Generally what would cause Unity Editor freezes and not responding?

Question

I have encountered a critical issue that Unity Editor freezes. I've spent many hours debugging step by step of my codes but still can't find where the problem is. So I think maybe I should try thinking from another angle, generally speaking what reasons would cause Unity Editor freezes and not responding?

I can't find a general case discussion about this topic.

From my experience, infinite loop is one reason for sure. Deadlock is critical issue, but not sure if it causes Unity Editor freezes. Unity Editor bug that I encountered only makes the whole editor crashes, instead of freezing. Any other experiences are welcomed. Thank you!

In such case, what kind of tools or methods could I use to debug it? Right now since the editor freezes I can't use "print" to find out what happens after it freezes. So I use Visual studio to debug the Editor thread, in this way I can see all the prints that I wrote. It appears the game is still running, only the editor not responding. And I can use VS click "attach to Unity and play" and put some debugging points, then debug step by step.

Answer 1

I solved my issue. It's fundamentally an infinite loop.

It's not a simple case such as "while(true)". I'll try to explain.

My game was a PvP game, and I'm making a local AI. Usually my design pattern works fine, however I just turned off the simulation of "AI thinking time", and since the AI codes and server codes all run in local mode, the transmitting of data between server and client are replaced by local method call(meaning instantly executed before everything else).

There is a loophole in my server code. I use "Update" and a flag on server to change a specific game state, however in this particular case, it got into an infinite loop because the local method call is executed before the "Update". And because my AI now doesn't need real time to "think", it "acts" and transmits the event data to server right away. And since the transmitting doesn't need time any more, it calls the server method instantly, hence forming the infinite loop.

Answer 2

The first thing that I would check out is for an infinite loop. At the hang/freeze moment, you can attatch the debugger of your choice and pause the execution. In the case that it is an infinite loop that it is executing, at the exec time pause you might find the execution in a forever running while (true) {...}

Other thing that I would check is the plugins in use. Several Unity plugins like Parse, FMOD, UMP (Universal Media Player), ZFBrowser, or Embedded Browser are using native threads. It’s an issue when a plugin ends up attaching a native thread to the runtime, which then does blocking calls to the OS. This means Unity can't interrupt that thread for the debugger (or domain reload) and hang. Source

To check that you can check the active threads in the visual studio command window af the freeze is reproduced:

View->OtherWindows->CommandWindow and type in this command:

Debug.ListCallStack /AllThreads /ShowExternalCode

In the stack you can check if some thread is there with no need, or if its related with the plugins mentioned above.

Also an interesting point is to check in the windows task manager (in the case that you are using windows) if the CPU usage is to 0%. It can lead you to the type of hang that is taking place.

Good luck.

Edit: I forgot to mention, you need to check also the unity logfiles

Answer 3

I notice this all the time, and its super frustrating.

Unfortunately, this could be any number of issues. I notice this issue most often when working in projects that are made for the Universal Windows Platform.

Try using the Task manager to monitor specific processes / threads running.

Some follow up questions:

What platform is your project currently targeting?

What version of Unity are you running? Have you tried other versions?

What are your computers specs? Is the OS up to date? Graphics Drivers? Does it happen (or happen more often) when an external code editor is open? Perhaps try going to Preferences>External Editor > Regenerate Project files.

Are you using Unity Collab by chance? I've had issues where collab is stuck trying to communicate with Unity Servers / looking for changes. Try logging out of your Unity account through the editor, and log back in.

Have you tried looking for a Unity editor crash dump, or error log files? I think they can be found here C:\Users\username\AppData\LocalLow\Unity by default. Those files may give you more specific data concerning your problem.

Answer 4

Unity's new versions are getting more slower and slower. From my experience 2019 versions are the best and more stable.