Need Help: Game Crashing When Playing a City

[sevithethird 54]

About a week ago, I shared a problem on NAM General Support with CTD when loading a city. I got the issue fixed by manually applying the 4Gb patch to the executable file of the game. However, there was one city of mine that I couldn't really play, even though it loads up just fine. The only way I can hold the city and the game running is to quickly pause the simulation once the city is loaded. But once I click the play simulation, the game stays for a few seconds then crashes. I got this very interesting log:

  

Luckily, I still have a copy of the city (.sc4 file) and tried to load it using my existing NAM 43. It, too, crashes. Tried to demolish the airport but to no avail. I also tried to move a few steps backward by removing NAM 43 and reinstalling the previous NAM 42, which basically put me back where the last time the game was still working fine, but still not working, still crashing. This city I'm having issues with has about 400k residential population so it's quite big of a file, too, about 45 Mb. 

My question is, could it be possible to pinpoint the cause of the problem or both files have been corrupted and could never be recovered? 

[rsc204 21,808]

I never personally find error logs and the like any help in diagnosing these problems, the integer divide by zero error just means an illogical calculation took place, which couldn't give an expected result, thus the game didn't know what to do and this is what causes CTDs. Computers and code must always follow an expected path and if something unexpected occurs, unless specific code exists to overcome it, will lead to such a problem.

How can we square that away to pinpoint a specific problem in layman's terms, the simple answer is without knowing and seeing the code that led to this event, we can't.

Therefore, I find the best course of action is to try and diagnose what has happened in respect of your Plugins, what you did in this city and how that might relate to any known problems with the game.

1 hour ago, sevithethird said:

ried to demolish the airport but to no avail.

Do you have a custom Airport controller, are you talking about the in-game Airport or a custom one?

Indeed if the game CTDs upon opening, that's usually a sign that something embedded in the save data, can't be reconcilled because it's files are missing or have been modified within your Plugins folder. Such a mismatch = CTD and it's imperative that anyone considering using a custom Seaport or Airport controller understands a least the general overview of how they work and such restrictions. In other words, once you've added a custom controller and placed content using it in your game, you can NEVER remove it, at the very least unless you remove all content using it beforehand. Likewise you can't alter that controller in certain ways and if you've content from a different controller, even the default Maxis one, present, you will have big problems.

So just for the sake of example, let's say you plopped the Maxis Spaceport in a city, installed the most current (2.2 I think) Airport controller, then tried to load the game... boom CTD! Now, it clearly states this will happen in the readme, so it's a case of RTFM, sorry to be so crude, but blunt as that acronym is, when using mods that are delicate like this, it's not optional.

Therefore, to recover from a problem like this, you must be able to restore your Plugins such, that it will put the save file into a working state once more. However, compounding the issue, it is possible in such circumstances to sometimes load a city, but the thing that breaks it's ability to subsequently load, isn't affected until you save that city, having changed something in your Plugins or by placing content related to it in your city. In this latter scenario, your save file is toast, if you have a backup then restore an older working copy, if not, I'm sorry but it's gone.

Best practise when using any mod that can give rise to such behaviour, is to test the new configuration in a blank, new city tile, dedicated to testing. Basically you save the city and confirm it reloads, whilst adding the content from the mod along the way. Provided everything keeps working, then you can be as sure as you can, with the proviso you followed everything in the documentation to the letter, that it's safe to use in your existing cities. When installing any mod that does more than adding some new buildings, make a region backup before you do so. In an ideal world, such mods are better left until you start a new region and especially surrounding Airport and Seaport controllers, there are real risks otherwise.

That's not to say 100% that this issue is an Airport controller, I'm simply picking up on the fact that you mentioned trying to demolish one. But, this didn't just happen, something happened and only you can know what that something might be, the rest of us can only speculate. Whatever it was, if you can restore the working config, you should be able to gain access to your city once more.

[sevithethird 54]

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

what has happened in respect of your Plugins, what you did in this city and how that might relate to any known problems with the game.

As far as what I did in my Plugins, there were a ton of changes, including re-arranging the folders, adding more new lots and dependencies, and, of course, upgrading to NAM 43. I didn't make that many changes in the city because it has seemed reached its growth limit and I only run it to manage neighbor deals and update neighbor commute.

 

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

Do you have a custom Airport controller, are you talking about the in-game Airport or a custom one?

I'm using the in-game Airport. The reason I blew it is because I thought I made a mistake during the NAM setup when I learned that the airport capacity is set to 'medium' vs with what I used to have in the city which is a Maxis default. The airport upgraded organically (large international airport) as the usage increased, thus causing the game to be unstable.

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

In this latter scenario, your save file is toast, if you have a backup then restore an older working copy, if not, I'm sorry but it's gone.

I mentioned at the beginning of this thread that the older and the last working backup isn't working even with the previously working NAM version 42. 
So, maybe it's time to start from scratch.

[rsc204 21,808]

48 minutes ago, sevithethird said:

upgrading to NAM 43.

As a NAM developer I can say with 100% confidence that upgrading the NAM or even changing settings in this regard would have no ill effects, especially that could prevent your cities from loading. The NAM package never has nor will contain such modding as it goes against our general philosophy, which is that players should be able to upgrade the NAM without harm to anything that exists from an earlier edition. In fact, with only a few tiny exceptions which were really necessary to move forwards, even all old NAM content, including that no longer able to be placed, will still work when using a newer version.

48 minutes ago, sevithethird said:

there were a ton of changes, including re-arranging the folders, adding more new lots and dependencies

That I would imagine would have been the trigger, can you track back all the changes, perhaps by looking at the dates of the file's creation? I suspect the problem is in those alterations somewhere, did you for example remove anything during this process?

Other common causes of CTDs just as the city loads (usually I wouldn't expect you'd have time to pause the game before the CTD, but who knows):

• Trees placed using the God Mode Flora brush exist in your city, but the Flora Exemplars used by them no longer reside in Plugins.
• Use of HD Textures in conjunction with Software Rendering (Note specifically textures over 256x256px in size, i.e. NOT BAT models).
• Certain modding errors can cause this.
  I once found an item on the LEX (after a user reported issues), that consistently after placing it and saving the game, broke the save file. In such cases, there is no way to recover your save. So it's possible it could be faulty modding, but as a community we're usually very quick to resolve such issues if they are found and it's extremely rare this happens.

Again, when adding lots of stuff at once, something I'd generally advise not too, slow and steady wins the race IMO, stick it in a special folder until you've verified it to be problem free. To be totally safe, either take the opportunity to make a backup beforehand or use a special test region.

48 minutes ago, sevithethird said:

I'm using the in-game Airport. The reason I blew it is because I thought I made a mistake during the NAM setup when I learned that the airport capacity is set to 'medium' vs with what I used to have in the city which is a Maxis default. The airport upgraded organically (large international airport) as the usage increased, thus causing the game to be unstable.

If you have not altered the controller, then altering the stats in this regard will not affect the ability of the game to load. In the worst case scenario, the values would remain as per the original Plop unless you replaced the airport.

48 minutes ago, sevithethird said:

So, maybe it's time to start from scratch.

It sucks and I've only ran into similar issues 3 times in about 9 years of playing. But if nothing else, now is a good time to re-evaluate how you approach your Plugins folder and it's maintenance, along with ensuring you've a regular set of Backups, not just of the Regions, but Plugins folders too.

SC4's save file system is really quite unique, it's sort of like a dump of what's in RAM when playing into a datafile. The folks at Maxis once said that with SimCity 4 they had literally pushed the code about as far as it was technically possible to do for a game of it's time. As a result, the save mechanism is atypical and somewhat necessitated by the game's complexity. For the most part, that doesn't mean it's inherently faulty, rather that it has some quirks that you need to be careful of. Not to mention, Maxis never once considered the things we are doing with their game, that it still holds up is proof of the sheer genius of those involved with coding and creating it. Whilst I'm no professional coder, I was educated about the concepts and best practices in the late 90's and have been coding in a hobbyist sense for almost 30 years. I have nothing but admiration for the wonderful product Maxis created, it really stands out for it's technical achievement in this regard. But...

Some data is stored forever in the save file, other data is stored in a way that it links to the files in Plugins, when the two are not in sync, it can be very bad. Therefore, you should never remove anything from Plugins or alter certain values, by way of overrides too, if the content exists in the save when such changes are made. By and large, adding stuff is pretty safe, but removing or modifying is always a risk.

Oh and lastly, don't feel too bad about this, trust me when I say you don't get to learn all this stuff, without a hiccup or two along the way.

[sevithethird 54]

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

As a NAM developer I can say with 100% confidence that upgrading the NAM or even changing settings in this regard would have no ill effects, especially that could prevent your cities from loading.

That's reassuring

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

you should never remove anything from Plugins or alter certain values, by way of overrides too

I have to confess something. I must have messed up some values when I tried editing some of the CS$ and CS$$ lots on my Plugins. Initially, when I started to have CTD issues, one of my suspicions about what might have caused it is that I made some mistakes removing or adding values on some of the lots. I made sure I marked those files. I should re-focus my investigation and testing on those files. I already made some attempts to remove what I suspect is a problematic file, but doesn't seem to cause the problem. I must do this again by batches and be very tedious like what I did with my previous experience with CTD upon loading a city. 

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

now is a good time to re-evaluate how you approach your Plugins folder and it's maintenance, along with ensuring you've a regular set of Backups, not just of the Regions, but Plugins folders too.

Funny thing is, I've never experienced CTD until I decided to declutter and rearrange files and folders on my plugins. But yeah, I have a backup and found an older copy of the city and will try to load and run this one. 

1 hour ago, rsc204 said:

don't feel too bad about this, trust me when I say you don't get to learn all this stuff, without a hiccup or two along the way.

I'm learning a lot and I should be more careful, especially when modifying the files.

[nickvon 161]

8 hours ago, sevithethird said:

Funny thing is, I've never experienced CTD until I decided to declutter and rearrange files and folders on my plugins. But yeah, I have a backup and found an older copy of the city and will try to load and run this one.

I've been experiencing mid game CTD's now for two weeks because I was tinkering with my plugins folder.  Been pulling my hair out trying to figure out what the problem is.  CTD's are following me to a brand new region too.

[spaced5 1]

I am experiencing a CTD after I installing NAM43.  I had a backup copy of my Plugins folder, so I cleared everything out and then opened a new city in a new region and I was able to load a city and establish a city.  I quit without saving and then installed NAM43 with the installer.  The clean and dependency tabs still went on for a long time without finishing, even though the Plugins folder was completely empty.  After a good 15 minutes or more, I installed NAM43.  The Plugins folder only had those files.  I then tried the virgin region again and when I tried to open a city I had a CTD. 

At this point, I do not have any ideas.  I have well more RAM available than 4G.  I did the 4G patch multiple times at this point.  I used an old version of NAM before and I was really looking forward to using the new one.  I would have tried Steam's Mac version, but the version on there is old and does not meet the requirements for Nam43.  I am currently running the Steam Windows version with Parallels on my M1 Macbook Pro with multiple cores.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Tarkus 6,932]

The CTD issue you're describing is exactly what happens when you try to load the "full" version of the NAM Controller without the 4GB Patch being applied.  If you've attempted to apply it, and it's still causing a CTD in that fashion, then the patch somehow wasn't applied properly.  Running the patch and/or the install .bat file as an administrator may help--we've had a few cases of this happen recently, and the suspicion is that it's the result of inadequate permissions.  The other option is running with the "LowRAM/NoRHW" version of the NAM Controller, which does not include the code for any of the RHW features, but does not require the 4GB Patch, either.

Steam's current Mac version was actually updated to be 64-bit recently (required, as Apple killed 32-bit apps), and while it does have its share of quirks, by virtue of being 64-bit, it does not require the 4GB Patch, and definitely meets the minimum requirements.

-Tarkus

 

[spaced5 1]

I did what was suggested with running the 4G patch as an administrator and I am still not able to make it work.  I did try the Mac version and I was able to install it, but I was unable to click on some of the control buttons.  I was able to hoover over them, but pressing the mouse did not work.  I decided that was not functional either.  I have tried running the program in compatibility mode.  The 98/ME will load the program, but you can't do anything beyond.  Without it I get a flat region of just Timuktu that you get an error when you try to save.  I don't know if there are other Windows security options that might help.  The SimCity launcher has not worked to resolve anything either.  I can't get a functional path that will go to where I have have the plugins folder. 

[rsc204 21,808]

55 minutes ago, spaced5 said:

I did try the Mac version and I was able to install it, but I was unable to click on some of the control buttons.  I was able to hoover over them, but pressing the mouse did not work.

Are you using a MacBook or iMac which contains a 'notch' on the screen?, if so I've heard about this problem on Steam's forums, in that case is was necessary to run the game at a lower resolution in Windowed mode to overcome the problem.

11 hours ago, spaced5 said:

I am currently running the Steam Windows version with Parallels

I wouldn't rule out this setup being part of your troubles, you aren't really running Windows and this additional emulation layer is probably not helping.

Provided the following conditions are true, the 4GB patch simply isn't there as required:

• You can open a blank, new city without NAM installed.
• You can open a blank, new city with the NAM's LowRAM/NoRHW controller installed.
• You can not open a blank, new city with the NAM's 4GB/Full/RHW controller installed.
  Note that the most typical behaviour is that the game starts loading from the Region View screen, having opened a city, it takes a while trying, before it suddenly exits (CTDs).

If the 4GB patch just isn't being applied, then your system is preventing it from happening, or perhaps even undoing the change silently as soon as it's made. By default Windows 10 doesn't need anything special to run this patch successfully, so we have to ask the question, why isn't your copy doing that?

If you run something with full admin rights, well you can't really have a higher level of permission than that, so if it isn't sufficient, that's not default Windows behaviour and something is locking things down. Some users report success, if they move the SimCity 4.exe file out of Program Files (a system protected area), run the patch with it somewhere not protected (you will have to run the 4GB Patcher manually and point it to the App in this case), then move the .exe back to it's original home.

If that doesn't help, perhaps some 3rd Party security software, which could even be related to the use of Parallels, is preventing this process from working? Whatever it is, you'll need to figure it out and disable it or otherwise whitelist things, such that it will allow the patching process to work as intended. In today's hyper-secure world, often the very idea of altering an App sends security software into a panic, which just goes to show how dumb such software really is at protecting you. Since all we're trying to do here is set a 'system flag' for the application, no code or major modifications are taking place, but Windows has no mechanism to set this flag otherwise. In a perfect world, EA would add this flag themselves and then have the Application 'digitally signed', but that's not happening so some users have to run through all these hoops to force things. Because as a user, you can't be trusted to have a button that says, I know what I'm doing, leave me alone and do what I say. That said, most users don't, which is precisely why things have moved the way they have. If you want your valuables to be secure, you might leave them in a safe deposit box, one drawback of which is that they won't usually be immediately available to you ad-hoc. You'd also need to understand the 'system' for accessing those items, or you would not be able to do so. That's kinda the problem here, your files are in the 'bank vault', but you aren't aware of why or the process to get them. Since we 'don't use the same bank', whilst we can give you general advise, the system you need to work with may be rather unique to you, so it's very hard to be more specific.

[spaced5 1]

I am not running Wine.  I am running a registered copy of Windows 11.  I am not having issues with other Windows programs that are old.  The 4G program does say it was successfully applied.  The one odd thing is that, in the initial times it ran from the Bat with the message saying it worked.  Then later attempts. I got a message that the 4G exe could not be found.  It was sitting exactly where it was unpacked.  I had to run the 4G separately later.  The 4G was blind to the Bat even happened when I used Windows to unpack the program.  I will have to take a look with the security issues again.

 

I will have to take another look at the Mac version of the game again. 

[rsc204 21,808]

6 hours ago, spaced5 said:

I am not running Wine.  I am running a registered copy of Windows 11.

Under parallels, which is NOT the same as running Windows natively, essentially you have a Virtualised Machine environment and given it's Mac software and MacOS has the most stubborn security requirements of almost any OS out there, it wouldn't surprise me if there lay your problems. Windows 11 also ups the stakes in this regard.

Whether or not you are having problems with other games makes no difference, you ARE having them with this. It's a specific issue, the 4GB patch is a mandatory requirement for adding over 5 million lines of new code to SimCity 4. That's the only difference between the two controller options, one has vastly more code, which requires the App can access more RAM or it won't work.

It's like telling me your car works so why shouldn't my toaster, the two things are in no way connected. I assure you, this isn't guesswork on my part, security restrictions and failing to properly patch this file is your problem. If you won't accept that, then you aren't going to be eating toast any time soon.

[spaced5 1]

I was able to get the program with the NAM 43 to load when I chose to isolate the Windows and the Mac.  I still needed to use the SC4 launcher initially to change the graphics options, otherwise it would not save the graphics configuration.  I am still trying to figure that out.  One thing that I have noticed thus far is that the windmills are a non textured looking green color I tried rotating the view and turning on and off the data view.  This seems to be a graphics issue.  When I run the Mac version they are the correct color on the windmill, so this probably another quirk.  I wonder what other issues might exist that I have not discovered yet.