gst-launch stays in PAUSED for ever if pipeline finishes buffering quickly. This happens for example with playbin2 using a local source.

gst-launch -m playbin2 uri=file:///local.mp4 video-sink="texturesink internalGL=true" audio-sink=fakesink flags=native-audio+native-video+buffering+download

Setting pipeline to PAUSED ...
Pipeline is PREROLLING ..
GstMessageBuffering, buffer-percent=(int)0
....
GstMessageBuffering, buffer-percent=(int)100
Pipeline is PREROLLED ...
Setting pipeline to PLAYING ...
Prerolled, waiting for buffering to finish...

At this point the preroll frame is shown but playback never starts. If using a network source so buffering is slower it works fine. Not passing the buffering flag for local sources also work fine. The reason for setting buffering flag is a goal of having one generic pipeline for all URI:s and network buffering is required.

(texturesink is a closed source element, but should be irrelevant for gst-launch buffering handling)