Is anyone else terrified of the random problems that just pop up and disappear?

[Zaen]

Like, I feel like I've seen people mention this enough that I don't need to at length explain what the problems can be. It seems like stuff has a tendency to just work fine, decide it's not going to work, and then change its mind later.


I'm really kind of afraid of MV updates and plugin updates. I feel like any of them could just ruin everything.

And the farther along I get, the more anxiety I have that I'm going to run into a thing that's not going to fix itself, that I can't understand what is wrong, and yeah.


I'm afraid to pour this much work into something that seems so unstable.


Anyone else?

 

[Shaz]

I suspect there might be some cache stuff happening, because I sometimes undo changes that I've made to my plugins, then play, and it plays as if the changes were still there.  I've had so many versions of MV and jump in and out of plugins so much, that I can't be sure that's what's happening, and it's not just me going slightly crazy.  By the time I think something weird has happened, it's too late to pay close attention to what it was like before, so I can never be sure.


To be safe, avoid putting your projects into folders that are synced online automatically (steam cloud, dropbox, onedrive, etc) as they are known to cause serious issues (start-over type issues)


Back up.  Regularly.

 

[Kes]

Multiple backups with the date of each one as part of the title.  That way I can know precisely what the cut-off point was.


Also, for scripts/plugins - if I am a fair way into the project and the update is not a bug fix, I will tend to stay with my existing version and only use the updated version in a later project.


I never, ever synch with anything, anywhere.  Life is too short to deal with all the problems that causes.


Having said all that, sometimes this sort of problems comes from the developer's own actions.  One of the most common is the result of using switches which have not been clearly named (or sometimes not named at all).  You end up using the same switch for 2 different things.


Another common thing with switches which can kick in with script/plugin updates is this.  When you installed the script/plugin, you dutifully went through it and changed the default switches there into the ones you were actually using.  Later on, you install an update and forget to do that.  Nasty things ensue.

 

[Milennin]

The thing I'm most afraid for, with updates, is forgetting which changes I made to the core .js files that have to be replaced by the new ones.

 

[HexMozart88]

It's for this exact reason (among other things) that I decided to stick with Ace and XP until MV becomes a little more, uh, shall we say, stable? But if you already have MV and it's the only program you have, I'd do as the others have said and make backups. I'd say put one on an SD card or something, and one on your server. That way if you get a problem that destroys your game, you just go to the last version you had.  

 

[Shaz]

@Milennin that's why it's better to make any changes as plugins.  I know in the past I've directed people to a single line or two of code that could be changed to achieve what they're after, but I always let them know that if they take an update, they'll have to redo those changes, and offer to give them a separate version they can use as a plugin instead.

 

[Milennin]

@Milennin that's why it's better to make any changes as plugins.  I know in the past I've directed people to a single line or two of code that could be changed to achieve what they're after, but I always let them know that if they take an update, they'll have to redo those changes, and offer to give them a separate version they can use as a plugin instead.

I'd do that if I knew how to make my own plugins. Like, if I want the Guard command removed from combat, I'll just delete the line in one of the core .js files, but I wouldn't know how to write a separate .js file myself that achieves the same thing.

 

[Shaz]

You just copy that whole function into its own file in the plugins folder (give it a .js extension) and remove the line you don't want.  Then add it through the plugin manager.

 

[Zaen]

The way a plugin works is it just takes code from the core js files and edits them and replaces those functions.


EDIT: If you're relying on Yanfly plugins, you essentially have to stay updated in everything, because his plugins require it. The first thing to do when something stops working is honestly to check that your plugins are updated. There is very likely a message in the console that says, "This plugin requires you to update to work."


Which like, makes no sense. We're trying to build games on an engine that is constantly changing itself. I'm having the problem with Terrax now (that he is working on a fix for) because an updated version of MV has rendered his plugin problematic.


I think it makes no sense to start a project, but constantly update the program and plugins to go along with it, and not expect to be constantly behind in your game, or worse, constantly starting over.


But you're kind of forced to update. You eventual will realize, "I need to update for this stuff to work"


Build your games and build them quickly, because the platform you're using isn't going to wait around for you.

 

[Andar]

that is not entirely correct - MV gets updated to solve problems in the core engine, and those updates are needed for stable functions. This takes longer than with other programs because Degica is a small company that can't hire dozens of programmers to get the fixes done in a month, but once that is finished the engine will remain stable and unchanged.


And for exactly the problem with incompatibilities, all project updates are always manual - you don't have to update your project at all.


The only problem here is if you want to push in newer plugins that require a newer core - but that is still your decision to add more plugins - basically you don't even need any plugin to make a game,

 

[Zaen]

I get that, and I know that. It's not that I don't think the updates should happen. I know that it's for the best overall program in the end, but if something currently works and I'm not experiencing an issue, I'm hesitant to want to update. This really is true of all software for me. I know that Windows updates are often security features, but I know that they come with... a whole slew of other things I may not want to deal with. So I do it hesitantly, and I don't enjoy having to do it, despite understanding the purpose of software updates.


But, what I mean is if you're using Yanfly, you need to update to his latest plugins. It will tell you to do so sometimes in the console. That's what I meant by required -- if you want to use those plugins, which I do.


And I just feel like, at all times, like everything is moments away from collapsing and I have to hurry up and produce the end result before everything falls apart.


That's really all I meant to say. I'm not trying to say that updates are bad in general. I know they're not.

 

[Ghost of Christmas Kloe]

Yup, sometimes that's happened and I've worked for a week on something and then BAM it stops working when nothing's changed. Then I get times where I remove something like a plugin and it's effects linger and it's really annoying. It's not that common and generally okay though!

 

[Dr. Delibird]

I have noticed that if you have the program open for a long while (no specific amount of time sorry) it will start to act slightly weird on me. It fixes itself once I save then close and re open but sometimes I will go insane trying to figure out why something isn't working and I start to doubt myself since I was so sure what I changed was correct and then it doesn't because MV is acting weird so I feel like I did something atomically stupid.


To be honest I do not believe this is the fault of the program at all since photoshop, maya and ableton live 9 all experience the same level of weirdness when their respective programs  have been running for a while so I would assume it is a problem on the operating systems part (Win 8.1). Regardless of the cause the bugs that happen are weird, like I was testing a bunch of battles and decided to change the party members and normally MV remembers the party members you have chosen once you test the battle after making the changes but lolnope that wasn't happening. Closed and reopened the program and it worked fine again.