Disc. I like having physical copies, especially when the game is absurdly large. I have never had a problem with Steam before, this is the first time, really.

Also, not terribly surprised it would be Bethesda that did the QA. Solid games? Sure, but buggy as hell. Wish this one would have gotten the continuous patches their other games get.

You have tried deleting the video folder so next is set the shortcut to admin.

To do this go into the Steam directory, then steamapps, then common and find the RAGE folder. Go into the folder and right click on Rage.exe and select properties then click the compatability tab and put a check in the box at the bottom that says run as administrator and then click apply. Try starting it again from Steam.

Avast has a game mode if my mind serves me right from when I last used it about a year ago. It was stopping a lot of my games from starting up in the way you are describing your current situation. Right click the Avast logo by your clock and select game mode. See if that does anything.

I just use Microsoft Security Essentials on my machine now as quite a few of the AV programs can cause issues with gaming. Norton is REALLY intrusive and a bit of a resource hog, AvG pops up constantly saying game exe files are viruses as does Avira and Avast has a habit of sandboxing game files stopping things from working.

Yep, done those too.

Check in the sandbox and see if there are any files in there, if there are you need to tell it to release them and not monitor them. Try the game again after doing this.

Next up, I know this is a bit harsh but actually uninstall Avast, then restart and try starting rage. I honestly think that your issue is with the AV

I've already set it to exclude Rage. Argh, it's getting late, I'll probably hold off on uninstalling my AV until tomorrow. I'll report back when I do.

From what I just read, you encountered a problem verifying the cache and have not resolved it. Not surprisingly then, the game continues to crash. Pursuing anything else until this problem is solved is wasting your time.

What I would do at this point is uninstall the game in Steam. Then I would go into the steamapps folder, etc. and manually delete the folder the game was installed to - it will still be there.

After doing the above, I would redownload and install the game and try again. If it fails, I would try to verify the cache again. If that fails I would send a support ticket into Valve indicating what you have done and the fact that you are unable to get the cache to properly verify.

They will send you back a form letter with instructions that include stuff you've already tried probably but may also have some steps you haven't. I'd try them, etc. and if it doesn't work I would then submit another support ticket requesting a refund on the game as Steam is unable to verify cache and provide you with a working purchase.

There's no point in doing any other troubleshooting when you know the game isn't even properly installed.

By the way, I would highly recommend removing Avast from the equation when you reinstall RAGE. If Avast does not offer you an easy way to COMPLETELY disable it, then uninstall it to be sure and don't reinstall it until you have been able to verify the cache, defragment the game and try running it to see if you get another crash out of a correctly installed game.

If the game is correctly installed, the cache verifies fine and it still crashes with Avast uninstalled COMPLETELY disabled (not just the sandbox thingy - all of it) then it is time to stop banging your head against the wall on this one and get a refund so you can spend your time having some fun.

I hate to say it but I have done it too. There is a time when it is time to abandon ship because it is more headache and time than it is worth for one game with so many other working ones to enjoy.

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2155388

just google, lots of people seem to have crashes and more likely its a driver thing.

His game isn't properly installed. That needs to get fixed before bothering with anything else in any case.

perhaps but one should always have the latests video card drivers too regardless

You might want to read the OP before suggesting things where he said, "I've updated the drivers to the ones recommended,"

If it's crashing during the intro, could be a problem with the Bink decoder. Give this a try: go into Steam, right click and open up properties. Somewhere in there is a thing about command line options. Put this in there:

+set com_skipIntroVideo 1

You won't be missing much - just the Bethesda and ID logos.

Well, I uninstalled Avast, uninstalled Rage, reinstalled Rage, and I'm still having the same problem with it not fetching the required bits when I verify the cache. I'm going to send a support ticket, would this be a Rage issue or a Steam issue?

That sounds very much like a Steam issue if it cannot fully download the game. If cache verify is coming up with stuff missing, it didn't download everything or some part of it was corrupt and needs to be replaced. I'm surprised it is still failing to do this.

What firewall do you use? I'm wondering if maybe you need to open some port or ports for Steam possibly although I'll admit that seems a shot in the dark if you've never had trouble with any other game. Still, when you are stuck it is worth brainstorming and trying everything you can think of. Sometimes I've accidentally stumbled upon solutions doing this.

If you use a third party firewall, you might try temporarily disabling it to see if verify cache works then or not.

Steam is allowed through the firewall, I just checked. I already sent off the support ticket, but not as a Steam one, so I guess I can look forward to a bit of a wait.

"not a steam one?" The problem is with Steam not downloading the whole game though. That's why verify cache keeps reporting stuff is missing.