Well i it started two days ago with the initial install of both Empire and APE. it acted up at first but i eventually got it to load the game. Yesterday i booted it up and it was doing the load screen/black screen thing but i waited and it eventually went to game. I left my session and when i came back to load it up again, it just did that thing again. I left it alone but it went on for about 15-20 minutes. i gave up and decided a fresh install of both game and mod would be the best course of action. So here I am! i reinstalled the game just now and am awaiting a response in the general discussion thread before I install APE. after that, i can tell you if the problem persists. thank you