How to Fix Pacific Drive Crashing on PC

Want to immerse yourself in the first-person driving survival game but only to find that Pacific Driver crashes on your computer a lot (sometimes with error messages)? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Luckily, here are some tried-and-true solutions you can try to get back on track without further hiccups.

Try these fixes for the Pacific Drive crashing on PC problem

You don’t have to try them all: simply work your way down the list until you find the one that does the trick to fix the Pacific Drive crashing on PC problem for you.

Ensure your computer meets the minimum system requirements
Update Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributables manually
Try to launch the game with DirectX11 or windowed mode
Verify game file integrity
Disable overlays
Clean reinstall the graphics card driver
Kill resource-hogging background applications
Add Pacific Driver to your antivirus and Windows firewall exception list

1. Ensure your computer meets the minimum system requirements

If Pacific Drive crashes very frequently a lot on your computer, one of the first things you do is to ensure that your computer meets the minimum system requirements for the game. If your machine is below or just at the requirements, you may need to upgrade your hardware for Pacific Drive to run smoothly without crashing.

Here are the requirements for Pacific Drive for your reference:

	Minimum	Recommended
OS	Windows 10 (64-bit)	Windows 10 (64-bit)
Processor	Intel Core i5 8600	Intel Core i5-10600k
Memory	16 GB RAM	16 GB RAM
Graphics	Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB	Nvidia RTX 2080/3070
DirectX	Version 12	Version 12
Storage	18 GB available space	18 GB available space

If you’re not sure how to check your computer specs, you can press the Windows key and the R key on your computer at the same time, then type msinfo32 to check your system specs in detail:

In general, Pacific Drive isn’t super demanding for your computer: as long as your processor and GPU are released after 2018, you should be good to go. Even though it does specifically say that it only runs on Intel processors, according to some gamers, should you have Intel Core i5 8600 equivalent AMD processors and Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB equivalent GPUs, Pacific Drive should run fine as well.

When you’re sure that your machine meets the system requirements to run the game, but Pacific Drive still crashes, please move on to the other fixes below.

2. Update Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributables manually

Even though Steam always makes sure that the Visual C++ libraries are updated to the latest versions when it starts, there are times when Steam falls short and fails to do the job right, therefore causing problems like Pacific Drive crashing on PCs.

To see if this is your case, you can install the Visual C++ libraries manually by visiting this link: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-US/cpp/windows/latest-supported-vc-redist?view=msvc-170

Select the right version for your computer and get the download started:

If you’re not sure which file to select here, on your keyboard, press the Windows key and the R keys together to open the Rub box. Type msinfo32 and hit Enter.

Then you should be able to see the 32-bit or 64-bit system type:

When the latest Visual C++ libraries are installed, but Pacific Drive still crashes, please move on to the next fix.

3. Try to launch the game with DirectX11 or windowed mode

Even though the game requirements ask for DirectX 12, some gamers have tested that Pacific Drive stops crashing when launched with DirectX 11. The windowed mode also helps in some players’ cases too. To see if this works for you, you can change the launch options in this way:

Launch Steam.
In the LIBRARY, right-click Pacific Drive and select Properties from the drop-down menu.
Under the launch options, add -dx11. Then save and try to launch Pacific Drive to see if it still crashes.
If Pacific Drive still crashes, try to change the command to -windowed and see if it helps.

If changing the launch options doesn’t stop Pacific Drive from crashing, please move on.

4. Verify game file integrity

Pacific Drive crashing on PC could also relate to corrupted game files, and Steam makes it very easy to fix: simply run the game file integrity verification, and the game files should then be verified. Plus, this also helps to update your game files to the latest. To do so:

Launch Steam.
In the LIBRARY, right-click Pacific Drive and select Properties from the drop-down menu.
Select the Installed Files tab and click on the Verified integrity of game files button.
Steam will verify the game’s files – this process may take several minutes.

When the verification is done, try to launch Pacific Drive again to see if it still crashes. If so, please move on.

5. Disable overlays

In-game overlays allow you to interact with friends and place orders while in the game, but this feature could use an excessive amount of computer resources, and therefore cause problems like crashes and freezes in Pacific Drive. If you’re using overlays provided by Discord, Steam or GeForce Experience, follow the instructions below to turn them off.

On Steam

Open your Steam client and navigate to the Library tab.
Right-click Pacific Drive from the game list and click Properties.
Untick Enable the Steam Overlay while in-game.

On Discord

Run Discord.
Click the cogwheel icon at the bottom of the left pane.
Click the Overlay tab and toggle off Enable in-game overlay.

On GeForce Experience

Run GeForce Experience.
Click the cogwheel icon at the upper right corner.
Scroll to toggle off In-Game Overlay.

After you disable any overlays in use, restart Pacific Drive to see if the crashing problem stops. If not, proceed to the next method.

6. Clean reinstall the graphics card driver

Another very common reason for game crashes is an outdated or faulty graphics card driver, and Pacific Drive is no exception. In this case, it’s recommended that you do a clean reinstallation of the display card driver. To do so, DDU (Display Driver Uninstaller) is usually recommended, as it can do a pretty good job removing all the older or faulty display driver files on your computer.

To do a clean reinstallation of the display card driver with DDU:

Download and search for the execution file of the display card driver from the website of your GPU manufacturer (if you don’t know what to select, please see how to do the clean installation of GPU:
- NVIDIA
- AMD
- Intel
Download DDU from the official download page. Then unzip the folder, and double-click the DDU file to further extract the execution file.
Boot your computer into Safe Mode as instructed here: Start Safe Mode using the System Configuration tool
When in Safe Mode, go to the folder where you unzip the DDU execution file. Double-click to run Display Driver Uninstaller.
Select GPU and your GPU manufacturer on the right side. Then click Clean and restart.
Your computer should restart when the old driver files for your graphics card are cleaned.
Double-click the setup file for the display card driver you’ve downloaded from step 1 to run the driver installation.
Restart your computer afterward.

If you don’t have the time, patience or skills to update the driver manually, you can do it automatically with Driver Easy. Driver Easy will automatically recognize your system and find the correct drivers for it. You don’t need to know exactly what system your computer is running, you don’t need to be troubled by the wrong driver you would be downloading, and you don’t need to worry about making a mistake when installing. Driver Easy handles it all.

You can update your drivers automatically with either the 7 days free trial or the Pro version of Driver Easy. It takes just 2 clicks, and you get full support and a 30-day money-back guarantee with the Pro version:

Download and install Driver Easy.
Run Driver Easy and click the Scan Now button. Driver Easy will then scan your computer and detect any problem drivers.
Click the Activate & Update button next to the flagged device to automatically download and install the correct version of this driver.

Or click Update All to automatically download and install the correct version of all the drivers that are missing or out of date on your system (You’ll need the Pro version for this – when you select Update All, you’ll get a prompt to upgrade. If you’re not prepared to purchase the Pro version yet, Driver Easy provides a 7-day trial at no cost, granting access to all Pro features like fast downloads and easy installation. No charges will occur until after your 7-day trial period ends.)
Restart your computer for the change to take effect.

The Pro version of Driver Easy comes with full technical support. If you need assistance, please contact Driver Easy’s support team at support@drivereasy.com.

Launch Pacific Drive again and see if the latest graphics driver helps to stop it from crashing. If this fix doesn’t work for you, try the next fix, below.

7. Kill resource-hogging background applications

If there are too many irrelevant applications running in the background, your RAM and CPU resources will be eaten up by a large chunk, not to mention that these programs could conflict with Steam. This is when problems like game crashing are prone to occur. So before you start Pacific Drive, make sure to close all unneeded applications. To do so:

Right-click the Windows taskbar and select Task Manager.
Select each resource-hogging application and click End Task to close them one by one.

Then run Pacific Drive again and see if it still crashes easily. If the problem still remains, please move on to the next fix below.

8. Add Pacific Driver to your antivirus and Windows firewall exception list

Third-party antivirus programs and/or Windows firewall restrictions are another common reason for Pacific Drive crashing on PC. This is usually because these programs can be a bit sensitive when it comes to detecting possible problematic services, and Steam and games like Pacific Drive consume a lot of memory and CPU usage when running, which could be mistaken for potential threats.

To see if this is the culprit for you, try adding Steam as an exception to your third-party antivirus application. If you’re not sure how to do it, please refer to your antivirus support page for detailed instructions.

To add Pacific Drive to the Windows firewall:

On your keyboard, press the Windows key and the R key simultaneously to open the Run box.
Type control firewall.cpl and hit Enter.
From the left navigation pane, click Allow an app or feature through Windows Defender Firewall.
Scroll down and check if Steam and Pacific Drive are on the list.
If not, click the Change settings button.
Click Allow another app….
Click Browse… and go to the installation folder for Steam and Pacific Drive.

If you don’t know what the installation folder is for your Steam, simply right-click on its shortcut and select Open file location.
Find steam.exe and click on it. Then click Open.
When it’s located, click Add.
Now make sure Steam and Pacific Drive are added to the list and tick Domain, Private, and Public. Once you’re done, click OK.