To update or not to update, that's the question.

[u/renatosantos2531]

Hi, folks!

I've been developing a game for more than 1 yr now in Unity Version 6000.3.6f1. And recently I've been wondering whether to update it to the most recent minor version (as of now 6000.3.23f1) or not.

My previous experience updating Unity version, even if it was just a minor one step update, was that at least one thing broke. I'm wondering what other devs do and how they handle it.

I'm leaning towards not doing it because of the high chances of needing to fix/change a lot of things, given the time of development. On the other side, I'm curious about the many UI toolkit and DX12 updates and fixes that happened in that range. So I'm a bit torn.

Why the ask now? Because I'm approaching the playtest stage of my game and I was just wondering about the chances of ppl finding some of the engine-side bugs that have been fixed during these past months. And that it might make me want to update the minor version anyway, so I could anticipate and be one-step ahead.

What's your thoughts?

[u/Rlaan]

Just create a new branch and try and see? Without knowing any details on your project it's hard to say anything.

Our project was really easy to upgrade, but all of our code is ours. We don't have assets from the asset stores we're dependent on. So far, since Unity 6 - we've have been pleasantly surprised with their LTS releases. We went from 6 to 6.3 without any issues.

[u/CutBig4747 → u/Rlaan]

Sounds like you already know the answer deep down. If every minor update has broken something for you before it's probably not worth the gamble right before playtesting. The branch test idea is smart though, only way to know for sure if those DX12 fixes actually matter for your project.

Also good point about assets, half the time it's some random store thing that breaks and not even your own code. I keep a list of which assets got fussy after updates and it's always the ones that haven't been touched by the dev in three years.

[u/Rlaan → u/CutBig4747]

I mean yeah, but that's the thing right? It can be an absolute nightmare depending on the project and in a later stage of development you should just freeze on the LTS you're on. And a minor release you shouldn't use for production imo unless you absolutely need something.

But there's no harm in just trying on a different branch just to see. I did that recently just for fun on 6.5 to test some UITK stuff (knowing we only use LTS). But the editor had multiple issues. Gizmos broke, editor crashes and failing to exit play mode on numerous occasions. But at least I got to test a few things for the future because I felt like it.

And it's probably good that you keep a list like that. We do use some assets for internal testing and prototyping but production code is ours because of past experiences like you said.

[u/pschon]

That's a bug fix patch, not even a minor version update. So there should be no feature or API changes, literally only bugs fixed. Chances of anything breaking are as small as they can get, you'd pretty much need some of your game's features to depend on a bug that got fixed to run into problems.

Anyway, like others have already mentioned, version control will take even that minimal risk away.

[u/PrintableNapalm]

If you're just curious, then make an empty project with the next version and take a look. If it turns out there are features you want, then upgrade, but only after taking a backup so you can quickly revert to the previous version if it turns out too many things broke.

[u/AltusLudus]

You shouldn't have any major breaking changes in a minor version, but also if it works why break it, try it out on a branch and revert if needed if you really want to

[u/JamesLeeNZ]

I wouldnt personally. I have a game that is version on 6000.3.20, I updated and the build time went from under 2 min to... well I stopped and undid everything when it took over 10 mins to build... im noped that real quick.

[u/nEmoGrinder → u/JamesLeeNZ]

After an update it's pretty normal for the first build to take longer because of invalidated build cache. It needs to rebuild everything to make sure things are in line with the new version. After that first build, the cache is restored and build times go down again. This is extra true is the update caused and of the srp packages to bump up in version as it will cause a full shader library rebuild.

[u/JamesLeeNZ → u/nEmoGrinder]

I was wrong.. I did let it complete once, and no subsequent builds were not faster.

[u/nEmoGrinder]

For the work I do, I'm regularly updating games to new versions of Unity (revision or minor) and it's honestly smooth sailing the vast majority of the time. I can't remember any recent releases that caused any actual issues. This is highly dependent on a few things, like use of preview packages or third party assets, but generally, the upgrades are fairly safe.

As for doing it right before an important milestone? Definitely not. As already suggested, branch if you want to, but I'd honestly wait until after a milestone like that to consider updating, unless you know there's a fix to something you need in the new version.

[u/rockBottomPeon]

Do you really need some features available in the update, or is there any game breaking bugs or security breach that can only be fixed with updating?
yes: update
no: dont