GAME INFORMATION
These details are CRITICAL; DO NOT skip them or your issue may not be reviewed.
- GAME BUILD #: 25040513
- GAME PLATFORM: Steam
- OPERATING SYSTEM: Windows 11
ISSUE EXPERIENCED
It’s been ages since I’ve been able to play Age of Empires III, or any Microsoft Games from AoE series. Whenever I open the games, I receive a “tampering detected” message error, and all the menu options get grayed out and can’t be selected.
I do not use any antivirus other than Windows Defender.
I already added the game in exceptions, both in Windows Defender and Firewall.
I’m not using any cheats.
I’m not running Steam Overlay.
I already reinstalled the game many times, in different disks as well.
I already closed and logged in again in XBOX Gaming on Windows.
I’ve been looking for solutions for this problem, and it seems it’s been around since 2021. There’s even older threads complaining about it, and the only answers we get are the generic answers, like “bro have you tried to reinstall your game?”
The problem also affects Age of Empires 2, 4 and Age of Mythology.
FREQUENCY OF ISSUE
- 100% of the time
LOG FILE
File ‘Age3Log.txt’ opened at Tue Sep 29 21:02:15 2026
===============================================================
PreGame 180: ************* Memory Report ***************
PreGame 180: There is 59 percent of memory in use.
PreGame 180: There are 16683136 total KB of physical memory.
PreGame 180: There are 6707284 free KB of physical memory.
PreGame 180: There are 29790336 total KB of paging file.
PreGame 180: There are 18447768 free KB of paging file.
PreGame 180: There are 137438953344 total KB of virtual memory.
PreGame 180: There are 135286970168 free KB of virtual memory.
PreGame 180: There are 0 free KB of extended memory.
PreGame 180: *******************************************
PreGame 2760:
PreGame 2760: ************* VRAM Report ***************
PreGame 2760: Device: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060
PreGame 2760: Budget (MB): 5177
PreGame 2760: Used (MB): 5
PreGame 2760: Available (MB): 5172
PreGame 2760: *****************************************
PreGame 2760:
PreGame 2760: adapter 0: (NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060)
PreGame 2760: adapter 0: dedicated video 1938817024 dedicated system 0 shared system 4246798336
PreGame 2760: adapter 1: (Microsoft Basic Render Driver)
PreGame 2760: adapter 1: dedicated video 0 dedicated system 0 shared system 4246798336
PreGame 2838: ------------ Hardware stats ------------
PreGame 2838: CPU Speed: 3600
CPU Cores: 16
SysRAM: 16 GiB
VideoRAM: 6234 MiB
Video Score: 593159
Video Desc: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060
PreGame 2838: ------------ Hardware stats ------------
PreGame 4413: Game CRC version set to 1506858169 (0x59D0D4B9)
PreGame 4465: Account Event - New State: AttemptingLogIn, Old State: Invalid, Last Error ID: None
PreGame 4487: startGame : Sign In SUCCESS
PreGame 4487: User folder id: 76561198153016478
PreGame 4590: ------------------------------------------------------------
PreGame 4590: Version: 100.19.18309.0 (608133)
PreGame 4590: ------------------------------------------------------------
PreGame 5935: Mod CRC version set to 0 (0x00000000)
PreGame 5935: Enabled Mods: None
PreGame 6056: Game locale: PortugueseBrazil
PreGame 9193: @@: 6807262642423286383
PreGame 17757: SetupMovie: 1920 x 1080 c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\aoe3de\Game\Movies\AOE_Microsoft.bk2
PreGame 18375: Data CRC version set to -232953680 (0xF21D68B0)
PreGame 20446: SetupMovie: 1920 x 1080 c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\aoe3de\Game\Movies\Tantalus.bk2
PreGame 22887: SetupMovie: 1920 x 1080 c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\aoe3de\Game\Movies\ForgottenEmpires.bk2
PreGame 23398: SetupMovie: 3840 x 1638 c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\aoe3de\Game\Movies\AOE_WorldsEdge.bk2
PreGame 24900: Game startup complete (24.86 sec)!
PreGame 24900: ------------------------------------------------------------
PreGame 25927: SetupMovie: 1920 x 1080 c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\aoe3de\Game\Movies\IntroMovie.bk2
PreGame 27445: startGame : End
PreGame 56277: [D3D11Manager] resizeBuffers(1920, 1080) – BEGIN
PreGame 56277:
PreGame 56277: ************* VRAM Report ***************
PreGame 56277: Device: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060
PreGame 56277: Budget (MB): 5177
PreGame 56277: Used (MB): 243
PreGame 56277: Available (MB): 4934
PreGame 56277: *****************************************
PreGame 56277:
PreGame 56277: ************* Memory Report ***************
PreGame 56277: There is 65 percent of memory in use.
PreGame 56277: There are 16683136 total KB of physical memory.
PreGame 56277: There are 5751768 free KB of physical memory.
PreGame 56277: There are 29790336 total KB of paging file.
PreGame 56277: There are 16796088 free KB of paging file.
PreGame 56277: There are 137438953344 total KB of virtual memory.
PreGame 56277: There are 135282926820 free KB of virtual memory.
PreGame 56277: There are 0 free KB of extended memory.
PreGame 56277: *******************************************
PreGame 56281: [D3D11Manager] resizeBuffers(1920, 1080) – END
PreGame 56502: APregame : EnterMode : Start
PreGame 56502: ************* Memory Report ***************
PreGame 56502: There is 65 percent of memory in use.
PreGame 56502: There are 16683136 total KB of physical memory.
PreGame 56502: There are 5712572 free KB of physical memory.
PreGame 56502: There are 29790336 total KB of paging file.
PreGame 56502: There are 16465640 free KB of paging file.
PreGame 56502: There are 137438953344 total KB of virtual memory.
PreGame 56502: There are 135282682848 free KB of virtual memory.
PreGame 56502: There are 0 free KB of extended memory.
PreGame 56502: *******************************************
PreGame 56502: APregame : EnterMode : Create Home City
PreGame 56588: APregame : EnterMode : EnterScreen : Start
PreGame 56588: APregame : EnterMode : EnterScreen : End
PreGame 56588: ModeTrack – entering mode 1 (Pregame) from mode 0 ()
PreGame 56611: APregame : EnterMode : End
PreGame 58662: Account Event - New State: LoggedIn, Old State: AttemptingLogIn, Last Error ID: None
PreGame 63814: Unlock Error - Inventory Extended:-1
PreGame 162122: ------------------------------------------------------------
PreGame 162122: shutdownGame : Start
PreGame 162129: APregame : LeaveMode : Start
PreGame 162130: ModeTrack – leaving mode 1 (Pregame) going to mode 0 ()
PreGame 162143: APregame : LeaveMode : Destroyed City
PreGame 162143: APregame : LeaveMode : End
PreGame 162153: cleanup : Start
PreGame 162323: BRandomManager::~BRandomManager(void)
PreGame 172949: cleanup : Complete
PreGame 172950: shutdownGame : Complete
PreGame 172950: ------------------------------------------------------------
