Whenever I hit the play button for 1.7.2 the game crashes and for any older updates the game just shuts down; no crash report is given

there is a random crash that my game has only had today; never done this before. It is making gameplay impossible to me and I would like further information on how to fix it

here is what the game launcher says whenever I hit the play button

---- Minecraft Crash Report ----
// Hey, that tickles! Hehehe!

Time: 12/4/13 11:20 AM
Description: Initializing game

java.lang.NullPointerException: Initializing game
at azd.a(SourceFile:502)
at azd.Z(SourceFile:340)
at azd.e(SourceFile:689)
at net.minecraft.client.main.Main.main(SourceFile:103)

A detailed walkthrough of the error, its code path and all known details is as follows:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

– Head –
Stacktrace:
at azd.a(SourceFile:502)
at azd.Z(SourceFile:340)

– Initialization –
Details:
Stacktrace:
at azd.e(SourceFile:689)
at net.minecraft.client.main.Main.main(SourceFile:103)

– System Details –
Details:
Minecraft Version: 1.7.2
Operating System: Windows 8 (x86) version 6.2
Java Version: 1.7.0_40, Oracle Corporation
Java VM Version: Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (mixed mode, sharing), Oracle Corporation
Memory: 2527168 bytes (2 MB) / 26808320 bytes (25 MB) up to 518979584 bytes (494 MB)
JVM Flags: 2 total; -XX:HeapDumpPath=MojangTricksIntelDriversForPerformance_javaw.exe_minecraft.exe.heapdump -Xmx512M
AABB Pool Size: 0 (0 bytes; 0 MB) allocated, 0 (0 bytes; 0 MB) used
IntCache: cache: 0, tcache: 0, allocated: 0, tallocated: 0
Launched Version: 1.7.2
LWJGL: 2.9.0
OpenGL: ~_ERROR~ RuntimeException: No OpenGL context found in the current thread.
Is Modded: Probably not. Jar signature remains and client brand is untouched.
Type: Client (map_client.txt)
Resource Packs: []
Current Language: ~_ERROR~ NullPointerException: null
Profiler Position: N/A (disabled)
Vec3 Pool Size: ~_ERROR~ NullPointerException: null
Anisotropic Filtering: Off (1)