move on as soon as their game is loading again. But it‘s absolutely something to learn from and prioritize for the next installment. No amount of slick new animations will matter if players can‘t get past the main menu.
Wrapping up
The dreaded FIFA 23 black screen has thrown a wrench into an otherwise exciting next-gen debut for the series on PC. What should have been a triumphant showcase of cutting-edge visuals and features has been overshadowed by a stubborn crash bug that‘s left far too many unable to play at all.
While EA works on identifying and patching out the conflict between FIFA 23, the new Frostbite version, and errant PC hardware/software configurations, those affected should focus on the few troubleshooting steps that have found consistent success. Disconnecting USB peripherals, especially racing wheels, updating GPU drivers, and repairing game files are your best bets for a black screen fix while we wait for a more permanent solution.
If you‘ve exhausted all the DIY tricks and still can‘t get FIFA 23 to run, don‘t suffer in silence! Be sure to submit a detailed report to EA Help so they can investigate your specific crash scenario. The more data points they have, the quicker they can narrow down on root causes and ship a fix to the masses. Strength in numbers and all that.
The good news is the FIFA 23 black screen will almost certainly be squashed in the near future. EA has already shown they‘re taking the issue seriously and marshalling resources towards addressing PC crashes and compatibility woes. The game is simply too big to not make resolving these blockers a development team priority.
In the meantime, stay tuned to official EA channels for the latest updates on patch timing and crash fixes. You can also keep an eye on community hubs like the FIFA subreddit or EA Answers HQ, where users are great about sharing newfound workarounds or configuration tweaks. While it‘s undoubtedly frustrating to be locked out of a hyped game at launch, especially one you‘ve paid big bucks for, patience and persistence will eventually win out.
Here‘s to hoping the FIFA 23 black screen will soon be nothing more than a distant memory, and we can all get back to scoring bangers and building our Ultimate Team of dreams. The virtual pitch awaits!
