I have enough information / experience / and test data to make this post very detailed, but I’ll keep it short for now.
We started a project in Unity 4, no problems. We upgraded to Unity 5.2 to update out 3rd party touch controls, and suddenly we run into problem 1. We upgraded to 5.3 to hopefully solve the problem and start using 3D particles, and now we have problem 2. I went and posted about both problems, a Unity employee told me problem 2 is fixed in 5.3.1 (it’s not).
So, we upgraded to 5.3.1, and now we’re stuck with problem 1, problem 2, and problem 3. I do not have the right to submit my project as part of a bug report, and I can’t reproduce the bugs consistently enough to put them in a new project (plus I’m in a time crunch).
So my question is: Should I ever trust a Unity update again? Should I revert to my last trustworthy build and lose months of work (our game will not be accepted if we have any bugs)?
Here are the problems, keep in mind I’ve scoured the internet and gone through shaders line-by-line with little luck.
Problem 1: 3D objects sometimes flash white for a couple frames. When this happens, all instances of a single mesh will flash for the given frame, and meshes that are a part of the same object will flash around the same time. It’s possible the materials aren’t setting the textures correctly (therefore white texture).
Problem 2: Several UI Images show the wrong sprite for a single frame. There is little rhyme or reason to it, but it happens more consistently when UI objects are moving/animating. This bug started in 5.3.0.
Problem 3: When 3D particles can cast/receive shadows and get too small, the whole scene gets covered in shadow. This bug was in 5.3.1, not in 5.3.0.
I don’t think anyone other than you can answer that.
In my project experience. We won’t update engine immediately.
We will keep using the starting version until our project is done.
Unless we need to use some new features.
Before that. Backup is a must.
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That tis the same approach i take. Unless i need a new version for sake of features or needed bug fixes i will stay with the version for the project unless i have to much time on my hands and i can confirm that the project is running fine on the new version.
Problem 1:
I thought you were also having this problem in 4? Your last message was that you were going to investigate ShaderForge for the possible cause. Did you? Like I said on the other post it sounds unlikely that this problem has existed since 4 without anyone else having it/reporting it. It sounds like a problem in your project or one of your tools. If you are able to recreate it then do please create a bug report.
Problem 2:
The problem you described sounded like this bug however it was fixed and was in 5.3. If you are still having the problem then we need a bug report with a project that shows the problem. We are not able to replicate it since the fix.
Problem 3:
Did you report this?
I can see no bug reports in our system concerning this but I have tested and it does have problems so I have created a new bug report so it can now get fixed. The bug id is 759485, it should appear in the issue tracker shortly.
It’s very difficult for us to fix bugs if we are unable to recreate the problems ourselves. If these are big problems for you then creating bug reports with solid reproductions is the best way to get them solved and is worth the time you spend.
It does sound like some of the issues could be problems with your project and the process of cutting a project down to a bug reproduction often highlights these issues. It is worth the time spent.
Here is some advice on cutting a project down to a bug report: How can I create a minimal reproducible? - Questions & Answers - Unity Discussions
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We do this as much as possible, but we’ve found the need to upgrade several times now; reasons such as improved touch controls and bugs being fixed. In my previous thread, I was told the issue to my problem was upgrading, but upgrading has now only caused more problems… but I’m supposed to expect the next update to actually solve these problems.
I will not stop relentlessly debugging, but I feel like I’ve been stuck on the same bugs for a while and I’m making little to no progress. In one ear, I’m told to never upgrade because it’s dangerous, and in the other ear I’m told upgrading will solve my problems (by the Unity Devs no less). I don’t distrust what anyone has said, but I don’t think anyone actually knows if what they’re saying is 100% true, and if anyone does, it’s likely the Unity Devs (I would hope).
I remember having the problem as long as I’ve been on the project, though in Unity 4 we hardly ever saw the flashes. Now, we see it very randomly about once every other minute. I thought it was possibly shader forge miscalculating spec, but I changed the specular color and still ended up with a white flash. I’ve also found an old hand-written surface shader (very simple one) that had the same issue.
I can’t send code/assets from the project with the problem and I have no say in the matter. I’m also in a crunch, so I can’t do this at work. My best bet would be to try to recreate the problem at home from scratch, when I already have no idea where the problem is coming from.
Are you able to create a bug report with the old spec shader you mentioned? That would at least give us a fighting chance.
Also a video/gif of the problem is better than nothing in a bug report.
No one can say 100% that bugfix x will fix problem y without the original project. There’s always a chance that while the symptoms match, the problem is something else. At this point we now know about problem 3 and will fix it(no eta yet) but 1 and 2 are going to need some more info.
The old shader (and the project it was in) no longer has the problem, but it was enough to convince me the problem can occur without shader forge involved. I’ll try to get some screenshots or gifs, but the problem never seems to occur when we want it to.
That was actually the point of this thread… problem 3 came about when I updated to fix problem 2. I’m still stuck with problem 2 and 3, how do I know updating won’t create problem 4? If I don’t update how will I fix problem 2/3? We’re too close to release to constantly run into this, I’m really thinking my best bet is to stick with 5.3.1 and debug the best I can myself, but even that’s not enough when there are bugs / misunderstandings with the engine code.
EDIT: I fixed problem 2; the UI flickering would occur when a sprite changes mip levels so we disabled mip maps
I thought I fixed the UI flickering but it’s back and I’m fairly certain it is not related to the UI bug fixed in 5.3.1p1, and I’m also fairly certain it is related to the 3D objects flickering.
I spent a full day (during crunch) to whittle our project down to 2 scenes without many of our game assets, each with just a couple simple game objects that can reproduce the bug. I can reproduce this bug about 80% of the time on 3 Windows machines with different versions of Windows and very different hardware, but the Unity QA team can’t seem to reproduce it at all. I understand I’m asking a lot, but I’d really appreciate any more help I can get. The ticket number is 761502
Other people are also having problems with flickering ui sprites. Its being investigated at the moment.