Troubleshooting

If you're having a problem with Open Manifold, you can report it to the issues page!

Before creating a new issue, first check Common Issues below and see if your problem is there. If it isn't, make sure to check whether or not your problem has already been reported via Github's issue search before filing a new one.

Logs

When reporting a bug, it's a good idea to include a log file to more closely pinpoint what went wrong. Open Manifold can write a log file when ran with the command line argument -l:

> OpenManifold.exe -l

> type log.txt
OPEN MANIFOLD v0.0.0
Build Date: Mar 16 20XX at 10:10:10
========================================
Initializing...
Loading configuration...
Creating window with resolution 1280 x 720...
...

Depending on the exact issue, adding the -d argument may help, as doing so adds additional information to the log:

> OpenManifold.exe -l -d

> type log.txt
OPEN MANIFOLD v0.0.0
Build Date: Mar 16 20XX at 10:10:10
========================================
Initializing...
Loading configuration...
[!] Enabling debug features. These are intentionally undocumented and may have odd behavior!
Creating window with resolution 1280 x 720...
...

Common Issues

The game crashes immediately on startup / doesn't open

This usually happens when files are either missing or not in the expected location, most commonly the SDL2 runtime binaries (the .DLL files for Windows users). Make sure that all the following files are in the same location as the game's executable:

• SDL2.dll
• SDL2_image.dll
  • libpng16-16.dll
  • zlib1.dll
• SDL2_mixer.dll
  • libogg-0.dll
  • libvorbis-0.dll
  • libvorbisfile-3.dll
• libwinpthread-1.dll

Another common cause of this is a malformed configuration file. Try deleting (or renaming) config.json and then launch the game; Open Manifold will generate a new config file on startup.

The game crashes when trying to select or play a certain level

This usually means the level.json file is malformed, most likely the result of either missing commas/brackets, extra commas, or incorrect values for a parameter. The game will attempt to check for any errors in level.json and throw up an error screen if it finds any issues (printing said issue to the log), but Open Manifold is known to be quite picky, so ensure your JSON is properly formatted. You can use a JSON linter such as this one to check for errors.

My browser/OS thinks the game is malware

This is a false-positive, likely caused by the fact that Open Manifold is a new and therefore untrusted/unknown program by certain antimalware systems. (A similar problem affects other open-source programs, such as Dolphin Emulator's update utility) Depending on what you're using, either grant an exception to OpenManifold.exe or disable the antimalware in question altogether.

My custom/installed levels aren't showing up

This usually means you haven't placed your levels into the right location. Open Manifold expects a very specific layout of level data; a given level should be a folder placed in the assets/levels directory and contain, at the very least, a level.json and song.ogg file like so:

Open-Manifold/
└── assets/
    └── levels/
        └── My Cool Level/
            ├── level.json
            ├── song.ogg
            └── etc.

Subdirectories are not read by the game, so for example this won't work:

Open-Manifold/
└── assets/
    └── levels/
        └── My Levels/
            └── My Cool Level/
                ├── level.json
                ├── song.ogg
                └── etc.