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Test Subject
Original Poster
#1 Old 19th May 2019 at 11:13 PM

This user has the following games installed:

Sims 2, University, Nightlife, Open for Business, Pets, Seasons, Bon Voyage, Free Time, Apartment Life
Default Lots appearing in the wrong neighborhood, neighborhoods vanishing (Ultimate Collection)
Me again, because I only ever post here when I have a game problem, hah. It's with the Ultimate Collection on Windows 10 this time.

I should probably preface this by saying that when I originally got the UC, my Windows machine had an issue where it would repeatedly lose internet connection regardless of what network it was on. I lost connection quite a few times while installing the game, so I would not be surprised if that caused the problem to begin with.

When I initially started playing the game, I replaced every neighborhood with Tarlia's clean templates, and most of them seemed to function correctly. The only exceptions were Belladonna Cove and Strangetown, where there were obvious signs of corruption (toddlers with LTWs, Sims with all-blank Wants and Fears, missing memories - it seemed like everything was "scrambled" to the wrong Sim), and Desiderata Valley, which caused the entire game to crash after awhile for some reason. Again, I would not be surprised if the corruption was due to a problem with the initial install, because I doubt Tarlia's templates were corrupt.

I have to be honest in that I don't remember the specifics of what else I did, but after a few months of a routine consisting of "mostly using the Windows machine for SimPE and playing the actual game now and again", I decided to try and change out BC's files with Tarlia's template again, and also decided to try taking a copy of a neighborhood that I play on my Mac and putting it into the Neighborhoods folder on the Windows machine, because why not.

The results:
  • Pleasantview disappeared from both my neighborhood list and the list in SimPE/Hoodchecker (probably my fault - both my custom hood and Pleasantview were titled N001 and I forgot to fix that at first, but changing the name of my custom hood's folder didn't resolve it)
  • Lots from other neighborhoods (I recognized at least one Strangetown lot, not sure about the other ones) landing in Belladonna Cove
  • BC as a whole appearing corrupt - the terrain map itself looks correct but there are holes in the terrain, lots are over roads, none of the original BC lots/families in the neighborhood, etc.
  • My custom neighborhood isn't in the game list (not unexpected) or in SimPE/Hoodchecker (unexpected)

Strangetown and other neighborhoods seem completely unaffected (besides Strangetown's initial corruption). All the lots and families are where they're supposed to be, so it doesn't seem like they got picked up from one neighborhood and put into another.

I backed up my TSData folders and tried swapping the NeighborhoodManager for BC with the one in an older folder, but that didn't seem to resolve anything (unless I'm supposed to have replaced the neighborhood files again when I did that). Either way, I'm not sure if I messed it up even more doing that and I suspect I'll need to restore the backup.

I'm not particularly attached to anything in my UC just yet, so I don't mind uninstalling and reinstalling the game as needed, but I'm also not sure if I need to or if I should be doing something else. Provided that I didn't confuse everybody with my explanation of what I did and what happened, is there something else I should be doing to fix what I screwed up or is uninstall/reinstall my only option?
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Field Researcher
#2 Old 20th May 2019 at 8:28 AM
If installation files got corrupted, you should try repairing the game through Origin and then reset your user data by deleting EA Games folder in Documents to let the game generate a fresh one. If that fails, try reinstalling the game. Sorry if this isn’t of any help.
Mad Poster
#3 Old 20th May 2019 at 1:10 PM Last edited by Justpetro : 20th May 2019 at 1:33 PM.
Hoods disappearing means that your game is probably corrupted - using the repair option through Origin is the first option, because if you have any working hoods, they will remain and you can continue playing them.
Repair will fix the game files, but will not remove your cc, so you may want to remove the cc first, because a repair is not going to fix any broken/corrupted cc.
Keep the essential mods in.
After a repair,you may have to:
1. download and install a new copy of the CEP 2. download and install a new copy of the Scriptorium
3. redo any graphic changes you may have had to made to get the game working in a proper size
4. Install your cc camera mod again if you use one.

(It really goes quickly, just make sure you have everything in a folder on your pc somewhere before the time).

If you do not have them yet, get the essential mods from here in your new game: https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=532696

If you want to start over, you don't need to uninstall and reinstall.
1. Remove all your cc from your game folder and back it up somewhere
2. Delete the entire game folder
3. Choose "Repair" in Origin and it will create a brand new vanilla game for you (takes a lot less time than reinstalling)
4. You will have to follow the above 4 steps (those that are needed on your pc).

(Tarlia's templates work fine on the UC).
Field Researcher
#4 Old 20th May 2019 at 6:38 PM
I'm not sure if that could explain everything, but is it possible that you simply copied the hood folders over the old hood folders instead of first deleting the old hood and then copying the new one over? For example, if you have one N001 folder in your hood folder and you simply try to overwrite it with another N001 folder, files from the old and the new N001 folder might get mixed together and create a probably corrupt/unplayable hood. Also, if you want to rename a hood, you need to change the name for the main folder and all the files that are in the hood folder. This is easiest if you use a program that allows you to change the name of a lot of files at once (e.g. Bulk Rename Utility).

As for your UC install, it sounds like a good idea to just try and repair it (as others have mentioned) to make sure the installation files are not causing any problems.

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Alchemist
#5 Old 20th May 2019 at 10:22 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Justpetro
2. Delete the entire game folder
3. Choose "Repair" in Origin and it will create a brand new vanilla game for you (takes a lot less time than reinstalling)


Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but it will create a new game folder if you just start the game if there's not user game folder. You don't need to repair or anything for that.
Test Subject
Original Poster
#6 Old 21st May 2019 at 1:28 AM
I tried deleting the old neighborhoods and repairing my game files, and the neighborhoods don't seem to be corrupt anymore, which is good. Of course, I got the classic "the application has crashed + will now terminate" while browsing clothes in BC (and then the game window wouldn't close and basically locked me into the game because Task Manager wouldn't appear over the window so I could kill it), but I don't think that's related to corruption.
Mad Poster
#7 Old 21st May 2019 at 7:09 AM
[QUOTE=Sunrader]Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but it will create a new game folder if you just start the game if there's not user game folder. You don't need to repair or anything for that.[/]

I created new game folders for contests a couple of times and it does create a new game folder, yes - it did not put back everything I changed, though!

So I found that repairing it turned it into a vanilla game again. (I also think - although it has been a while - that the business subhoods remain in the installation files in both cases).

I also think that, if there is a possibility of corruption, a repair is safer.
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