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Test Subject
#526 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 12:25 AM
I see. So as far as I see it the basic list of mods to download for beginners (we might want to put this into a separate thread to help people who are trying to figure that out, I tried looking for one but couldn't find it) are:

*Tarlia's clean neighborhoods for if you want to use the Maxis neighborhoods
*the mod to prevent vampires from biting Mrs. Crumplebottom
*the mod that limits the number of NPCs the game can generate (to slow the game reaching critical file mass)
*Mootilda's Hood Checker
*Batbox Debugger (this fixes the stuff found in the hood checker right?)
*SimPE

anything else?

What I meant is that how could the game make millions of dollars if it was released basically unfinished and messed up? I've never heard of a game being released with major, game-ruining bugs before (although The Sims is the only game I play, so maybe that's just my ignorance). In the Sims 1 the only way to get a bug was to actually mess with the game using cheats, like leaving move objects on for too long or marrying Mrs. Crumplebottom. But it's not like deleting Sims is an esoteric thing to do, it's a major part of playing the game! And this game has been out for 8 years and they never bothered to fix it? It just boggles the mind.
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Mad Poster
#527 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 1:23 AM
Or maybe nobody ever played them long enough for anyone to notice ongoing corruption. And why would you hear about it if you didn't play the game, anyway?

It's a corporation and somebody decided that fixing the problems was not cost-effective.Corporations do much, much worse things in much, much more critical areas (like, say, war zones) all the time, and still keep their government contracts.

Ugly is in the heart of the beholder.
(My simblr isSim Media Res . Widespot,Widespot RFD: The Subhood, and Land Grant University are all available here. In case you care.)
Theorist
#528 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 2:18 AM
Quote: Originally posted by thismustbetheplace
anything else?

It's advisable to find gameobjects.package in your latest EP folder and set it to read only. It prevents some bad things from happening, like a bug with a toy car.

There's a detailed wiki thread about game corruption created from this topic:
http://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title...Hood_Corruption

I don't know why the game is bugged, but I suspect it wasn't possible for testers to find all the bugs and see their long-term consequences. Why not, the game is huge and complex, and it's probably much more complex in programming than any shooter or an RPG. Maybe not because of difficulty, but because there's so much of everything that you'd forget what led to what in your own code.
Scholar
#529 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 2:32 AM Last edited by ieta_cassiopeia : 9th Apr 2013 at 2:43 AM.
In case you're curious, thismustbethecase, EA's errors in coding The Sims 2 are not even the worst example of games programming in gaming history (though they are, taken together, unusally poor). TV Tropes' page on game-breaking bugs includes such "gems" as a driving game where a bug makes it impossible to lose (Big Rigs: Over The Road Racing), a space game with the most unusable DRM ever recorded, preventing anyone from playing the game (Elite for ZX Spectrum) and a game that is capable of uninstalling other programs in the background due to extremely bad programming (UFO: Aftershock). At least with the Sims 2, the worst-case scenario is to reinstall one program...
Test Subject
#530 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 7:35 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Peni Griffin
Or maybe nobody ever played them long enough for anyone to notice ongoing corruption. And why would you hear about it if you didn't play the game, anyway?

It's a corporation and somebody decided that fixing the problems was not cost-effective.Corporations do much, much worse things in much, much more critical areas (like, say, war zones) all the time, and still keep their government contracts.


Oh, I'm not saying that corporations are infallible. Obviously they do much worse things all the time (Monsanto, anyone?) But they tend to cover up those things so that it's not obvious to most people unless you are into activism or have a friend who is. Whereas a glitch in gameplay is something that everyone can notice whether they want to or not. I was just asking it more in a "how could this game succeed in the free market" sense. But I guess a lot of these bugs take a while to show up so for the average player it might not be as much of a problem as someone trying to create a legacy or who wants to play for years.
Top Secret Researcher
#531 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 8:07 AM
Quote: Originally posted by ieta_cassiopeia
In case you're curious, thismustbethecase, EA's errors in coding The Sims 2 are not even the worst example of games programming in gaming history (though they are, taken together, unusally poor). TV Tropes' page on game-breaking bugs includes such "gems" as a driving game where a bug makes it impossible to lose (Big Rigs: Over The Road Racing), a space game with the most unusable DRM ever recorded, preventing anyone from playing the game (Elite for ZX Spectrum) and a game that is capable of uninstalling other programs in the background due to extremely bad programming (UFO: Aftershock). At least with the Sims 2, the worst-case scenario is to reinstall one program...


Ah, Big Rigs. I need to get that one day just to screw around with the complete lack of physics.

Simblr.
Asks are always open, even to anons. I will always reply to asks, and I do my best to be cordial/less snarky than usual.
Mad Poster
#532 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 10:36 AM
Quote: Originally posted by ieta_cassiopeia
At least with the Sims 2, the worst-case scenario is to reinstall one program...


Sure, if you have base game.
Oh the other hand, if you have an expansion with Securom... well.
Theorist
#533 Old 9th Apr 2013 at 11:35 AM
Quote: Originally posted by ieta_cassiopeia
In case you're curious, thismustbethecase, EA's errors in coding The Sims 2 are not even the worst example of games programming in gaming history (though they are, taken together, unusally poor).

I recall playing an old shooter called Sin once. At the very first level my character got stuck, because there was an "invisible wall" in the room he needed to go to for a key! Restarting the game helped.

It was a funnily coded game. In one of the levels terrorists were so bright that one of them jumped from the roof to his death instead of fighting

But your examples are beyond crazy, a game uninstalling other programs in the background, I can't even imagine
Theorist
#534 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 1:17 PM
Hopefully the right place for a question. In case someone has shredded character files, would Boiling Oil's mod "No trash memories" help to stop spreading the corruption? Or would the game still try to look into those references that don't exist uopn gossiping and corrupt further, regardless of that mod?

Also I think there's something strange going on with search, I tried to find this topic by entering the word "non-intuitive" and setting it to "search titles only" and nothing came up. So I lost a topic I myself started very long ago about what happens when townies buy pets in a pet shop (at display cases). To my chagrin I forgot whether it is dangerous to the game, maybe someone can clarify that?
Field Researcher
#535 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 3:14 PM
Sorry I can't help with your recent question, Babahara, but noting all the comments about broken games reminds me of something--when I think about the borked-ness of The Sims 2, I always think of it in connection with one of my favorite games, Vampire: The Masquerade--Bloodlines. I love this game for many reasons, not least of which is laughing at the rampant and over-the-top sexism, but it's a really good game, and it's really broken. Not broken to the point where you can't play it, but broken where you have to have multiple saves to go back to, some quests suddenly don't work at all, and at least one of the fighting styles you get as a particular type of character doesn't work like it's supposed to. Yet, whenever someone in my circle of gamer friends mentions it, we all have the urge to install and play it again. It's just that enjoyable, and the replay value is that high. That's very much how I feel about The Sims 2, and I often remind myself that at the end of the day, I'd much rather have it broken than not at all.

http://kahonseecity.livejournal.com/ < - New Prosperity Challenge. Last update: 6/9/14
Theorist
#536 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 3:29 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Babahara
Hopefully the right place for a question. In case someone has shredded character files, would Boiling Oil's mod "No trash memories" help to stop spreading the corruption? Or would the game still try to look into those references that don't exist uopn gossiping and corrupt further, regardless of that mod?


I believe No Trash Memories stops a sim getting a memory of their cousin they've never met getting an A and similar. I think a no-gossip hack or clearing the gossip on the batbox would do more to slow the spread of corruption, although No Trash Memories certainly can't hurt. But once the files are shredded, they're shredded, so you may want to back up and to look into extracting sims and saving/recreating stuff, just for when the inevitable happens.

esmeiolanthe's Live Journal and Tumblr
Most recent story update: Fuchs That! on 2/21/15
Theorist
#537 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 4:47 PM
Quote: Originally posted by EmeraldFalcon
Not broken to the point where you can't play it, but broken where you have to have multiple saves to go back to, some quests suddenly don't work at all, and at least one of the fighting styles you get as a particular type of character doesn't work like it's supposed to.

Haha, that's amusing, because I've played Bloodlines (unpatched) and never had a single bug with it. We laughed about it long ago in a forum devoted to it. People described bugs unimaginable to me, they were really funny, yet my own experience of that game was impeccable. I particularly remember how one person came back to a hotel in the game and gaped at the room full of fridges stacked on top of each other everywhere

Quote: Originally posted by esmeiolanthe
I believe No Trash Memories stops a sim getting a memory of their cousin they've never met getting an A and similar. I think a no-gossip hack or clearing the gossip on the batbox would do more to slow the spread of corruption, although No Trash Memories certainly can't hurt.

According to BO's description of the hack, it stops gossip memories from being generated. That's why I thought that maybe it can prevent corruption. When another sim gossips about a shredded sim, perhaps his hack stops the game from checking that reference entirely.

With batbox I've got a big problem... Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't! So for example I cleared all gossip from one of my sims, but two other sims in the household didn't get that treatment no matter how many times I tried. I try to clear it, the game takes time to "think", yet nothing happens. I have no idea why. Those sims have gossip memories for sure, I've seen them gossiping.
Theorist
#538 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 5:07 PM
I guess I didn't read BO's description closely enough! Yes, that would help prevent further corruption, then, and reduce the spread of pre-existing corruption.

The sims that are still gossiping, are they gossiping about new events (which BO's hack should stop), or are they gossiping about things that happened a long time ago? I don't actually know how to fix it if it's the latter, but if you don't have BO's hack in yet, sims will still generate new topics of gossip.

esmeiolanthe's Live Journal and Tumblr
Most recent story update: Fuchs That! on 2/21/15
Theorist
#539 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 6:07 PM
It's possible that he updated the hack and the description, I don't remember seeing the half of what I read there before, either.

I can't say if they gossip about new events, because I haven't played much more with that hood (that's why I'm asking questions instead). It's not new gossip that can harm the game, though, it's the old one. Alas, I suspect some dead pre-made sims still had their files shredded, even though those were clean templates. By now I'd summon all sims to erase gossip if the batbox wouldn't behave so selectively.

If I understand correctly gossip harms the game if the game checks a sim that it references and there's no full sim file. Maybe I should ask BO if his hack prevents checking references in addition to stopping new gossip memories, it's just that he was a little unnice to me last time I asked something so I'd rather be a coward and ask somebody else to clarify that
Forum Resident
#540 Old 7th Jul 2013 at 6:21 PM
Quote: Originally posted by thismustbetheplace
Oh, I'm not saying that corporations are infallible. Obviously they do much worse things all the time (Monsanto, anyone?) But they tend to cover up those things so that it's not obvious to most people unless you are into activism or have a friend who is. Whereas a glitch in gameplay is something that everyone can notice whether they want to or not. I was just asking it more in a "how could this game succeed in the free market" sense. But I guess a lot of these bugs take a while to show up so for the average player it might not be as much of a problem as someone trying to create a legacy or who wants to play for years.


Donkey Kong Country 2 sold very well despite the infamous Castle Crush Glitch that would cause one to lose their game save files.
Mad Poster
#541 Old 8th Jul 2013 at 1:00 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Babahara
With batbox I've got a big problem... Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't! So for example I cleared all gossip from one of my sims, but two other sims in the household didn't get that treatment no matter how many times I tried. I try to clear it, the game takes time to "think", yet nothing happens. I have no idea why. Those sims have gossip memories for sure, I've seen them gossiping.
I thought when you chose "From All" that cleared all the gossip memory in the 'hood? Surely when you select one Sim, click on the batbox, select Memory, then Clear Gossip ..., and finally From All, that will clear all the gossip from all the Sims in the whole 'hood. It would take forever if you had to do it for every Sim - that would include all the townies and all the NPCs. Am I right?

Theorist
#542 Old 8th Jul 2013 at 2:49 AM
I don't know if you're right, but the batbox stopped "working" right after I chose "From all" option. Oh I really hope that you're right, because clearing all the gossip in the hood is surely a hassle. I used to do that manually using a sim teleporter!

I can check it a bit later by having sims gossip.
Mad Poster
#543 Old 8th Jul 2013 at 3:21 AM
I'm going around clearing gossip in each of my hoods, and as far as I can tell, "from all" clears it from everybody in that household. "Clear Trash" has to be done for each individual sim.

The fact that I keep getting the "clear gossip" option in each household, however, may be a result of my continually generating new gossip as fast as I clear the old, with my frequent community lot visits, inviting of households, etc.

Ugly is in the heart of the beholder.
(My simblr isSim Media Res . Widespot,Widespot RFD: The Subhood, and Land Grant University are all available here. In case you care.)
Lab Assistant
#544 Old 8th Jul 2013 at 4:15 AM
I have played Big Rigs before. It's a bad game, and only amusing for about ten minutes, but whatever.
I'm searching for, and have already played, some games considered the worst.
I have Vampire: the Masquerade - Bloodlines and installed it succesfully once. But only once. And I didn't even play it.
If I'm correct, Vampire was borked because Troika Games didn't have enough time to test and fix all the bugs. Activision wanted the game to release as soon as possible.
Then Troika went bankrupt in 2005.
There are many, many horrible games. Don't advise you to play them, though, because they might cause temporary insanity.
I really have to get Superman 64 some time.
In all cases, thanks for the link. Hardly know anything about TVTropes and don't go there much but it is a nice site overall.

Question:
One day, I downloaded PCSims' cigarettes to use in my game. I was playing a dorm and bought a display for Sims to buy cigarettes.
After some people bought them, I started to see some squiggly lines in speech bubbles and stuff. But I'm sure it was caused by my low graphics quality.
The game glitched soon afterwards and wouldn't start (probably my fault, accidentally deleted registry keys)
Have reinstalled TS2 since then but does anyone think I had some sort of corruption or whatever?
Theorist
#545 Old 8th Jul 2013 at 7:12 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Peni Griffin
I'm going around clearing gossip in each of my hoods, and as far as I can tell, "from all" clears it from everybody in that household. "Clear Trash" has to be done for each individual sim.

The fact that I keep getting the "clear gossip" option in each household, however, may be a result of my continually generating new gossip as fast as I clear the old, with my frequent community lot visits, inviting of households, etc.

Thank you, that explains it. And I thought that "From all" meant both from dead and alive sims (there's an option "from the dead", after all) for that particular sim only.

As for the "clear gossip" option, it never disappears for me, either. Not even right after clearing.

One of the strangest things I've observed so far is one of my sim's having got rid of more than 2000 gossip entries. I'm not even sure what to think of it. That was a teen. He hasn't been around that much.

Quote: Originally posted by Right-thgiR
The game glitched soon afterwards and wouldn't start (probably my fault, accidentally deleted registry keys)
Have reinstalled TS2 since then but does anyone think I had some sort of corruption or whatever?

If you deleted the registry keys, I'm not sure it could start at all? Squiggly lines suggest some form of corruption, but it could've been mild at that point. And I doubt that it was necessarily about those cigarettes
Site Helper
#546 Old 17th Nov 2013 at 1:39 AM
A few additional threads of interest on this topic:
Is it possible to clean a previously-occupied lot? http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=503383
Super Duper Hug bug can attach to a CC-free lot: http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=508487
Instructor
#547 Old 10th Aug 2014 at 12:10 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Jemcrystal
Everyone keeps talking about some site named MATY. I tried to find this site and got a British forum with ridiculous anti-bot registration questions. There was no way in he.ll anyone could hope to answer the 2nd one, a piece from a Monty Python skit where a guy gets thrown off a cliff for not being able to answer a question. I normally like Brits sense of humor but I'm feeling Irish atm. I just want to know where the hack is to stop Sims 2 overpopulation problem. And why would it be on this evil MATY site AND NOT HERE!!!!!!


what exactly did you type? lol

To see a world in a grain of sand, and heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand, and eternity in an hour.


My Tumblr
Scholar
#548 Old 10th Aug 2014 at 11:12 AM
I don't tend to promote threadcromancy but this is a helpful thread!

I think my legacy hood is a bit more than Pescado's BFBVFS.

EDIT:

On topic now, I've another thing not to do.
Set flags on social worker/rod humble when they appear on your lot. Because that's baaaaaad.

The drop off has been made. You've been warned.
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