Skinned MeshParts flicker when removing MeshPart from welded group

Hello. Sorry for the bump, but this issue hasn’t been addressed yet. Also, this bug has a much broader impact than reflected in this post.

In fact, skinned MeshParts always flicker back to their original position/shape when one or more of their properties related to rendering is changed (including BrickColor, Color, Reflectance, Transparency and Position). This however does not happen when CanCollide is changed. Inserting an image (Decal/Texture) to the MeshPart, or changing any property of the image object child of the MeshPart, will trigger this bug.

This happens regardless of whether the MeshPart is anchored or not, or if its DoubleSided property is ticked or not.

Furthermore, changing the property of a single skinned MeshPart can lead other skinned MeshParts (occasionally all of them in a game) to flicker as well, even if they were not affected by the change.

The effects seem to be way bolder while play-testing in Studio and in live servers than while running a test in Studio.

Total number of bones does not seem to have any relation with this bug.

Repro steps:

  1. Insert a skinned .fbx file through the Avatar Importer plugin.
  2. Deform the MeshPart by changing the CFrame of its bones (by scripting or manually, using Move and Rotate tools).
  3. Run the game with a script like this:
game:GetService("TweenService"):Create(workspace.MeshPart, TweenInfo.new(15), {["Transparency"] = 1}):Play()

Using a TweenService makes the part to flicker constantly until the tween has been completed, so it’s easier to observe.


Related: Deformable meshes flicker when MeshPart size changes - Bug Reports / Engine Bugs - DevForum | Roblox

13 Likes

Thank you for bringing this issue to attention again. This is a massive UX issue in our (@thunder1222) upcoming game as well. I’ve added lots of optimizations to try and mitigate it, but this seems to be an issue on Roblox’s end. The quicker this can be fixed, the better.

I’ve supplied a minimized repro file in the thread that @mishajones linked above.

7 Likes

This bug seems to occur whenever something new is added to the player, and it still a issue that hasn’t been resolved as of May 1st 2021

https://gyazo.com/2ebd528020133a0e6863542dd0e4b58a

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I ran into this issue with my current remake of Roblox Battle where I use the TweenService on the superball tool for changing colors. For me, this causes flickering pretty much every other frame, which might actually be enough to cause an epileptic seizure. I am at the point where I am debating of having a feature flag to enable or disable mesh deformation-based characters because of this.

(Flashing warning)

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This still happens when any property of the meshparts is manipulated, including transparency and colors, and objects are moved around in the character. May have something to do with roblox needing to rebake and setup the objects after the change. Would appreciate a fix, need to manipulate these properties in a game, but this makes my goal unachievable. interestingly enough, one of my meshparts have no problem having their transparency changed, but the other does.

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Can confirm we’re also running into this issue and it is very frustrating, literally ruining the whole experience ahaha. Our characters are fully skinned models and as soon as they start moving around it’s a constant T-pose flicker simulator.

We’re unable to release our game until this is fixed… :woman_shrugging:

1 Like

Also experiencing this issue, but with TextureID.

We have Skinned Mesh rigs (custom rigs, animal-like). We are trying to support “blinking” by changing the TextureID of a MeshPart, but it randomly (sometimes does, sometimes does not) causes the rig to take on its default pose for 1 frame.

Maybe it has to do with whether the change is made before/after AnimationStep in the frame.

I’ve seen this issue before as well. To anybody experiencing it - try turning on the Beta Feature for Cage Mesh Deformer and then try to replicate the behavior in Studio. It fixed the problem for me, (though it can’t run in a live game yet), so if it works for you guys too, I think the solution could be somewhere in that feature’s code.

This issue still happens bumping so Developer Relations can see!

This happens for even something as minor as a position change, so the issue is actually quite big.
I’m not sure why this hasn’t been fixed yet, since it’s a pretty visible bug.
My game has bows that use mesh deformation, and they repeatedly flicker when the players move while holding them. I hope it gets fixed eventually, it’s such an eyesore in my game.

2 Likes

This bug also severely impacts my game which has custom characters and character customization, as well as several abilities that modify the appearance of the character. This is a critical issue with respect to the appearance of my game, and is a major blocker for me fully adopting the use of skinned MeshParts. This needs to be fixed if Roblox expects developers to use this technology.

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Hello,
I’m experiencing this as well, this bug appears to happen when a part which is a descendant of a character, is cframed rapidly (tweened, in the gif it’s tweened via C0/C1 changes); the skinned mesh begans to flicker back to its T-Pose Parenting the cframing part outside the character appears to fix this.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/605480959793430543/860331537094410280/bug.gif

3 Likes

Also had to abandon blinking for our skinnedmesh avatars due to this.

This bug (and how long it’s been unaddressed) is telling me that skinnedmeshes shouldn’t be used for any public games right now. The priority seems to be elsewhere as bugs / feature requests aren’t being touched. We reported this back in February separate from this thread.

(Here’s our bug report from February: https://devforum.roblox.com/t/animation-flickering-behavior/1039803)

1 Like

Temporary workaround is to parent everything separately from your avatar so any changes won’t force this refresh. So for eyes, have a copy of your face that’s invisible following it in the Workspace.

I have this same issue on my skinned mesh rig, but they are pretty rare so getting one on video is hard, but that video is basically what happens to my skinned mesh rig. Usually happens in idle too

They have been working for several months on an update that includes a fix for these bugs.

There is no follow-up from the Roblox avatar engineers in this thread, but check this topic instead to read official responses.

The official announcement of the feature release is kept up to date as well:

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Still have this issue… I’m really surprised this hasn’t been fixed in years considering its such a major issue.

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From what I’ve seen it seems fixed for a long time

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I don’t think it’s been fixed. Here’s a reproduction file:

flickering.rbxl (41.6 KB)

In this file all I’m doing is moving skinned meshes and changing their transparency from 0 to 0.001 for the first row of meshes. It results in this: https://gyazo.com/08931ee880ce12fb503f1bb7199e3fcc
The flickering even affects meshes not in the first row as described by mishajones earlier in this thread.

This is something that’s really limiting the use of skinned meshes in my game.

2 Likes

This post describes the issue very well, and you can see the impact of the glitch in the rbxl file @DevInfinitum just posted. Here’s an mp4 of the link he just sent.


Using skinned meshes is very important for our game’s performance, so I’d really like to see a response so we know this glitch is known about and that a fix is coming.

1 Like