My Big Fish Game Manager doesn't want to open. Should I uninstall and re-install? Actually, maybe I should reboot my computer first but if that doesn't work? Any idea why it might stop working?

This sometimes happens to me and what I do is hit control/alt/delete to bring up the task manager and then shut down the Big Fish files running that I see there. For some reason it sometimes continues to run in the background rather than shut down when I exit the Game Manager. This may be why the Game Manager is not opening for you.

First thing I was going to suggest too... look for it in running processes.

Thank you Marian and Draclvr! That was the problem and it is fine now!

I'm glad I asked. I was thinking it was a dumb question but asking saved me some hassle!

I am glad you asked, too! It can be a bit disconcerting when it happens, but happily there's an easy fix.

I laugh when people tell me they think they are asking a dumb question about their computer! Hah! Nothing can make you feel dumber than a computer.. I tell them half the time I have no idea why something worked and it's just best to shake your head and not question it!

The Big Fish Game Manager never shuts down completely when I exit it. Usually shutting the Game Manager down in Task Manager works, but not always. The only sure way I've found is to reboot.

This bug in the Game Manager (I consider it a bug) has been present for years, and Big Fish apparently doesn't think it's worth fixing. It's one reason I prefer to start Big Fish games directly from the game exe and not from the shortcut that the Game Manager makes when you install the game.

Thanks Jenny. I may have had this happen once before but since I can't remember, I know it hasn't happened often. Unless I just never noticed it before. I only noticed it this time because it didn't open a couple of times when I exited out of a game, and I thought that was weird, so I tried to open it and couldn't.

My Big Fish Game Manager always shuts down completely when I exit it - even in Processes. Now I do start most of my games from a shortcut I make with the game.exe, but as you know, when you exit the game the Game Manager pops up anyway.

Mine never shuts down completely, no matter whether I start the Game Manager directly or from a shortcut that's made by the Game Manager when it installs a game. As I said before, the only way to be sure it's completely shut down is to reboot, because using Task Manager doesn't always shut down everything.


I always make a shortcut directly to the game exe.
The Game Manager never pops up at any time, either when starting or exiting the game, when using the shortcut that points directly to the game exe.

I'm not sure why we are getting different results.
Maybe different versions of Windows.

That's what I was going to suggest. I use a shortcut from the game.exe and the cursed GM pops up when I exit! But it always shuts down even in processes when I close it. I've checked multiple times.

Try this...
Copy the game folder to somewhere else, either another location on your hard drive or to an external drive.
Then uninstall the game using the Game Manager.
Reboot or in some other way make sure the Game Manager is closed.
Try running the game from the game .exe in the copied folder and see what happens when you exit the game.

I originally tried doing things this way (playing from a previously copied folder after uninstalling the game) because I had over 150 games on my computer and the Big Fish Game Manager was taking all year to start up -- it wanted to display all installed games by default and was taking too long to detect them. If the Game Manager doesn't know the game is there because it thinks it's been uninstalled, maybe that's why it doesn't pop up when I exit games.

With older versions of the Game Manager it made no difference whether the game was uninstalled or not -- as long as I made my own shortcut, the Game Manager wouldn't start up. But newer versions of the Game Manager may be different.

Just an FYI,
I just checked my version of the BF Game Manager and it is at version 3.3.0.2 (2.8)
Under Options, General, there is an option "Quick Exit".
Its' purpose is to "Skip the BF Game app when I exit a game".

Thank you LadyLinda.

That's the version I have but I don't have the box checked. I never even looked at the options in there until very recently. I've always thought it weird that the manager opens when I exit a game but it has never bothered me. Jenny100 explained to me that just because I don't see it open when I start or am playing a game, doesn't mean it's not open. Hasn't caused me any problems that I'm aware of so it doesn't matter to me (at this time anyway).

After years of having no problems with the Big Fish Game Manager, it recently couldn't activate games. I tried all the fixes suggested on the BFG site to no avail. Today I tried again, this time turning off the antivirus software on my computer and the game downloaded, installed and activated without a problem.

Just mentioning this solution for those having the same issue with activation.