Facial genetic strangeness

[DrNerd]

Is there any reason for the game's genetic engine to stop meshing the facial structure genetics of both parents in the children?  What I mean is, with all the kids I've had this generation (so far, 5 in the main houses, 8 outside of the main houses), the kids all seem to be facial clones of one parent or the other.  They're not combining features from both parents; they're just younger versions of one.  Hair, eye, and skin color genetics seem to be working as normal.  It's not always the SAME parent, either.  And it isn't First-Born Effect except in one case; the personalities of the kids are different (widely different, in some cases).  The last birth, I randomized, and got facial-clone twins of their daddy.  In my Uglacy in particular, I WANT a kid with some of the features of both parents, but I can't seem to make that happen in ANY household this generation, and I just want to know if there's some reason why this is happening.

Edit: I can post pictures of the problem if that would help.

More edit: I've checked in SimPE, and it's NOT a case of one parent's genetics being totally dominant.  In my Uglacy, Mom has more dominant genetics than Dad, but all three kids are clones of Dad, despite randomization.

[mildlydisguised]

No idea why.  I'm assuming that you haven't added any hacks since this happened?

In CAS, if you make parents and generate kids, are their facial features blending?

[KillerLlama]

*snicker* Maybe the game's revolting against you for deliberately making fugly sims. Just a thought.

[Zazazu]

Do you have faceblend limits off? I'm wondering if what you are noticing is the game's default behavior of blending faces to whatever it decides is the nearest template equivalent.

[DrNerd]

No idea why.  I'm assuming that you haven't added any hacks since this happened?

In CAS, if you make parents and generate kids, are their facial features blending?

Nope, no new hacks aside from Wear Anything While Pregnant.  And I'm only running up to Seasons, so AFAIK, there's no issues with using the Squinge version of that.

And in CAS, I'm getting feature blending, which is why I chose the spouses I did.

Do you have faceblend limits off? I'm wondering if what you are noticing is the game's default behavior of blending faces to whatever it decides is the nearest template equivalent.

Don't have faceblend limits off.  This is the first time I've had this problem.  I finally did get a kid with a mix of his parents' features, it just took me forfuckingever.
Basically, I got three of these:

Except that Vex is blonde and Howie and Abel are black-haired.  That face is 100% Brad the Hippie.  Mom Tess has genes from the default PolliTech, Malcolm Landgraab IV, and Remington London the Pizza Guy, and I wanted a kid with some of those.  Happily, that happened with youngest spawnlet Stevie:

Brad the Hippie's crazy baggy eyes, and Tess's Landgraab nose and Pizza Guy mouth and jaw.  He also inherited her ten nice points, so I love him already.

Brad the Hippie is an Ottomas.  They are Uglacy GOLD.

[mildlydisguised]

I would put it down to sadorandomness then, if you were eventually able to get a blended face.  Albeit particularly stubborn and irritating sadorandomness.

[Zazazu]

<snip>
Except that Vex is blonde and Howie and Abel are black-haired.  That face is 100% Brad the Hippie.  Mom Tess has genes from the default PolliTech, Malcolm Landgraab IV, and Remington London the Pizza Guy, and I wanted a kid with some of those.  Happily, that happened with youngest spawnlet Stevie:
<snip>
Brad the Hippie's crazy baggy eyes, and Tess's Landgraab nose and Pizza Guy mouth and jaw.  He also inherited her ten nice points, so I love him already.

Brad the Hippie is an Ottomas.  They are Uglacy GOLD.

You are truly excelling at your Uglacy.

I'd turn the limits off, especially for an Uglacy. Go into your userstartup.cheat and add a line "faceBlendLimits off" without quotes. That way, you'll get a true blend between your subjects without the game deciding to blend in Secret CAS Template #X. Since my 'hoods are built from three or four sets of templates, I hate it when my variety is culled in the slightest.

As Mildlydisguised said, it's probably annoying sadorandomness. I was adding new families from my townies today, and the first family correctly spawned the boy and girl children I needed to set them up on the first try. The second family took fourteen births to finally get two girls.

[DrNerd]

I haven't noticed any random face templates ending up in the mix, although several of the spouses had stock templates (Sandy Bruty-face, Carmen Patch-face, Remington London-face).  It's been pretty clear-cut as to which feature has come from which parent.
For instance, Tess:

Eyes from the PolliTech, nose from Granddaddy Landgraab, lower face from Xander/Coco/Cory/Rosemarie (who had the Remington London-face to start with).


And Archie, the Oddly Hot Little Bastard: Daddy Landgraab's brows, and a whole lotta Pizza Guy face, with a soupcon of Loki Beaker.

[mildlydisguised]

Archie was the best ever.  He should have a spin off.

[DrNerd]

Archie was the best ever.  He should have a spin off.

His current spin-off is "Marco!  You don't need to be doing things outside after dark!  Muahahahahahahahahaaaaa!"  *scare* *scare* *scare* *scare*  "Had enough, eh?  See you tomorrow!"

And I cannot be mad at him, not gonna lie.

[MadameUgly]

*flicks away a tear*

My gawd, Stevie is so wonderful.  Even before I read the line about his Ottomas lineage, I KNEW.  The Ottomas Ugly is very strong, bless it.

[DrNerd]

And some day, that face will be doing the Maxed Nice Creepy Smile.  Just like two of his three brothers.

[J. M. Pescado]

MEAN faces are so much better than nice faces. Just look at La Butt's avatar.

[DrNerd]

MEAN faces are so much better than nice faces. Just look at La Butt's avatar.

Your wish is my command.

First, Helen, or proof of why extracting and gender-swapping Loki Beaker and playing her to Elder is an AWESOME idea.

Necrotizing fasciitis is all the rage in Paris this year.

Helen's son Morocco, with the sadly apropos nickname "Rocky."



He does, in fact, have eyeballs.  Trust me.

The Little Bastard!






"Monkeyboy" Xander!





Fair and the Uglacy Boys!




Safe to say I have had my fair share of sour expressions.

[haifen]

OMG kudos on that one - I nearly died laughing during the middle of a coughing fit just now. BRAVA!

[DrNerd]

He was a sad panda for a while, but he was also a Family Sim, so there was a certain amount of YAY BAYBEEZ!!1! involved once the initial trauma had passed.

[nocomment]

Thanks for sharing those pictures.  Rocky makes me think of a muppet, a mean muppet, obviously.

[DrNerd]

Thanks for sharing those pictures.  Rocky makes me think of a muppet, a mean muppet, obviously.

He only has one Nice point, but he is actually pretty mellow.  Mostly, he just makes the obligatory "mean Sim grouchyfaces when having a conversation."  Unlike his nephew Archie, he never just randomly went off on anyone.