My Little Adventure with 4b538e50 in 2k22
Alright, let me tell you about this weird thing that happened back when I was really into NBA 2K22. There’s this string of characters, 4b538e50, that got stuck in my head because, man, it caused me some grief for a while.
So, I was spending a lot of time in MyCareer, you know, grinding badges, playing games, the usual stuff. Everything was running smoothly for weeks, maybe months. Then, out of nowhere, the game started crashing. Not all the time, but often enough to be super annoying. Especially when it happened right at the end of a key game. Ugh.
The weird part was this code, 4b538e50. Sometimes, when it crashed to desktop, I’d catch a glimpse of an error message, or maybe I found it digging through some log files later, I don’t remember exactly. But that specific code popped up. Naturally, the first thing I did was try to search online. Found basically nothing useful. Just a few random forum posts with people having different issues.
Digging In
So, I figured I had to sort this out myself. Here’s what I tried, pretty much in this order:
- Verified the game files through Steam. You know, the standard first step. It downloaded a small file, but nope, crashes continued.
- Updated my graphics drivers. Always a good idea, right? Did that. Still crashed.
- Messed with the in-game graphics settings. Lowered everything, turned off fancy stuff. Didn’t seem to make a difference. The game ran smoother maybe, but still crashed eventually, showing that same stupid 4b538e50 hint sometimes.
- Checked my PC temps. Everything looked cool. Wasn’t overheating.
- Thought maybe some other software was interfering. Closed everything running in the background. Antivirus, chat apps, everything. Still no luck.
I was getting pretty frustrated. I even considered reinstalling the whole game, which is a pain because it’s huge. But before I did that, I decided to try one last thing.
The Fix, Kinda?
I remembered the crashes often happened during post-game highlights or when transitioning back to the MyCareer neighborhood. It felt like it was related to loading or maybe some specific animation sequence. On a whim, I went into the game settings again, looking for anything related to replays or presentation.
I found some setting related to ‘Action Replays’ or something similar. I think it was set to ‘Often’ by default. I just switched it to ‘Never’. I also turned off some other minor presentation fluff, like the special camera angles during timeouts. I wasn’t super hopeful, but I had nothing to lose.
And you know what? The crashes stopped. Like, completely. I played for hours that evening, finished several games, walked around the neighborhood, and nothing. Solid as a rock. That weird 4b538e50 error never showed up again.
Why did turning off replays fix a crash related to that specific code? I honestly still have no clue. Maybe it was some weird conflict with my specific hardware and how the game handled those replay files or rendering. Maybe 4b538e50 was an internal ID for that replay module, who knows. The important thing was, my game was playable again.
It wasn’t the most technical fix, just flipping a switch in the settings. But man, figuring that out after days of troubleshooting felt pretty good. Sometimes it’s the simple stuff, right? So yeah, that was my little dance with 4b538e50 back in 2k22. A weird little bit of tech trouble I managed to stumble through.
