Quick answer: Debug overlays don't have to be cut from release - a gated, password-protected dev menu gives you on-device diagnostics from real players' machines without leaking internals.
Twenty minutes spent enabling a debug overlay in release builds saves you a week of remote debugging on a player's exact machine.
Gate it behind a code
A keyboard chord (Ctrl+Shift+~) plus a passphrase entered on a hidden text input. Cheap to implement, effectively impossible to discover by accident.
Strip sensitive paths
Debug overlays often print file paths, server URLs, build numbers. Audit the strings. Don't ship the path to your unencrypted save file in a release build.
Provide a one-shot dump
Most useful command: 'dump bug report'. Captures FPS history, memory profile, recent log, last 5 seconds of input - bundles into a Bugnet ticket. Players who can't describe a bug can hit a button.
Keep it text-driven
A graphical debug menu looks fancy but breaks on the player's odd screen DPI. ImGui-style text panel survives any output device.
“If your release build can't tell you what's wrong, you'll never know what was wrong.”
The first time a player uses your debug dump command and it solves a long-standing crash, you'll wish you'd shipped it on day one. Build it now.