Oh that's weird, the game can't find the maps. and your specs are overqualified for this game LOL
You sound like you know what you're doing here, so I'm not going to go step by step with all this:
Let's start by deleting the FeralHeart folder completely from your C: Drive, and grab a new copy of the installer
heres mine. Install it again.
What rendering system are you using? Direct X is the recommended one, if you're OpenGL then switch to DirectX.
Usually the black void is caused when your character is in a map that doesn't exist anymore. But as you said there's no old version of FH to mess things up and you reset your characters. I'm sure you did, but did you also hit the GO HOME button too? I don't think it's that, especially since you have void 24/7/365 days a week even in the character creator.
If the above doesn't work then will you take a screenshot of this folder:
C:\FeralHeart\media\terrains\
fhmapsI guess it wouldn't hurt to make sure everything is in there.