While starting Call of Duty: Modern Warfare on PC, I sometimes encounter a strange bug where the game crashes to the Windows desktop while the game is logging me in my account, or immediately after the game intro credits. In this respect, no error is shown and the game just crashes to the desktop. This problem has occurred to me several times.
In order to find a fix to this issue, I have extensively searched the internet. Although I have never found a definitive answer to this problem, I have been able to consistently perform a temporary fix in order to be able to start up the game and start playing.
Note that crashes to the desktop might not necessarily always be caused by the same thing. Crashes can be system dependent, which means that what worked for me might not necessarily work for you. My system is currently running on a Core i7 CPU and an Nvidia 2080 Ti. The resolution is set at 3440×1440 and I am using Windows 10 64-bit.
Update the graphics drivers
Make sure that your graphics drivers are up-to-date. If you are running an old graphics drivers, that driver might not have the latest fixes and thus might have unpatched bugs which will not play nice with the game’s engine.
Since in my case I use an Nvidia graphics card, I made sure that the drivers are up-to-date by going into Nvidia’s Geforce experience portal and checking if there are any updates.
If you have an Nvidia graphics cards, remember to choose ‘custom installation’ when updating the drivers. Then, make sure that you select ‘re-install drivers’. This will uninstall the old drivers and install the update from scratch. I have found that this method solved the crashing issues in most cases.
Turn off Nvidia’s in-game overlay
While searching on the internet, one of the suggestions I have encountered is to remove Nvidia’s overlay functionality. Since the overlay runs atop of the game, the overlay might result in a memory leak. The game would then crash due to the memory leak.
Since I do not use Nvidia’s in-game overlay feature, I have switched the feature off from Nvidia’s Geforce experience portal.
Restart your PC
The last step to do is to restart your PC. Restarting your PC ensures that your memory is cleared from any stored data that might conflict with the game’s data. Some software on your PC might be referencing to that part of the memory which the game would want to use, thus resulting in conflicts.
Open the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare again
Now it’s time to open Call of Duty: Modern Warfare again. You will notice that the game will now proceed to log you in and take you to the in-game menu. Here, you might notice a message at the top of the screen that some shaders are installing. Leave the game as is until the shaders are fully installed.
The game should work from now on. Should you encounter the crash to desktop again, make sure to check that you have the latest graphics driver again and restart your PC.