Unsupported Image Format crash start up

Been wanting to play Sunrider Liberation Day for a while now but I have had this problem when starting it up.
The game will being to startup with steam when its window pops up it will immidiatly close and show a crash log.
[This is the crash log I get every time I start it up]

I'm sorry, but an uncaught exception occurred.



While running game code:

File "game/init_characters.rpy", line 206, in script

init python:

File "game/init_characters.rpy", line 269, in <module>

CharacterSprite(*element_list).init_images()

File "game/classes.rpy", line 4016, in init_images

sprite_dimensions = Image(self.body).load().get_size()

error: Unsupported image format



-- Full Traceback ------------------------------------------------------------



Full traceback:

File "D:\MyGames\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Sunrider Liberation Day\renpy\bootstrap.py", line 281, in bootstrap

renpy.main.main()

File "D:\MyGames\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Sunrider Liberation Day\renpy\main.py", line 401, in main

game.context().run(node)

File "game/init_characters.rpy", line 206, in script

init python:

File "D:\MyGames\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Sunrider Liberation Day\renpy\ast.py", line 805, in execute

renpy.python.py_exec_bytecode(self.code.bytecode, self.hide, store=self.store)

File "D:\MyGames\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Sunrider Liberation Day\renpy\python.py", line 1461, in py_exec_bytecode

exec bytecode in globals, locals

File "game/init_characters.rpy", line 269, in <module>

CharacterSprite(*element_list).init_images()

File "game/classes.rpy", line 4016, in init_images

sprite_dimensions = Image(self.body).load().get_size()

File "D:\MyGames\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Sunrider Liberation Day\renpy\display\im.py", line 529, in load

surf = renpy.display.pgrender.load_image(renpy.loader.load(self.filename), self.filename)

File "D:\MyGames\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Sunrider Liberation Day\renpy\display\pgrender.py", line 142, in load_image

surf = pygame.image.load(f, renpy.exports.fsencode(filename))

File "pygame_sdl2/image.pyx", line 86, in pygame_sdl2.image.load (gen\pygame_sdl2.image.c:1574)

error: Unsupported image format



Windows-8-6.2.9200

Ren'Py 6.99.8.959

Release 3.01


I have done the following to remedy the situation.
1. verify game cache
2. Complete Re-install of the game
3. Updated/Re-Installed with the various betas [The report above came up with each branch]
4. screamed in utter frustration at how I can't figure out the problem [all while doing a montage to Two steps from hell- Protectors of earth]

I hope anyone can help me fix the issue.