Game freezes and cannot be closed at all!

Started by CharlieThis, November 28, 2017, 04:47:39 PM

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CharlieThis

So I just bought this game a couple days ago. Every time I run the game, after 1-2 hrs play(sometimes 30 min), the game would suddenly freeze and not respond. I tried to close the game but it still runs background. I tried to forcefully close it with task manager and cmd command(taskkill /f /t). I even tried uninstall the game and reinstall it with no mod. But nothing works. Now my computer cannot shut down unless I hold the power button. Does anyone know anything about this? Any help please!
My computer runs on i7, GTX960, 16gb ram.
I have attached the output log.

[attachment deleted by admin: too old]

Calahan

The game can not interfere with your operating system in such a way, so if you are having trouble shutting your computer down then that is an issue with your O/S rather than with RimWorld. And if you are unable to turn on your computer, and then immediately shut it down properly (without needing to use the power button), then that is 100% a problem with your computer and/or your O/S. There is no way RimWorld (or any game I know of) would be able to affect your computer like that.

Computers usually need to finish processing all outstanding orders before they can shutdown, so after you told your computer to shut down how long did you wait? And was the disk drive access light (that most computers should have) flashing when the computer was trying to shut down? If it was then it's very likely your computer was shutting down, but just taking a long time to do so.

And when the game freezes how much CPU and RAM is being used at the time? Are you able to open the Task Manager to check this? And are there any other programs on your computer that are using a lot of CPU or RAM?

Also, when the game freezes how long have you left it to see if it unfreezes? Sometimes when a game freezes it is still working, but frozen because it is waiting for the CPU to process information. So next time it freezes please wait at least 5 minutes to see if it unfreezes again. As from a troubleshooting perspective, there is a big difference between the game freezing due to a crash, and the game freezing due to waiting for the CPU.

CharlieThis

Thank you so much for the through solutions! It took me some time to check the things you listed. And I went back to read some other threads of crash issues. I finally figured it out that it was the config issue. I deleted the config and the game was running fine this time. Thanks for the time replying! :)

kall11123

Quote from: CharlieThis on November 29, 2017, 06:35:39 PM
Thank you so much for the through solutions! It took me some time to check the things you listed. And I went back to read some other threads of crash issues. I finally figured it out that it was the config issue. I deleted the config and the game was running fine this time. Thanks for the time replying! :)

I have the same problem can you tell what the config issue is?


Calahan

I assume CharlieThis is referring to deleting the config folder. Details on where to find that folder can be found here (see #1): https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=4805.0

kall11123

After like 2 hours of playing it froze again :'(

Calahan

Did you try deleting that config folder? And can you please post your log file (as an attachment). Details on where to find it can be found here: https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=513.0 . Also, can you please confirm whether or not you are using any mods.

Finally, when the game freezes does it unfreeze after a while? If yes then how long roughly does that take? And if no then how long have you waited to see if it unfreezes?

When a game or program or O/S etc. freezes, it doesn't automatically mean there has been a crash. As more often than not the freeze is due to a system/resource work overload, and the freeze is the computer's way of pausing everything until it can process the overload and restore functionality. And depending on many factors, a computer can easily take 10+ minutes to unfreeze itself. If not 30+ minutes or more. And from a troubleshooting perspective, there is a big difference between the game freezing and then unfreezing, and the game freezing and crashing.

kall11123

lol I never heard or seen a game freezing for 10 minutes and then it continues just fine. At least not in my time I played video games (15+ years).

I uploaded my log and I changed some GPU drivers around. I have yet to play some more and see if it happens again.



[attachment deleted by admin: too old]

Calahan

#8
Thank you for the log file. It's clean though, and so gives no clues as to what the problem might be. If the game freezes again then please post the log file once again that is generated from after a playing session ends up frozen.


The main reason you likely have not heard of games unfreezing after 10+ minutes is because once a game freezes, the mast majority of gamers just simply don't wait very long before shutting the game down via task manager or the power button. And on the off-chance they do wait a long time to see if a game unfreezes, if it then doesn't unfreeze, then that significantly reduces the chances of them ever waiting again (for any game).

"I waited an hour for GameX to unfreeze before and it didn't. Therefore I'm never waiting for any game to unfreeze ever again".

A lot depends on whether it's just the game that has frozen or the entire O/S. If it's just the game, and assuming Shift-Ctrl-Esc still works to launch the Task Manager (under Windows O/S obviously), then you can check it to see how much CPU activity the game is using when frozen. If the CPU activity is not negligible and/or fluctuating, then that makes it more likely it will unfreeze. If there's no CPU activity then it's far more unlikely to unfreeze. Similarly for any change in RAM usage. The game will almost certainly be using (a large chunk of) RAM, but is the amount static or changing?. If the entire O/S has frozen then that also makes it more likely that the game will unfreeze. Anyways....

Think this explanation is getting a bit lengthy and a bit O/T now (in regards troubleshooting RimWorld). So please post if the game freezes again (and attach the log file). If the log still gives no clues then it'll likely be time to start looking elsewhere for the cause.

(also, my forum time will be sporadic and limited between now and the new year. So if you do post and I don't reply for a while then it's likely due to the aforementioned. Which doesn't mean someone else won't post to offer you their assistance, just that I can't guarantee I will be able to with any certainty until sometime in the new year).

nccvoyager

So, I hope you have already found a fix yourself, though if you haven't, I will offer a suggestion.
(No guarantees it will work.)

I will first make an assumption.
You are running the game using a netbook, laptop, or other mobile computer.
I make this assumption since you are running a NVIDIA GTX 960M, which is a mobile card.

Now, I've seen a few issues between Unity and GTX Mobile cards.
Most of these issues stem from power management.

Setting your computer to high performance mode from the power settings and disabling all power-saving features within the NVIDIA control panel can alleviate issues.
(For certain systems which also have an on-board Intel HD graphics chipset, I believe there is a management program called "Optimus" which would also need to be tweaked.)

Now, from what you described, it is possible that an issue similar to an out of memory error occurred, but could not be processed by your computer.
These happen a lot on my netbook, which is admittedly little more than glorified cloud storage with a physical user interface.
(No internet where I live, so it at least lets be use free WiFi.)
Most often, these issues occur due to RAM being filled, and the CPU and HDD being unable to move data to and from the system page file quickly enough to free up the space.
These issues are different than traditional out of memory errors because traditional OOM errors usually result in a blue-screen STOP error with Windows OSs, since no physical (or virtual) memory is available.
In this case, memory is available, though cannot be properly utilized.
In terms of fixing this issue, I don't have much of a suggestion.
Mainly, ensure that you have at least 4GB of system RAM.
Beyond that, my best suggestion is to put your computer into hibernation mode and then wake it up before you start playing.
(Something I noticed a couple months ago is that putting a computer into hibernation clears reserved RAM, like restarting the computer, but it also doesn't start your startup programs again. This usually results in more free RAM after waking from hibernation than when the system first starts up from a restart, or from being off altogether.)

Now, I will point out that this next section is probably not your problem, and is probably a waste of time if your system is working fine outside of Rimworld.
BIOS updates can be complicated depending on the chipset, and if done wrong, will probably brick your computer.
The computers that have incompatibilities between CPU and GPU due to their BIOS are few and far between, however, and as long as you are running a system with an Intel CPU, it is extremely unlikely to be a factor, since the vast majority of the incompatibilities I saw were with an AMD CPU and NVIDIA GPUs.
(Just a fact that AMD CPUs and NVIDIA GPUs don't tend to play well together. AMD and ATI [AMD still] are fine, and Intel and ATI are usually fine, but the NVIDIA GPUs don't seem to like AMD CPUs.)
(For mobile devices, the number of attempted BIOS updates that have bricked computers seems higher than desktops, though, ironically, they should have a lower chance of being bricked in the process since they have a power supply that is less likely to be interrupted. [Their battery.])

(Off topic, but, interruptible isn't actually a word? Uninterruptible is though. What?)