@Moderator if this post is better housed in 'Ask A Dev', feel free to move. I wasn't sure. I returned to SC a few weeks ago for the first time since 3.14. I found a lot to like, with many new ships, gameplay loops and areas to explore. One thing that hadn't changed was the awful performance on my aging workstation, so after a week of struggling, I upgraded some key components (7800X3D, 650E, 32gb DDR5) and bought a new flight stick (Gladiator NXT EVO). I even sold a somewhat rare ship on the sc_trades Reddit and upgraded to a better starter package. I set up the new rig and re-installed SC this week and have been unable to launch since. Summarizing my installation attempt: Wouldn't install, error 5021. The only fix I could find involved a manual registry edit. No other game ever written has struggled with this issue, but SC does and I wanted to keep playing, so I went ahead and did it against my better judgement (forcing the OS to misidentify sector size of an SSD degrades performance, especially for small writes). It locked up my system boot sequence and required a BIOS delete of the primary SSD and re-installation of Windows 11. Because I'm an idiot, I tried again and this time the registry edit did allow the installer to finish without bricking my system. Launch! Error, "Easy Anti Cheat Not Installed". I manually installed from the file system. Launch again! Error, "SC quit unexpectedly, error 3221225477". Googled to find that's an issue related to EAC still not working. Flashed BIOS. Ensured latest audio and video drivers. Tried to update Samsung SSD firmware, but it was already the latest. Manually deleted EAC directory under SC/LIVE. Re-installed, Verified. Lit two sticks of incense and sacrificed a live rooster. Nothing works. It simply won't launch. I understand the game is still alpha and likely will be for many years still. But it's a hair's-breadth short of one billion in funding, more than any game ever. More even than even the biggest Hollywood blockbusters. My system is decent now but hardly "cutting edge" such that it wouldn't yet be supported. I haven't encountered these sorts of installation problems in any game since I used to have to manually edit autoexec.bat and config.sys to free up a few more KB of my available 1mb RAM. The SC devs are obviously incredibly skilled. So why is SC such an incredible pain in the ass to even install? More than any game for me since literally the 1980s? Between the upgraded system and joystick, I spent $900 last week specifically so I could better enjoy this game, and it will not even launch. I'm 55 years old. I have 8 grandchildren that get first dibs on my time. This whole experience has left me feeling extremely agitated, dejected and petty. Why am I even wasting my time on a horribly-broken, flying-by-the-seat-of-its-pants product unlikely to launch until I'm at retirement age? Shouldn't I have better things to do? Probably, but I'm a sucker for space sims. Technical advice, moral support and "OK Boomer" jokes gladly accepted (though I'm Gen X, not Boomer!).