OOTP crashing with an "Application Error"

[Corsairs]

First things first: I'm using the latest patch! If you need information beyond what I've listed, just let me know and I'll provide it.

I am commissioner of a startup fictional online league. Last month I ran a number of lengthy simulations to test settings for the league and had no problems. We've just completed our inaugural draft and have been discussing making some alterations to our settings before our first season gets underway. Last night I started a test sim for those settings with the intention of letting it run 35 years or so. Instead I was hit with this error while the game was saving the database after year 2008:



Note that sometimes it says the memory could not be "written" instead of "read". Fortunately I have a backup, so I've been able to run a few tests on this. Here's what I'm finding:

• The game is regularly crashing at the end of 2008 during the "Saving Faces" portion of the database save.
• After a crash I'm usually no longer able to load my league file: it freezes at 93% loaded (during the "Loading Faces" portion).
• Sometimes I'm able to get back in after my year's-end '08 crash. In these cases I can sim until year's-end '10, when it will again crash while "Saving Faces". I've never been able to reload my file after this second crash.
• The exact same thing happens if I run the sim on my second computer.
• Disabling FaceGen/deleting pictures from the "Images" directory has no effect.
• Directing the game not to save box scores/game logs/etc. has no effect.
• Once the crash has occurred, the only way to access my league file is to delete the crashed version and restore from a backup.
• I can only think of a few things of significance that have changed from my successful tests last month. I've upgraded to the latest patch, enabled FaceGen and am using a newly created database of players.

Obviously this has me concerned: I don't want to run into a situation where my league is shut down after two simulated years because of this. Is this a situation where I'm doing something wrong, or am I dealing with a corrupted file of some kind? I'll be happy to upload files as needed.

EDIT: Here's a link to my league's HTML reports (in case it helps to see the structure we're working with). I also wanted to add that I tried turning off my virus scanner and still experience the crash.

[Nutlaw]

Hrm. This is somewhat disturbing. We're going to have to brainstorm possible causes.

What operating system are you using on both computers? Have you defragmented both hard drives recently? Do you have plenty of available hard drive space? How much RAM do you have on either computer?

How many leagues/teams are you running in your league? Any unusual settings that might affect something at the end of the year? Retirement/HoF settings? Do you have draft pick compensation on?

When you disable FaceGen, at what point are you disabling it? Are you shutting off generation of FaceGen pictures for the leagues, or are you disabling FaceGen from the program entirely?

[Corsairs]

Thank you for your reply, Nutlaw, and some further research may have uncovered my problem. Apparently it's related to the "faces.dat" file: after one of my crashes I noticed that file's size changed from about 3.5 MB to 0 MB. That lead me to search for "faces.dat" on the forums and I came up with several previous threads detailing just the kind of problem I'm having. I just this moment have finished testing battists's suggested fix of renaming "faces.dat" to "faces.old": sure enough, I've been able to sim into 2011 (and counting) without a crash. The downside is that all player pictures will have to be regenerated, which is definitely a shame but certainly not the crisis that the crashes were.

I haven't yet fully regenerated all player pictures. Until I do that I'll hold off on saying I'm 100% fixed, but it certainly looks like this will do the trick. I'll report back when I've finished recreating my pictures and have tried simming again.

Also, to answer your questions: Both computers are using Win XP SP2. Computer #1: Recently defragmented, short on HD space. Computer #2: Not recently defragmented, lots of HD space. 11 leagues w/ 208 teams in our universe. No unusual end-of-year settings that I can think of (including retirement/HoF). Draft pick compensation is on. FaceGen is being shut off from the program entirely (in the OOTP preferences screen), but was originally on when the league was created. The start point for this test had our league advanced two days in game and pictures for all players in the universe generated.

[Corsairs]

After having a chance to test this "fix", I'm reporting back with mixed results. Renaming "faces.dat" does allow me to again access my league file, and if I don't regenerate pictures then everything seems to go just fine. However, once I use the "Force Update / Generate Player Pictures" FaceGen option, I again experience a corruption of "faces.dat" after two years of simming.

I'm hoping not to have to make a choice between using FaceGen and being able to advance past two simmed years. No one mentioned having this problem reoccur in the posts I linked to above. Any clue why "faces.dat" keeps going bad on me? Sure, there's a lot pictures (11,280 to be exact), but I'd think the system should be able to handle it.

Both computers I'm running have similar specs: A64 3000+/3200+, 1GB DDR RAM, 256MB 7800GT/X800XT, WinXP SP2.

[Nutlaw]

Have you updated your video drivers lately, just to be sure?

[Corsairs]

Originally Posted by Nutlaw

Have you updated your video drivers lately, just to be sure?

On my main computer, yes: Forceware 163.75 (latest WHQL version). The ATI drivers on computer #2 may be a bit further out of date.

[Nutlaw]

In addition to defragmenting, did you check your hard drives for errors? It almost seems like the game is trying to write to a bad section after a time. I agree that it would be unlikely given the fact that you tried two computers, but maybe worth a shot.

On computer #1, just how short of HD space are you?

I haven't heard of too many images causing trouble down the line, but you might be less likely to run into errors if you have fewer pictures generated. What if you try generating pictures only for the leagues you will be actively playing? (Your league members may not want to download 10k+ pictures, anyway...)

[Corsairs]

I'll run a check for disk errors, though like you said it's unlikely since it's happening on two machines. I'm at 2.5 GBs free on computer #1; computer #2 has over 100 GBs free.

What steps exactly do I have to take to just generate pictures for the main league? That was my intention when I set it up, but it seems like it generated a lot more than that.

[Nutlaw]

I don't have the game available and in front of me, but there are some options as to when to generate pictures for players. If you can't limit it to one league by default, you can turn off picture generation (or set to generate as needed), then (I believe) tell the game to generate pictures for everyone in one particular league all at once. If you can't find it, let me know and I'll look through it when I next get to a computer with the game installed on it.

[your boy]

I'm having essentially the same issue. I don't have much experience with troubleshooting and how to get these sorts of issues rectified, but I've had my league crap out at the two-year mark several times now as well.

I don't know how much this helps - but these problems aren't isolated to the original poster. I was really hoping the final patch would deal with this, but to no avail. It's a terrific game, but this is a huge problem and one that has made the game basically unplayable for me.

[Corsairs]

I've been kept busy this week and have been unable to check in here, but I did get some time to run some test this weekend. Unfortunately I continue to reach the same conclusion: the game is crashing shortly after the completion of the 2nd season, and I'm then unable to load the league file. Renaming "faces.dat" to "faces.old" allows me to get back in (minus all the player pictures). This "fix" is temporary, though: after a few more seasons the same problem will occur and I'll again have to lose player pictures to be able to continue play. Generating pictures for just the main league does not prevent the crashes from happening.

Obviously this is extremely frustrating. I'd like my owners to be able to get into their ballplayers, and part of that is getting familiar with their pictures. If I have to regenerate those photos every 2-4 seasons, though, the feature is basically better left off - no sense getting people accustomed to a picture that will soon be lost!

Although I'm sorry that your boy is having this problem as well, it's good to see someone else posting about it. I imagine there are others having this problem as well. Hopefully anyone suffering from similar crashes who stumbles on this thread can leave a post - maybe we can learn from each other's experience.

Nutlaw, thank you for the assistance you've been providing! Judging from how far back posts on this topic stretch, it's clear this is a tough nut to crack. I don't expect you to be able to fix this issue yourself, but can you suggest a next step to take? I've pretty much exhausted my testing options on this end, and my league is a little over two weeks from beginning play. I'd absolutely hate to have to explain to them that we're turning off player pictures forever. Would it help for me to send over my .dat files?

[Nutlaw]

Yeah, a couple of ideas.

Go to your OOTP Preferences and try simming your league after switching your FaceGen Mode first to Troubleshooting mode 1 then try it again using Troubleshooting mode 2.

Do you have a co-commish? If so, could you have him try simming out your league to see if he generates the same error? That would help to narrow down whether it might be an issue related to your computer/installation or an issue related to your game files.

[Corsairs]

Originally Posted by Nutlaw

Yeah, a couple of ideas.

Go to your OOTP Preferences and try simming your league after switching your FaceGen Mode first to Troubleshooting mode 1 then try it again using Troubleshooting mode 2.

Do you have a co-commish? If so, could you have him try simming out your league to see if he generates the same error? That would help to narrow down whether it might be an issue related to your computer/installation or an issue related to your game files.

Good suggestions; I should have thought to try the troubleshooting modes. I just had a chance to give this a whirl, but unfortunately no luck: the game still crashes with either mode enabled.

I don't have a co-commish, but I did get a chance to load my file onto a friend's computer and try there. Again, same result. That makes three separate computers where this is occurring, so it seems likely that the problem is with the game files.

I'm totally open and ready for the next suggestion! I would dearly love to get this problem resolved.

[Nutlaw]

Do you have AIM? My handle is the same there. If you could send me your .dat files at some point, I can play around with them to see if I can figure anything out. (I'd need the commish password or a copy with it disabled, though.) I'm not sure what else to suggest.

[Corsairs]

I do have AIM (handle: "pebacommish"), but not on this computer. I'll be on later tonight and will look for you then. Thanks for taking the time to look over my .dat files! I realize it's no sure bet that you'll find something, but it's a comfort to know someone's trying to help.

[Nutlaw]

Well, I ran your league and ended up with the same problem, though it took me a lot longer to see it. I had a crash at the end of 2009, but it didn't damage any files. At the end of 2012, I had another crash that reverted faces.dat to an empty file.

In your first post, you wrote that, "Disabling FaceGen/deleting pictures from the "Images" directory has no effect." Do you mean that disabling FaceGen won't stop the crashes from happening or that it doesn't fix your damaged file?

Have you tried specifically setting your "Player Pictures for" "No Fictional Players" while simming out your league and only changing it to "All Players" to "Update/Generate Player Pictures" once or twice a season before immediately switching it back to "No Fictional Players"?

[Nutlaw]

I spent some more time trying to figure out how to reconnect old player images to a league after its faces.dat file was removed, but I couldn't seem to do it. If you disable player pictures, the game will continue to use your old faces, but as soon as you re-enable them, the game will overwrite them.

Hrm. One more idea.

[Nutlaw]

No, the faces.dat file holds all of the information needed to generate new faces. As soon as it is gone, you lose the abililty to alter that same face in the future. You can access your old faces by either disabling FaceGen or by copying all of your face images to a different directory and then overwriting the newly created files with your old copied ones, but as soon as you try to generate a new version of the face, the old features are lost.

[Nutlaw]

I don't know what causes the crash in the first place. It doesn't always seem to happen during the same year. Hrm.

How about this as a workaround, albeit not a perfect one? Every year of simming before reaching the last day of the year, make a copy of your faces.dat file. If the game does crash and destroy your faces.dat file, simply substitute in your copied file.

[Corsairs]

I had considered that as an option and will definitely hold onto a backup copy of faces.dat in case of crashes. I'm not 100% sure that it won't just keep crashing at the same spot whenever I replace the file, but it's worth a shot.

When I said, "Disabling FaceGen/deleting pictures from the "Images" directory has no effect," I meant that it won't stop the crashes. It seems like the problem is embedded somewhere in my files; different options/settings that I've tried haven't helped.

I have not tried your suggestion of using the "No Fictional Players" option coupled with occasional "Update / Generate Player Picture". It doesn't seem likely that it would prevent my crashes given when I've seen, but it's certainly worth trying. I'll test it when I get a moment and let you know what happens.

Do you think there's a chance of having my .dat files forwarded onto Markus or anyone who might be able to determine the cause of the problem? It'd certainly be nice to have the core problem rooted out of OOTP9.