Cities Crashing at Certain In-game Dates

[Patricius Maximus 236]

I have a problem in one of my cities, Manheim, where the game crashes at a specific date in the game (like crashing at 6/10/10). This happens in Manheim regardless of what I do before it crashes (i.e. it's not triggered by a particular action). Does anyone have any idea what causes this and what I can do to fix it?

[Mister Giggles 310]

Off the top of my head, a malformed LUA script is attempting to do something on that date and is resulting in a crash.

It would be best if you could remember all the plugins you added since between the time that date worked properly and now and start removing them to check if they're responsible. If that doesn't work out, you'll want to look for recently grown/plopped buildings and demolish them. If that fails, you'll need to do in an attempt to find the plugin responsible for the crash. That's a messy option, though, since your city is already-developed. Just don't save. <_<

It's also possible something is deciding to grow on that day, and because it was poorly made, it's causing the game to puke all over itself. The above techniques will find it, too.

If you find the plugin responsible, link to it. If it's on the STEX, it can be updated/removed. If it's hosted elsewhere, as least we know it causes problems.

  Edited August 18, 2012 by CaptCity  

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Happy hunting, and do let us know what the offender is.

[Patricius Maximus 236]

It's just one city, so the plugin theory seems dubious. To be sure, I removed all the plugins I downloaded since the last time it worked properly, and it crashed exactly the same way it did last time.

I'm now going to dezone the areas to see if it's something growing that's causing it. I'll report back here when I have results.....

[Patricius Maximus 236]

....Success! It was something that decided to grow in that timespan. I have no idea what it was, but when I dezoned the area the simulation ran for over 3 years after the crash date at top speed. Fortunately it was outside of the less-critical newer areas, and it will be easy to redevelop. Thanks, guys .

[Mister Giggles 310]

According to the logic you used ("The plugin theory seems dubious"), vanilla SC4 has a building that's resulting in a crash when it grows. Except vanilla SC4 contains no buildings that result in crashes unless, of course, one of the .dat files broke.

One of your plugins is almost certainly causing the crash, and it's one of the older ones based on what you've done so far. Any problems with grown buildings, depending on how you zone, can be sporadic to very rare; this doesn't mean the problems don't exist. The crashes will start again somewhere down the line.

I'm afraid all you've done is taken care of the symptom, not the disease.

  Edited August 17, 2012 by Mister Giggles  

[Patricius Maximus 236]

Hmm....that puts it in a different light. I was thinking of the usual plugin crash where something I download causes a crash any time it's used or used in a certain way; I was not aware that it could just occur occasionally. If I encounter the problem again and I find out which building is causing it, I'll be sure to let you all know. As of now, the immediate problem is fixed, and if it occurs as rarely as it has in the past 9 years I've been playing the game, I don't think it will be much of an issue.

[Wiimeiser 444]

I seem to get crashes with large amounts of zoning, too, but it appears to be related to the total surface area of the zones because I don't remember downloading anything growable.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

I don't create large amounts of zoning at one time, and I frequently use the in-game save (CTRL+s). Try a little prophylactic playing.

[Jim14409 448]

I seem to get crashes with large amounts of zoning, too, but it appears to be related to the total surface area of the zones because I don't remember downloading anything growable.

I may be wrong, but I would think that would be more related to your machine than to the game or plugins. Processor speed, memory, dedicated graphics RAM and more play a part in what you can and can not do in the game.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

I seem to get crashes with large amounts of zoning, too, but it appears to be related to the total surface area of the zones because I don't remember downloading anything growable.

This actually sounds like a relatively new problem. Why not start a new thread with a description of your hardware, the first 20 lines of your latest dump text file, and a description of your problem. I don't think it is relevant in this thread.