Talk:Tech Support

Bitdefender Advanced Threat Defense Blocking HorizonXI Launch

Here is a new section I propose adding under "Bootloader Problems,".

Bitdefender Advanced Threat Defense Blocking HorizonXI Launch

The bootloader window opens briefly and immediately closes when using Bitdefender.

If you are using Bitdefender and pressing Play HorizonXI / Launch causes a command prompt or console window to flash briefly before closing, Bitdefender Advanced Threat Defense may be blocking HorizonXI's boot process. The HorizonXI Launcher itself may appear to work normally, but the game will not open because Bitdefender is blocking one of the underlying boot executables.

This can happen even if HorizonXI has been reinstalled, installed to a different drive, run as administrator, or if legacy Windows components such as DirectPlay have already been enabled. Simply disabling Bitdefender may also not resolve the issue.

To fix this, add Advanced Threat Defense exceptions in Bitdefender for the actual HorizonXI boot executables, not just the launcher:

• ashita-cli.exe
• horizon-loader.exe

The horizon-loader.exe file is usually located inside your HorizonXI installation folder under:

Game\bootloader\horizon-loader.exe

Make sure you are adding exceptions for ashita-cli.exe and horizon-loader.exe, not only for the HorizonXI Launcher. After adding these exceptions, restart the launcher and try launching the game again.