I haven't been able to play this game either. When it does start, there are endless load screens.

i'm having this same problem and i have been doing everything i can to troubleshoot it but nothing has worked for me i cant even get into the start screen anymore >.> it just goes to launching then nothing opens and the game just says play again

Same here damn game won't launch?

Had to redo the game from the chapters portion in order for the game to work.

update: so i opened the game as admin and its says that the file XAPOFX1_4.dll was not found which i am assuming is the reasoning as to why the game will not open, even with fresh installs it still is not in the games files. I am assuming this is the same problem other people are having so i am going to look into it more and figure out how to get the file back into the game.

update and instruction fix along with the links! alright so i finally figured everything out so i hope this will work for you as it did me first and formost download both these files and put them in game folder) binaries Win32 if they are missing (i had this issue) https://www.dll-files.com/x3daudio1_7.dll.html aswell as https://www.dll-files.com/xapofx1_4.dll.html

step two, more then likely you will get the same error after that i got from running the game admin so follow this guide to fix that and download the first two as i already linked the dll files for you so you can ignore that step https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgamingtechsupport/comments/vky73k/how_to_fix_the_0xc000007b_error_in_games_ultimate/

it is long and tedious but this is what worked for me and now my game is able to launch <3

EDIT: use these steps if your game is just not launching from the steam app!

Cool instructions and wish I had them when I was playing. It would take me about 2-3 tries of trial/shut down to get it to start up correctly, which means going straight into gameplay. Truly a weird software issue

a fix for me was just completely reinstalling. WARNING this will delete any previous saves. make copies if you want to keep them. delete the game on steam. open files and go to my documents. from here go to the my games file and delete the file that says alice madness returns. reinstall the game. sorry if this is no help

right click on the game. go to properties, installed files. then verify game integrity.

Originally posted by Belle:

update and instruction fix along with the links! alright so i finally figured everything out so i hope this will work for you as it did me first and formost download both these files and put them in game folder) binaries Win32 if they are missing (i had this issue) https://www.dll-files.com/x3daudio1_7.dll.html aswell as https://www.dll-files.com/xapofx1_4.dll.html

step two, more then likely you will get the same error after that i got from running the game admin so follow this guide to fix that and download the first two as i already linked the dll files for you so you can ignore that step https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgamingtechsupport/comments/vky73k/how_to_fix_the_0xc000007b_error_in_games_ultimate/

it is long and tedious but this is what worked for me and now my game is able to launch <3

EDIT: use these steps if your game is just not launching from the steam app!

Thanks! That worked.
I downloaded dll files and installed older Direct X - that was enough for me.

was stuck with endless loading screen
changed the screen resolution to 1600, loads in 2 seconds