So this was me coming back to GMS2 after the 2.3 update and updating GMLive, I removed all previous traces of GMLive and set up the new one.
I posted a thread last year about a similar issue but that was caused by me installing a custom user theme on windows 10.
To recap, the game will open just fine and process live code, but after opening the title screen's room, you either stay on the title screen or crash the game -- any room changes will just make the debug runner program freeze and terminate itself:
however, there is a new side effect this time around -- it doesn't crash on the title screen anymore but using it in a step event makes some massive framerate drops... in the same step event i was livecoding before.
but I at least get to play my test level before the program crashes upon room changes this time.