Inactivity on the map crashes the game

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Targ Collective
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Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Sat, 27. May 23, 19:13

If I go AFK on a map, the game crashes. Not freezes, I'm getting booted out of the application. I'm testing to find the scope of this bug, to see if it is map-specific.

Current testing is inactivity while the map is not showing. I'll test activity periods on the map last.

I've noticed dancing positions on the map, ships displacing in a scatter, so it could be linked to that.

I'm running AMD and Nvidia which I know it a touchy combination for this game. I've recently upgraded to the latest AMD driver so it could be a compatibility glitch with that.

Specs and save included, as I have learned you prefer.

https://uploadnow.io/f/XfKqSM4

N.B If I don't linger on the map the game AFKs fine so I think there's a CTD memory leak in the map code somewhere. I would have no idea how to find or fix that, if you could tell me how to find a crash log I'd be happy to upload one.
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Targ Collective
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Mon, 29. May 23, 22:57

My testing on AFK without the map showing is longterm stable. This crash is map-specific.

EDIT: I'm going to do a map activity dive soon. I suspect it's a redraw bug, and if I keep interacting on the map without the crash that makes it more likely. If you can't find the duplicate data causing this - which I suspect is the problem - then resetting cache and doing a redraw every five minutes or so could be a way forwards. I know that needing that fosters bad habits, and yes X4 is a game that benefits highly from optimisation, but a hang every five minutes on the map is better if it comes with no crashes.

My test environment that most reliably crashes is having modules queued for construction folded out on the Mercury stations under construction, which should be a test environment you can do from the linked save. I apologise for not being more precise in the original report.
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Tue, 30. May 23, 04:02

N.B I'll get more activity time on the map if I have something to do, so I'm building seven Mandalas in mercury with 140 Honshus - twenty per station. They'll each take two Trader Wing Baldrics and a Trade Rule. That's a lot of data entry time so if the map crashes while I'm doing that I'll inform you. If it does not I'll let you know.

Triple posting is stretching good manners, so if you wish to monitor my testing I'll edit this post with my findings. I've taken the risk of being told off because I believe you would prefer this bug report to have this update visible for your convenience. I'm not currently using SETA because I'm trying to get the feel for the natural pace of the game. So this test might take a couple of days - I'll need the resources for the Honshus and Baldrics for my data entry test.
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Imperial Good » Tue, 30. May 23, 08:15

For this kind of issue I would recommend making a series of clear instructions to reproduce the crash reasonably reliably. Such instructions would usually include some user input to set up X4 into the correct state from a provided save file (fewer is better to avoid human error), an estimate of time to wait for the bug/crash to occur (minutes? Hours? days?!) and how reliably it can be reproduced by doing that sequence (always, sometimes, very rarely, e.t.c).

I recommend checking GPU resource usage, power usage and thermals around the time of the crash. This is to rule out it being a hardware related problem, such as instability after an extended period of high power operation.

Targ Collective
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Wed, 31. May 23, 18:01

It's an inactivity crash, so the instructions are simple. Send the map to Mercury and open the Welfare modules list on a station under construction - I was using the top left. My goal was to track station construction speed. The game started regularly crashing.

Once this is done go AFK and wait for the game to crash. If it doesn't, then you don't have the bug.

I'd happily provide the data points you ask for but it's a CTD so when the game borks it releases that data.
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by CBJ » Wed, 31. May 23, 18:10

The game produces crashdumps. Providing one of those would make things a lot easier than just asking us to leave the game to run for an indefinite period of time and hoping it will crash for us the same way it does for you.

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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by alt3rn1ty » Wed, 31. May 23, 20:19

Make sure you haven't disabled sending the Crash dumps
https://i.imgur.com/YmHvuiW.png
When the game crashes you should briefly see a little box upload the crash dump, but rarely I have noticed that the game can be frozen and prevent the crash dump upload from happening.
To be sure, have a look in the X4 Foundations\ folder where the game is installed (you should see X4.exe in there), thats where the crash dumps are created and have a name that corresponds with the date and time of the crash, upload that .dmp file to somewhere like Dropbox, and put a link in a post here to where that upload is.
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Targ Collective
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Wed, 31. May 23, 21:17

That's the information I was looking for - I thought there would be crashdumps but didn't know where to look. On it.

https://uploadnow.io/f/w0CjgDh has the whole history of my crashdumps all the way back - I figured you'd want all of them. Good luck, hope you fix this. :)
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Alan Phipps
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Alan Phipps » Wed, 31. May 23, 23:46

"That's the information I was looking for - I thought there would be crashdumps but didn't know where to look."

That's why we put how to find and provide them in the 'Please read this before posting' Sticky at the top of this forum. Yeah, I know, Sticky blindness is a really common condition. :D

Here's the relevant extract:
" .. and crash dump files (see this Wiki entry)."

Thanks for the reports. :thumb_up:
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CBJ
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by CBJ » Thu, 1. Jun 23, 09:51

Sadly the crashdumps were singularly unilluminating. The crash seems to have come from Vulkan rather than the game itself, and the only thing I can think of that might cause this would be if your screen switched itself off during the period of inactivity. Try disabling your monitor's energy-saving timer when you leave the game running.

Targ Collective
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Thu, 1. Jun 23, 13:11

That might actually be it. Thanks for taking the time to share your insights. Have a fantastic day. :)
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Targ Collective
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Re: Inactivity on the map crashes the game

Post by Targ Collective » Thu, 1. Jun 23, 14:58

I am pleased to share that I am getting better performance and better stability from disabling my computer's screen and sleep timers. Vulkan clearly has a bug around suppressing these functions that can cause what looks like memory leaks, and while I am not sure what you can do around that, your advice worked like a charm. Hoping this report will be of use to others. My apologies for not reading the stickies with more care, my retention is not what it was.

I don't know exactly what you can do to fix this, if anything, but you may find it prudent to make a recommendation for others with entirely too much time to disable monitor and computer sleep functions. There's a lot of people who run the sim overnight for example, if they have the means to do so.
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