I am having the same issue.  I have no solution for you.  But I am trying to reboot and try again.

Edit: still going on.  Rebooted and even tried an earlier save. I get about 3 turns and it crashes again.

Ok, Started a new character... played for a couple hundred turns. Same issue.

I love the game, but I'm going to be a little cheesed if I can't even finish it.

Can we get any response from the devs or help desk or anything about submitting a bug report, or info on an update or a quick fix or something?

Edit: Ok, just to update: I installed the Day 0 update and it's still mucking up. Seriously Stardock, WTF?

The next update may fix it.  I mentions a memory leak on 64 bit systems.  I was able to complete smaller game today.  We shall see.

I had the same issue..but the day 0 update fixed mine so i dont know what to tell you.

Im also using vista 64bit , Did you make sure your video drivers are up to date?

It does appear to be the memory leak everyone is talking about. The best way I know to fix it at this point is just to keep an eye out for the warning signs and autosave a lot. The problem is momentarily fixed just by shutting down the computer and rebooting it. That and the fact that it only happens after a couple hours of continuous play makes me feel that it really isn't that big of a deal.

Hopefully the patch fixed it, but I just wish it hadn't made my prior saves worthless. Going to hang on to them at the moment and hope another patch restores them.

Well, on my 64 bit Win 7 machine, I continue to have lockup after only 8 or 10 moves in a battle senario.  These are with the latest update installed.  Only CTL-ALT-DEL and killing the process gets me out.  Similar lockups have now happened in several other Elemental games I have attempted.  I have yet to finish one game.  This problem needs to be addressed.

I am running 1.06 version of the game and crash a few turns into the game, can't even get playing the game at all.

I am running Windows XP SP3 with decent hardware. I was able to play just fine before the update.

I have the 1.9 version, the one that was just released and I can't get past 3 turns total.

I'm playing on a Sony Vaio, 64-bit Windows 7 with an ATI graphics card, 4 GB of RAM. No error messages, it just completely locks up my computer. Black screen of death and I have to power off.

The first game I played, I managed 3 turns, since that, I can't even get through the 1st.

And this is a finished, 50 dollar game!

Ever since I updated Elemental to the newest version, I cannot get the game to launch.  Whenever I try to launch the game, it loads the initial start page, the one with the dragon, and then the game locks up.  Is anyone else having this problem?  Can anyone tell me how to fix it?

sometimes it takes FOR EEEEEEEEEEEVER to get past the dragon screen.  if you have 2 computers, you can pass the time by playing something on the other one.

memory leak error here after few hours of play all the time, i also get the lock up in battles alot, but you can get around them by clicking auto resolve after the lock up, as long as you are sure you will win. using vista 32bit newest drivers. 

Dinoz669 - you may want to post in the elemental sub-forum for more immediate assistance (since nobody from inside the elemental forums can actually see threads posted in the general stardock games forum without extra navigation)

I'd also like to point out that posting in a bug thread started in august for this game is a bit old to still be used for current memory leaks since some of the old symptoms might be for other memory leaks that have been fixed already.