With a recent update, a large amount of Fortnite players have been hit with a crashed game and the pop-up window titled Fortnite game – Athena crash reporter. This pop-up closes the game completely and repeats every time the game is launched. Twitter is aware of this particular Athena issue with PC players but has also addressed the issue persisting with other platforms.
This common issue could be caused by a number of factors that are all remedied and diagnosed with a few simple steps. Some of the most common causes are corrupted game files, out-of-date game drivers, and running the game through old graphics programs. These issues are easily solved with a few diagnostics checks and some tweaking to your game settings.
Before you try to launch the game again to receive the same error code, let’s run through some of the ways to get back in the battle.
Verify Your Files
The first thing to do with any game crashing is to verify the files on your PC. Often files become corrupted due to a download that’s downloaded incorrectly or incomplete. If your PC is unable to properly read the files or they are in the wrong place, the program simply won’t operate as intended.
Epic Games Launcher has an inbuilt game verification tool for exactly this purpose. If you are seeing the Fortnite game Athena crash reporter it may be time to give it a go. Follow these simple instructions to do a quick verification of your files.
- Run the Epic Games Launcher
- Locate your Library
- Navigate to Fortnite
- Click the three dots on the bottom right of the image
- On the drop-down menu click Manage
- In the new window, click Verify
Once you have followed these simple steps the Epic Games Launcher will run through a verification program that checks and repairs any corrupted or missing files. If this still doesn’t fix your problem, move on to our next step.
Check And Update Video Drivers
It is a common issue that video drivers can be out of date. Most graphics cards will update themselves automatically or prompt for an update but sometimes this can be missed. An out-of-date driver will not always be compatible with the latest update to a game causing it to run badly or in the case of the Athena crash reporter, not at all. Updating drivers is a simple task and one that should be done periodically on a PC anyway. It is good to make a habit of it. Depending on your driver manufacturer you may need to navigate to their website to download the latest software. Below are the download links for each manufacturer
After downloading your driver follow these simple steps to check and update.
- Open the start menu
- Search for device manager
- Click on device manager
- Select the drop-down for Display Adapters
- Check the manufacturer of your card and download the corresponding update
- Right-click your graphics card
- Select Update and then Search for updates automatically
- The program will locate and apply your driver update
Driver updates will smooth out any bugs, optimize, and ensure all your games run properly on your PC. Routine checks are always a good idea even if everything is working well. They often help with power usage and can even add some very impressive new features. Are you still stuck with the crash reporter? Read on.
Run on DirectX11
Epic has stated that running Fortnite on DirectX12 has caused an issue for a number of players. Reverting back to the older version may be the solution for the Fortnite game Athena crash reporter issue. Follow these steps to make sure Fortnite launches on DirectX11.
- Open Epic Games Launcher
- Click on your initial at the top right corner
- Navigate to settings
- Scroll down to Fortnight and expand the drop-down
- Mark the box titled Additional Command Line Arguments
- Type d3d11, close settings, and launch Fortnite
This will cause Fortnite to run on the older version of DirectX. This won’t cause any noticeable changes to the game but may prevent the Fortnite game Athena crash reporter window from popping up and closing your game. To revert back to running the game with DirectX12 simply repeat the steps and delete the d3d11 text in the box. It is recommended to do this if this step doesn’t work.
Repair Visual Redistributables
Visual C+++ Redistributables are required to be updated to run Fortnite successfully. If they are missing or out of date the game will crash and you will be left with an error message. Updating them manually requires a quick download from the relevant website which can be found here. Follow these steps to update.
- Navigate to the previously mentioned site and download both x64 and x86 versions
- Open the file and proceed to repair, if no repair option is present select install.
- Wait for the installation or repair to be completed
- Restart your PC and relaunch Fortnite.
C+++ files are necessary to run most programs using the C+++ framework. They can be corrupted or deleted by accident so a quick check can usually fix the issue.
Hang Tight
If none of these solutions solve your problem then it may be a case of waiting for Epic to release the patch. They are aware of the problem and are reassuring people via Twitter that they are on the case and working on a fix.
It is also always worth checking through some of our other troubleshooting methods to see if they solve the problem.