I usually tend to do the following steps in the situations:
- If a file with references, then open file option box and set to open with all references unloaded. That usually tends to fix a lot of issues when it’s anything happening with referenced nodes in the scene. After opening of scene you can then try to load the references one by one to see which one ends up erroring. (And often suddenly all load fine. Then just save as new version and check if that scene opens fine. You never know.)
- Open file option box, disable execute script nodes. That way settings from the scene are ignored completely as it doesn’t try to run the initialization script nodes. (This should also fix the opening file trying to re-enable evaluation if it did so.)
- Disable the Evaluate Nodes as described.
- Pause all viewports. (E.g. the pause button at the top of maya)
- If all that fails I tend to open in mayapy to see if that also fails under those conditions - often than magically it behaves differently.
Also, in some rare cases it could be worth trying to import your scene instead of opening it - as was already mentioned. This for example also shouldn’t mess with the evaluate modes. However, after trying the above steps I mentioned before this usually doesnt solve more things - unless its related to render settings or some odd default node setting in the scene.
And of course, if it’s a .ma
file and you have a vague idea what is causing the crash you can edit the file in notepad and remove whatever is breaking things. However this might be more involved than most (non-tech) people feel confident with.