Client freezes - something to do with fire particles.

[bluap]

Version 1.2.0p1 Beta and latest CVS 1.2.0.p6 Beta (Linux tested only)

 

Here's how to reproduce the problem: Set Advanced video -> Perspective to 0.55 (or there abouts). Go to Portland storage and sit by the bookcase. Maximise the distance you can see using up arrow (or mouse), you'll be able to see the inside of other rooms on the map (another bug?). Look around using the rotate

left/right. In one of the other rooms, there is a caldron with a fire underneath and stream coming from the top - the client freezes and has to be killed.

 

I have prevented the problem by stopping fire particle effects: In the latest CVS version, particles.c, update_fire_sys() put a return statement at the top of the function (line 1051). Now fires have no particles but the client does not crash.

 

I would love to be able to submit a patch to fix this but I do not know the client code well enough yet. Good luck with the bug hunting those who do...

[bluap]

Vegar was trying to reproduce this problem and could not. Therefore I added a bit more debug. The client does not lock up (although the screen does not update). It is stuck in the SDL event loop below, never reaching the done printf(). Could it be a machine speed related problem, there are more events than can be handled before more are generated? My machine is a 2.4GHz Pentium 4 with an Nvidia GeForce4 Ti 4200 graphics card.

 

 

Code frgment from main.c start_rendering():

/* Loop until done. */
while( !done )
	{
		SDL_Event event;
printf("handle SDL events top\n");
		// handle SDL events
		while( SDL_PollEvent( &event ) )
			{
				done = HandleEvent(&event);
			}
printf("handle SDL events done\n");

		//advance the clock
		cur_time = SDL_GetTicks();

[Puntif]

I don't know if it's related but I find that a particle display (such as the sparkles from teleporting or from a permanent teleport pad) while it's raining/foggy makes things go really slowly. My main system (where I've noticed it) uses NVidia graphics under Linux.