Crossfire not loading after HGW

Hi, I've seen a ton of other topics similar to mine but none of them were this exact problem and I'd rather not bump a topic from half a year ago.

I've got a fresh install of Crossfire that I downloaded last night, I'm on Windows XP MCE 32bit, my Internet Explorer version is 6, and I've got ports 16666, 13008, and 10009 TCP & UDP forwarded through my router.

When I click on the Crossfire icon, it provides me with the pre-game news screen. After I hit "Start Game", the patcher appears for a second, disappears, X-TRAP appears for a second, disappears, HGW Game Watcher appears and loads until 93% "Step 10", then disappears.

Then nothing, no Crossfire login screen, no blank screen, no error messages. Just nothing.

I did this again, this time keeping an eye on the Processes tab in Task Manager. HGWC.exe shows up when HGW is loading, then when HGW goes away, crossfire.exe appears for a second then disappears, while HGWC.exe remains in the processes.

Help?