Tinker causes lsass.exe process to run @ 50%

[ikjadoon]

Hi! I just installed the latest Vista Ultimate Extras, one being a game called Tinker. Whenever I open the game (through shortcut, Game Explorer, or direct .exe file), nothing pops up on the desktop, no splash screen, no reason to believe that I even clicked anything.

However, opening up Task Manager shows that indeed the game has opened, but takes maybe 2% CPU usage. More importantly, some service named LSASS.EXE jumps up to 50% CPU usage, on both cores. As soon as I end the Tinker.exe process, LSASS.EXE goes back down to 0-1% CPU usage.

I have run AVG 8.0 Free AV's "Scan Whole Computer", Windows Defender's "Full Scan", and the Malicious Removal Tool. None, and I repeat, none found any evidence of anything dangerous, minus some tracking cookies in AVG. All came through clean. For the past few days, AVG actually didn't auto-start on booting for some reason, but I just did a reinstall and it is working again. I don't know what's going on, I'm usually pretty up-to-date on my Windows Update; the worst thing I did was tell it to ask me before it installed updates, but so far, I've let it install all of them (trying to stop a pesky Media Center update from coming through).

If anyone knows anything that can help me, that would be great! Thanks!

~Ibrahim~

EDIT: If left open long enough, the game starts to open. I see the top bar and only the "Help" menu does anything. lsass.exe drops back down to 0-2%, however. There is something stopping the game for at least 10 minutes and then not fully launching.