[UBT] Unable to generate project files in after updating to 5.4

[Omniac]

I’ve recently updated from UE5.3 to UE5.4, and I’ve had a bunch of issues with my project, one of which is that I can not re-generate my project at all using UBT. Everytime I try, I get this error:

Exception while generating include data for UnrealEditor: System.ArgumentNullException: Value cannot be null. (Parameter 'element')
   at System.Attribute.GetCustomAttributes(MemberInfo element, Type attributeType, Boolean inherit)
   at System.Reflection.CustomAttributeExtensions.GetCustomAttributes[T](MemberInfo element)
   at UnrealBuildTool.ModuleRules.IsValidForTarget(Type moduleType, ReadOnlyTargetRules targetRules, String& invalidReason) in D:\Epic Games\UE_5.4\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\Configuration\ModuleRules.cs:line 1636
   at UnrealBuildTool.UEBuildTarget.AddAllValidModulesToTarget(ILogger Logger) in D:\Epic Games\UE_5.4\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\Configuration\UEBuildTarget.cs:line 3938
   at UnrealBuildTool.UEBuildTarget.PreBuildSetup(ILogger Logger) in D:\Epic Games\UE_5.4\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\Configuration\UEBuildTarget.cs:line 3403
   at UnrealBuildTool.UEBuildTarget.Create(TargetDescriptor Descriptor, Boolean bSkipRulesCompile, Boolean bForceRulesCompile, Boolean bUsePrecompiled, UnrealIntermediateEnvironment IntermediateEnvironment, ILogger Logger) in D:\Epic Games\UE_5.4\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\Configuration\UEBuildTarget.cs:line 1392
   at UnrealBuildTool.ProjectFileGenerator.<>c__DisplayClass87_0.<GenerateIntelliSenseData>b__0(Int32 TargetIndex) in D:\Epic Games\UE_5.4\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\ProjectFiles\ProjectFileGenerator.cs:line 2165

It seems this was an issue after this commit in UE5.3:
https://github.com/EpicGames/UnrealEngine/commit/22d71006f092da479968514f8b71a9767254a845#diff-e484445152abd3e9249a4eac7efe106748d8978f3dea2256314cf9dbc01de920

A lot of the other posts I’ve seen about this have been for plugins, such as this one:

[UBT Bug] No longer able to compile plugins in standalone since 5.3

Hey all! Since 5.3, UBT crashes when compiling plugins in standalone mode (i.e. not part of a project). Here’s the build command used to repro: dotnet "<PathToEngine>\Engine\Binaries\DotNET\UnrealBuildTool\UnrealBuildTool.dll" UnrealEditor Win64 Development -plugin=<PathToPlugin>\<PluginName>.uplugin Here’s repro’s log: Using user-specified engine root: z:\Unreal\UE_5.3 Using bundled DotNet SDK version: 6.0.302 Running UnrealBuildTool: dotnet "..\..\Engine\Binaries\DotNET\UnrealBuildTool\Un…

But for me it’s for my entire project, and I can’t figure out for the life of me why this is happening.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Omniac]

bump ^

[Omniac]

man really no replies

[Omniac]

Resloved this issue.

I had some plugins in my engine plugin folder that had incorrect build.cs files which were causing the error with UBT. After removing them from the engine plugin folder I am now able to correctly use UBT.