Facing Those Annoying Anti-Cheat Errors
Okay guys, let’s talk Marvel Rivals and the stupid kernel anti-cheat errors. Mine started crashing the game like crazy after the last patch. Game launches, splash screen pops up, then BAM – crash report window shows “Anti-Cheat Kernel Error”. Super frustrating. Felt like throwing my keyboard. Did the basic stuff first: restarted my PC, restarted Steam, verified game files through Steam. Guess what? No change. Still crashing like it owes me money.
Trying the Obvious Fixes
My next move? Hunting down conflicting software. Remembered I had some RGB controller apps running for my keyboard and mouse. Totally forgot about those guys working in the background. So I went down my system tray icons, one by one:
- Quit Corsair iCUE completely.
- Made sure Razer Synapse wasn’t doing anything sneaky.
- Even closed MSI Afterburner, even though I wasn’t overclocking right then.
- Did a hard shutdown on Discord’s overlay – that thing causes drama sometimes.
Launched the game again. Held my breath… splash screen… login… then the crash. Still nada. Same kernel anti-cheat junk. Sigh. Felt stuck.
The Deeper Dive – Drivers & Anti-Cheat Reset
Time to roll up my sleeves. Went straight to Device Manager:
- Looked under “Display adapters”, right-clicked my GPU (Nvidia for me), hit “Update driver”. Used the “Search automatically” option. Got lucky, found one newer.
- Scrolled down to “System devices”, found the anti-cheat service (it has a specific name, you’ll recognize it), right-clicked -> “Update driver”. Again, auto-search. Did its thing.
Figured, why not? Decided to reinstall the anti-cheat module itself. Popped open Steam, found Marvel Rivals in my library, right-clicked -> “Manage” -> “Browse local files”. Inside the game folder, hunted for the anti-cheat installer (usually an .exe file sitting in its own folder). Found it, double-clicked, got the repair/reinstall option. Selected “Repair”. It did its thing, closed.
Crossing My Fingers and Launching
Okay, deep breath time. Double-clicked the Marvel Rivals shortcut again. Watched the anti-cheat loader screen pop up – held longer than usual this time. Then, the splash screen appeared… then the login screen actually loaded! Quickly punched in my credentials. Felt that laggy, hold-your-breath moment… and BAM! Finally made it to the lobby screen. No crash! Jumped straight into the training area just to be sure. Ran around, shot stuff – smooth as butter. Huge relief.
What Finally Did the Trick?
Honestly, hard to pin it on just one thing since I did a few. But if I had to bet? That anti-cheat repair + the updated GPU driver combo probably sealed the deal. Closing down RGB apps didn’t fix it for me, but it’s a common culprit – definitely worth trying first. The system device driver update for the anti-cheat service might have been key too. Either way, worked. Back to blasting heroes! Hope this helps you guys avoid tearing your hair out.