I'm trying to play Dark Souls 3 with specialk (to get HDR). It works fine vanilla but I would like to (re)play it with the Cinders mod (https://www.nexusmods.com/darksouls3/mods/310) (overhaul of the game)


when I launch with this mod active the game crashes, before I can load into the game (I hear a SpecialK error sound)

here is the log - https://pastebin.com/raw/yq1NSDLk




Anything I can do? (I tried chatgpt):


🔥 Cause of the Crash
The game Dark Souls III crashed due to an EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION (c0000005) error. This is a memory access violation, meaning the game tried to read or write to memory it didn't have access to — typically a null or invalid pointer.

📍 Crash Location
The crash occurred at this address repeatedly:
DarkSoulsIII.exe+F14C52h
This is inside:

ruby
Scaleform::Render::Matrix2x4<float>::TransformByInverse
This function is part of Scaleform, which is middleware used by many games to render user interfaces (menus, HUDs, etc.).

🧠 What That Likely Means
The game was trying to transform a UI element using an invalid matrix or pointer.

The crash happened in both the "RPCSystemThread" and "MOMainThread", which are internal engine threads responsible for system messaging and main game logic.

The rax (accumulator) and r8 registers were 0x000000000000, strongly indicating a null dereference.

Repeated crashing in the same function suggests a deterministic bug, not a random memory error.

🛠️ Possible Causes
Corrupted or missing game files (especially related to UI/menus).

Mods or overlays interfering with UI rendering (especially Special K, ReShade, etc.).

Graphics driver issues (older/incompatible version).

UI scaling problems (e.g., high DPI, ultrawide resolutions).

Save file corruption (if triggered after a specific action/menu).