How do I catch this when it only happens for some players?

Capture it automatically from the player's device with the full stack trace, the device and OS, the build, and a breadcrumb trail of what they did. That turns a vague complaint into a specific, reproducible issue you can fix without owning the hardware it happens on.

How to Fix a Service Locator Returning Null Because a System Registered Too Late

Q: What causes a service locator returning null because a system registered too late?

A consumer resolved a service from the locator during startup before that service had registered itself, so the lookup returned null and the consumer broke.

Quick answer: Register all services in an explicit bootstrap phase before any system resolves them, or make the locator resolve lazily and fail loudly when a required service is missing.

A service locator only works if registration precedes resolution. Without a defined bootstrap order, a consumer can ask for a service that has not been installed yet.

How to fix it

1. Split bootstrap into phases

Run a register phase that installs every service, then an init phase where systems resolve their dependencies. Never resolve during the register phase.

2. Fail loudly on missing services

Have the locator throw or assert when a required service is absent rather than returning null, so the ordering bug surfaces immediately instead of as a later null reference.

3. Prefer injection where you can

For systems with a fixed set of dependencies, pass them in at construction instead of pulling from the locator, removing the timing question entirely.

Catching the ones you can't reproduce

The hardest version of this to fix is the one you can't reproduce — it only happens on a player's hardware, OS, driver, or save state, under conditions that simply aren't present on your machine. A report that says “it crashed” or “it froze” gives you nothing to act on, so the bug survives release after release while quietly costing you players.

Automatic error capture closes that gap. Each failure arrives with its full stack trace, the device and OS, the build number, and a breadcrumb trail of what the player did right before it broke, so even a failure you have never seen becomes a specific, reproducible issue. Fold identical failures into one signature ranked by how many players each hits, and your worklist sorts itself worst-first instead of arriving as a stream of vague complaints.

This is where a tool like Bugnet earns its place. Its SDK captures every error automatically with the full stack trace plus device, OS, memory, build, and game-state context, folds duplicates into one grouped issue with an occurrence count, and ties each to the build it first appeared on — so you fix the problem that hurts the most players first and confirm it is gone when its signature disappears from the next release.

Ship the fix, watch the signature disappear from the next build. That's how you know it's really gone.