What things can cause the game to freeze?

[Meira]

I've got two people reporting that the game freezes to the loading screen when they try to enter the are my mod has added to BG2. (Several players and testers have entered the same areas without any problems.) Uninstalling and re-installing didn't help to solve freezing while a crashing problem for the same area reported earlier was cleared out with it..

 

I know a bunch of things that can cause the area to crash to the desktop upon or soon after entering it, but I'm uncertain what could cause freezing. Help?

 

 

Relevant thread.

[seanas]

three usual suspects:

* corrupted/ broken .are file

* corrupted/ broken .wed file

* corrupted/ broken .cre in the .are file

 

also possible: broken .cre or .cre using broken animation called by the .bcs file.

 

if the game crashes straight to a black screen or loads approx 1/3 of the way thru the load screen, then it's related to the .are file: either the .are file itself, the associated .wed or a .cre listed as an actor in the .are.

 

if the loading screen almost finishes, it's usually script related; if it finishes but then immediately crashes - with at most a brief flash of the area in question - then it's an animation problem.

[berelinde]

Seanas, that was particularly helpful. Not that I get crashes all that often, but it's nice to have some idea what's going on inside the mysterious box.

[Avenger]

Turn logging on.

And check out baldur.err

You can also find useful hints if you try to load the area (or savegame) into dltcep.

If it works, try the 'check' button too.

[Meira]

Seanas, the error reported was the game freezing, not crashing (if that makes a difference). In my experience broken/corrupted .cre doesn't crash the area until you can see that cre, but I guess that the .cre can be broken in multiple ways.

 

The other player also reported that he can hear a windows 'chime' sound just before the freezing.

 

Turn logging on.

 

How do I do this? I'm guessing I have to edit baldur.ini?

 

You can also find useful hints if you try to load the area (or savegame) into dltcep.

If it works, try the 'check' button too.

 

I'll ask if the error reporting players can send me copies of their .are files. I already got a one savegame last night, but I didn't take a look at it yet.

[seanas]

Seanas, the error reported was the game freezing, not crashing (if that makes a difference). In my experience broken/corrupted .cre doesn't crash the area until you can see that cre, but I guess that the .cre can be broken in multiple ways.

 

The other player also reported that he can hear a windows 'chime' sound just before the freezing.

there's a corrupted .cre listed as an actor in BPv177 (c6bodhi.cre, sadly... ) that causes exactly this effect for BP users when they try to access bodhi's lair in chapter 6. because the .cre is listed as an actor - rather than summoned via script - the load crashes at the point where it would if the area in question was corrupted (because, strictly speaking, the area is corrupted: one of the elements of the area - a listed actor - is broken).

 

i mentioned on the other thread that it oculd have been caused by mod reinstallation: there was an issue with earlier weidu versions of Check the Bodies - the mod would install fine, everything would work, but if for some reason CtB was caused to be re-installed (ie, by a user removing or reinstalling another mod) it would corrupt certain areas it had previously patched. this was caused by bad area-patching code in CtB - in particular, if i recall correctly, from poor handling of container in the affected areas.

 

finally, there was an issue with non-weidu forms of Tortured Souls: it was relatively simple for users to mistakenly not install the relevant .tis files, thus causing a CTD whenever they tried to access the TS areas. i mentioned in the other thread that the user should search for the .tis file: is there a reason it might not have installed?

 

G3 puts out good code, but it used to be very simple for mac users to not install .tis files; or, does the area install process in amber occur after the rest of the mod has installed (ie - the 'press ENTER' stage of the weidu install?) if so, is it possible the user just closed the cmd window rather than pressing enter - thus causing the .tiz files to not unpack?

[Meira]

I asked the players to check if the area files were in the override (m#ar01.are, .mos .wed and .tis plus three .bmp files) and other one of the said yes. I'll ask wanderon again for the presence of .tis-file in the override.

 

And yes, the unpacking of .tiz files takes place after the actual WeiDU process. So does the unpacking of sound files though, so I'd imagine that I would have gotten reports of missing sounds already.... I'll ask if they pressed enter or closed the window right away.

 

Thanks for your help!

[Avenger]

Turn logging on by editing baldur.ini

 

[program options]
Logging On=1
Debug Mode=1

[Meira]

And that will mean I got an an error log printed to baldur.err when the game crashes?

 

Thanks!

[Avenger]

Well, it is more like an one liner (if any).

But it sometimes helps.

[Meira]

Yay! I tested Logging by disabling the m#ar01.tis from my game (which indeed caused the game to freeze when the area was loading) and I got this very helpful error message dropped to the baldur.err

 

---------------------Start Logging Session---------------------

 

ASSERTION FAILED!

File: Infinity.cpp

Line: 1889

 

Exp: FALSE

 

Msg: Tile set M#AR01 not found

Run Debugger?

 

Now I only have to find out if the two players got the same error...

[Meira]

Yep, it was the tiz files not getting unpacked and thus the tileset missing from the area that caused the game to freeze. Thanks for the help Avenger and seanas.