Black Screen during invasions

from GalCiv3 Forums

We are working on reports of the screen going black during invasions. Players have submitted ticket son it, which we definitely appreciate. But the game isn't actually crashing, the video driver is getting messed up, which means that the crash file that we get (which is usually from forcing the game to shut down) isn't very useful.

We have saves, but none of them are able to reproduce the issue for us. I know those sending them in had mentioned that it fails intermittently for them too. This post is to let you know that we are working on the issue, and please post here if you have any additional information to share on it. If you get a save that reproduces it I would love to see it. If you notice a pattern for when it works or doesn't work I would love to hear it.

Also, some of the invasion issues we have seen aren't black screen issues. They are hangs (the screen doesn't go black, you just can't do anything). We do have a fix for one fo those because of the case that was submitted that is coming in todays patch update.

Thanks for your help.

 

*** UPDATE #1 *** (5/7/2015)

We figured out at least one major cause of it.

It's from hitting Escape when you are in the invasion screen. Doing this closes the window but doesn't re-render the main game and you end up with nothing but a black screen. We will fix it, but not in tonights patch. In the meantime please be careful not to hit Escape on the invasion screen, and please let us know if this fixes you issues or not.

 

*** UPDATE #2 *** (5/9/2015)

The hardest part about fixing a bug is figuring out what specifically is broken. After that the fix is typically easy (outside of architecture issues which are the opposite).

We figured that out for the black screen issue, its a problem rendering engine trails in two scenes. Be that in the main map and battle viewer or the main map and the old invasion scene (that transport picture is an actual 3d model, so it has engine trails hooked up to it even if the ship isn't moving). We can fix the issue entirely by just not rendering engine trails anyplace except the main map. But now that the developers know the cause they will have a real fix shortly.

Thank you for everyone for reporting this issue in its myriad forms, and especially those that submitted bugs, error logs and save games. Those were invaluable. The issue was very inconsistent. A producer who had the issue 100% of the time at home brought his computer in only to find out that when his computer was in the studio it never happened. A few golden saves that would reproduce the issue 30-50% of the time were the secret that allowed us to isolate the issue.

Thanks again, and we look forward to having the fix in your hands shortly.


 

*** UPDATE #3 *** (5/9/2015)

 We have been unable to reproduce the issue with engine trails turned off. One thing you can do, if you are running into the issue where your video driver dies starting a battle (causing the entire game to go black) is disable engine trails.

 http://screencast.com/t/IIs0RUayMea9

 If this issue has been effecting you, please let us know if this resolves it for you.



 

38,818 views 26 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

This has been the only recurring bug I've noticed in the 6.1 beta opt-in. I have to restart the game after every single invasion, because it only works then the video driver fails to initialize. I also notice that this corrupts the executable and steam syncs with the cloud to restore it. It's done this over ten times in a row now with the same pattern.

Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Sorry to repost, but I just wanted to say that I don't press escape in the invasion screen and I still have the issue. Also, the syncing with steam seems to happen when I exit the game normally as well. 

Curtains - Customize Windows with additional styles
Reply #3 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I'm not getting a blank screen but I do have invasion screen freezes. Most of the UI seems to dim and then nothing.  Took a screen shot of it with Task Manager going. As you can see CPU is going hard. This is after three or four minutes of waiting.  It only happens to me on the SECOND invasion after loading a save game. First invasion, successful or not, works fine. This seemed to be very reproducible. Finally, Though I had researched Information War, it did not show up as an invasion option. Only conventional war did. 

 Beyond adding some logo's. No other mods in play. 

Image link

 

 

 

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Thanks. The hangs are another issue. We fixed one of them in last night patch update. The other fix (which is for the more common issue) is going to more involved and won't be ready until Beta 6 patch 2.

Reply #5 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

alright, so tomorrow for patch 2?  :-" :P

Reply #6 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Coming today?  Haven't seen a thread for changes in Beta 6 #2

Reply #7 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting ManiiNames, reply 6

Coming today?  Haven't seen a thread for changes in Beta 6 #2

I was joking :)  I don't think they are ready to release it just yet :)  I don't expect it until the end of the week, early next week.

Reply #8 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I got a freeze on the battle viewer (not invasion) on .97.  I opened ticket ASC-417-58043. 

Reply #9 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

same here, just got a freeze.  Much less frequent than it used to, but still there.  Not much luck in reproducing it so far...

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Reply #10 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Unfortunately, this issue is now far more widespread than just invasions for me. Now it happens intermittently whenever I do anything that takes me away from the main screen, even looking up a ship's stats or entering the View Combat screen instead of choosing quick combat. It's so bad that it causes my computer to BSOD, and as you said, it's caused by the driver crashing and being unable to restart. I have made double sure that my video drivers are up-to-date.

Unfortunately, I can't reproduce it. It happens once and then goes away when I reload, every time.

Reply #11 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

The hardest part about fixing a bug is figuring out what specifically is broken. After that the fix is typically easy (outside of architecture issues which are the opposite).

We figured that out for the black screen issue, its a problem rendering engine trails in two scenes. Be that in the main map and battle viewer or the main map and the old invasion scene (that transport picture is an actual 3d model, so it has engine trails hooked up to it even if the ship isn't moving). We can fix the issue entirely by just not rendering engine trails anyplace except the main map. But now that the developers know the cause they will have a real fix shortly.

Thank you for everyone for reporting this issue in its myriad forms, and especially those that submitted bugs, error logs and save games. Those were invaluable. The issue was very inconsistent. A producer who had the issue 100% of the time at home brought his computer in only to find out that when his computer was in the studio it never happened. A few golden saves that would reproduce the issue 30-50% of the time were the secret that allowed us to isolate the issue.

Thanks again, and we look forward to having the fix in your hands shortly.

Reply #12 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Here is my two cents. The game does not enter the battle viewer; however, all other menus are still working and I can explore everything except the resolution of the battle. The bottom box (lower right) displays the message "wait".

I tried to save the game but the game will not allow that option and gives the message that the battle must be resolved before saving. I reloaded the game multiple times and get the same result. As an aside the battle viewer did show skirmishes with pirates. This "wait" battle was the first time that two majors were going into battle.

Reply #13 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

 

We have been unable to reproduce the issue with engine trails turned off. One thing you can do, if you are running into the issue where your video driver dies starting a battle (causing the entire game to go black) is disable engine trails.

http://screencast.com/t/IIs0RUayMea9

If this issue has been effecting you, please let us know if this resolves it for you.

 

 
Reply #14 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I have been getting the battle viewer to work the first battle, then going black for the second battle.  After using the Control Panel to shut down GC3, restarting GC3 and continuing with more battles, the battle viewer problem repeating exactly the same.  Since the battle viewer was included in the Beta, I almost never got more than one battle to work correctly in the battle viewer.

After seeing your post, I started GC3, turned off trails and restarted GC3 as required because a graphics option was changed.  I loaded a save that was from a new game started after Friday's update (.exe version 0.97.5).  Over several turns I got 10 successful battle viewer battles! 

I am very happy. :grin:

 

nVidia GeForce 650M, Driver 350.12.

 

I also noticed that the red damage indicators were not carrying over from one battle to the next.

 

I have had the same problem on my desktop, so I turned off trails there and got 13 successful battle viewer battles before I ran out of things to attack.

 

nVidia GeForce GTX 660, Driver 350.12.

Reply #15 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Derek, reply 13

 

We have been unable to reproduce the issue with engine trails turned off. One thing you can do, if you are running into the issue where your video driver dies starting a battle (causing the entire game to go black) is disable engine trails.

http://screencast.com/t/IIs0RUayMea9

If this issue has been effecting you, please let us know if this resolves it for you.

Thanks, Derek. I'll get back to you with results once I get more of them. So far, things are looking promising.

Reply #16 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Seems to be working for me as well, been able to view a lot of battles after each other without hanging, after disabling the trails!

Reply #17 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Yeah, that seems to have done it. I played all night doing a full on slugfest against the Krynn, watching every battle, and I didn't crash once. Glad we got that taken care of before release!

Reply #18 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Turning off engine trails seems to have fixed the issue for me.

Win 7, AMD Radeon HD 6950, Catalyst 14.12

Reply #19 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Awesome, thanks everyone.

Reply #20 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I was going to post an issue because I got another black screen during a battle viewing session and also had a message about unable to create some texture related to battleplasma (didn't copy to clipboard like I asked it too...) and when I loaded my last auto-save I saw there were two entries for auto saves and previous auto saves. With a little checking, I then noticed that the game updated again last night and am wondering if it's due to continuing a game from the previous build (.097.5). Then I spotted this thread and will disable trails to make sure and of course start another new game...

 

Well, I started a new game and I'm surprised I'm still seeing ship info (Hit points and remaining moves left) disappear!

 

 

Reply #21 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

That's something I noticed too. I mentioned it in the support forum as well

Reply #22 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting AvatarRob, reply 21

That's something I noticed too. I mentioned it in the support forum as well

 

I've got one there, too.

Reply #23 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Not sure how far you are into a fix for this, but I have been having this issue as well during battles where the screen will go gray (black) and I can do nothing but kill the game.  I happened to have my 2nd monitor on for the last couple hangs and realized that both times it happened, windows was also changing my background wallpaper at that same time.  No too sure how many people have theirs set to change every 15 minutes, but I do and That may be a contributing factor for me at least.

 

Win 7 Pro - 64 - 12gb ram

Nvidia GeForce GTX 650 Ti

Reply #24 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Are you wanting tickets on this as this is the exact crash I had earlier.

Win7 Ultimate 64, 8gb ram, AMD8320 8 core, R9 285x 2gb  Driver Amd Catalyst 14.12

Reply #25 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

You should file a support ticket with all possible details you have :)