Game hangs when an action requiring picking something is taken

[dezxter]

I've done a browse on the forum here and didn't notice this issue reported so apologies if I missed it. But I'm running the steam version of the game (I also tried exiting steam entirely and running the game without using the steam client) on Windows 10. I use a SSD for storage. But since I started playing the game again recently I've noticed that often when I take an action which should bring up another menu to make a selection (For instance eating food or building something. What type of action doesn't seem to make a difference, even pressing the button to perform a ritual (F4) which should bring up the page to select which ritual I want to perform causes it) The game won't freeze and I can make a selection if I know what key to press and sometimes pressing a directional button will show the selection menu but not always. But basically it makes it very difficult to play the game. I'm not entirely sure I've explained it clearly.
Basically when taking an action which brings up a menu to allow for a selection the menu I should be selecting from won't display. I can still make a selection if I already know what key
I want to press. And only sometimes will pressing the up or down key cause the menu to display. I'm not running any mods. And I'm not sure what else to try. I've tried closing pretty much everything else to make sure it's not a memory issue. And it doesn't seem to be a memory leak in the game as it can happen on starting the game up fresh. And seemingly related on starting the game up fresh a black screen with only a mouse cursor is displayed. Usually that clears up with either Alt+Tab or movement keys though.

[Erkka]

Since there has not been a flood of Windows 10 users reporting the same problem it must be something more specific. What is your graphics card?

[dezxter]

I have an AMD Ryzen 7.

[Erkka]

And if you go to the Windows control panel, choose Device Manager, what does it list under Display Adapters ?

[dezxter]

Oh. Derp. The Ryzen is the CPU. It's an NVIDIA RTX 3060.

[Erkka]

OK, thanks for the details! And, one more clarification: You mention that when starting the game, it initially shows only a blank window, but if you switch the focus out and then back to the game again, it refreshes the window to display actual content. So, my question is: does this Alt+Tab trick work with invisible submenus, sometimes making them correctly drawn?

This might be an issue with the SDL2 library the game uses for graphics. If anyone else is experiencing similar symptoms please comment to this thread.

And, just to be sure - I suppose your graphics card driver is up to date?

[dezxter]

Yes. I've updated my graphics driver. I was playing on full screen when this was happening. I have since switched to windowed and I haven't had it happen since. So I'm not sure what is different about the two of them but playing windowed I haven't had it happen. I will try playing it full screen and see if Alt+tab helps with the submenus.

[dezxter]

Alt + Tab does help with the sub menu issue. I can't confirm that it helps every time but so far when I've tried it it has helped. I should also clarify that I haven't updated my graphics driver since I had the issue but that it has been updated recently.

[Erkka]

Great, thanks for the details!

[ineedcords]

Alt + Tab does help with the sub menu issue. I can't confirm that it helps every time but so far when I've tried it it has helped. I should also clarify that I haven't updated my graphics driver since I had the issue but that it has been updated recently.

Hi,

Sorry to hear you are having issues.

I will try and help however this does not appear to be an Unreal World issue - it must be a local hardware-related issue.
There are quite a few other reports on the exact brand/model graphics card, exhibiting the exact same issue.

See the link below mentioning many potential fixes including changing a setting in software, changing cable, changing the graphics card (MSI accepts it apparently) etc.
https://www.reddit.com/r/gigabytegaming/comments/mkqumm/rtx_3060_black_screen_100_fan_speed_when_playing/

Below, I suggest two alternative routes: the top one is the better approach and it should help fix the issue permanently but it is time costly. The bottom one is the quick & lazy workaround which may help run this game and other 2D/3D software without black screen but it is not a fix, just a band aid and you will need to keep re-applying it after each restart (assuming it works at all).

SUGGESTION 1
1) Uninstall graphics driver & any accompanying software,
2) Reboot the computer,
3) Install the latest drivers,
4) Reboot once more,
5) Launch Unreal World & test the game again.
If the issue repeats, then you may just want to log a support case with the card vendor as the quickest path to expert assistance and potential unit replacement.

SUGGESTION 2
If you do not want to do all the above, and just want a quick fix, you can try one quick potential fix as described below. Even though this has more steps below it should take 10 minutes to test whereas the aforementioned test can take days.
The main idea below is reducing the capability of your graphics card (and thus its power usage) to see if that helps - it still should be powerful enough to run at least 3-4 Unreal Worlds side by side so do not worry about the "reduction" here much. What's below can only help if the issue is power related, then it would be a quick temporary workaround.
Steps:
1) Download the free 'NVIDIA Inspector' utility here: https://www.techpowerup.com/download/nvidia-inspector/
You can read more about it here: https://stepmodifications.org/wiki/Guide:NVIDIA_Inspector
2)  Extract the ZIP archive & launch the utility by double clicking on the EXE file,
3) Click on "Show Overclocking", then click YES, which will reveal some advanced options
4) Near the top right corner, under the "Base Clock Offset [n Mhz]" field, click on the "-20" button as many times as you can to reduce the clock rate of the card as much as you can, then from bottom right corner click on "Apply Clocks & Voltage" button.
5) Click X icon to close that utility.
6) Launch Unreal World & test the game again.
If the issue repeats, then I suggest you do not waste time and go back to SUGGESTION 1 above.

If you try either, please let us know the outcome, both to satisfy curiosity but also to potentially help others with exact same hardware.

Good luck!

Edit: oh, by the way, @Erkka & @Sami, I am sufficiently confident this is a local hardware-related issue and I suggest moving this outside Bug Reports; either to General Discussion or maybe Off-topic - we can still try and help there.

[dezxter]

I can try those things thanks. But I can't say I've noticed issues like this in any other game or watching videos or other things. Maybe it's just more noticeable in URW due to how the game works though.

[JP_Finn]

SDL(2) can be odd at times. Even if it’s local HW issue, it’s still a bug. Not in necessarily in URW code, but in how SDL handles (or fails at handling) system resources.
If anything, edit top post’s icon to “system specific problem or failure”

If the problem only occurs while running the game full screen only; run the game windowed, but stretch it out to 99% of the screen.
I like K.I.S.S. thinking