Professors crash the game, OFB, anyone else?

[RabidAngel]

Hey all,
I"m having a really bad issue right now, and it seems to be directly connected to professors....(i can't be positive)
A few times when a professor enters my home-business lot, my game comes to a screeching halt and I get a blue screen.  Everything completely locks up, but if I wait 2-3 minutes, the game screen comes back and I can play normally. It happens almost every sim day, and each time it happens I check to see who's entering the lot, and several times (perhaps everytime, though I didn't catch it the first few times), it's been that a professor has appeared....  I have no clue why this might be happening, but it doesn't seem too good at all.  It's such a weird thing....it's almost like a crash where it quits to desktop, only the screen comes back up and stays blue for a few minutes....
I removed all of my hacks when this started happening, and it still happened without them...
I wonder if anyone else has had similar issue with OFB and this...It never happened until this expansion pack.
Plus, it scares the crap outta me everytime it happens, because right before it the game sort of flashes and cuts off. lol!
Any advice would be so very much appreciated.
Thanks so much!

[ZephyrZodiac]

The only thing that occurs to me is whether these professors have been played in Uni, or if the game is having to generate them.

I wonder if banning them from the lot would work?

[Renatus]

Banning won't work very well as TwoJeff's hack for that isn't OFB compatible.

What hacks do you have in? Did you turn on testing cheats to see if an error message pops up? If you did, did one pop up and if so, what? That information help us get a lot further in finding a solution.

[Charamei]

This was happening to me, but I don't think it was Professor-related. It seems to have stopped now I've removed all the MATY 'dirty' hacks, but I also shifted the business in question to another lot... home --> business.

So perhaps it's home-business related.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, my EP arrived this morning, but I am getting more reluctant to install it the more I hear of problems!

Maybe I'll just install it and create new game files and see what happens!

[RabidAngel]

I have no hacks installed at the moment, so I'm sure it isn't hack related.
I was thinking the same as you, zephyr, that perhaps the game is taking a moment to generate them...
Perhaps I'll give it some time and see if once all of the NPCs are generated it won't lock up anymore.
Zephyr, I'd definitely keep a backup on-hand of your neighborhood before you install!
Then if you need to uninstall OFB, you can just revert back to your NL version.....I've been noticing a lot of weirdness since OFB, so I'm really hoping that there is a patch out soon!
I had only installed the hacks that were known to be compatible from the beginning....only pescado's.  I don't even have the de-censor in, but once the problems occur I played completely hack free and still had all of the issues. 
I'm hoping it stops happening soon, once all of the un-met professors have been seen on the lots!
Thanks for all of the replies!  I'd be interested to see if there are more people that have this problem once everyone gets the EP.

[MokeyHokey]

FWIW, I've seen several professors parading around my home business this morning, no blue screen. It's an old neighborhood, but I just did a deleteall day before yesterday, and it's still constantly generating new NPCs. You could use the debug cheat, spawn the NPC creator and generate all NPCs that way instead of letting the game generate them as it needs 'em. See if the problem persists.

Well, my EP arrived this morning, but I am getting more reluctant to install it the more I hear of problems!

ZZ, don't be afraid to install it--it's fantastic and very complex. I've not had any major bugs on my end, just ignorance. Like when I forgot to move my custom CAS over to the new folder and spent an hour trying to figure out why my game was crashing when I tried to access CAS...

[ZephyrZodiac]

At the moment, to be perfectly honest, I hate it!  Things that I'm supposed to be able to do, just aren't working!  It took me ages to sort my hacks out, and I think I still have some that I don't want!

At least, since it is a new install with a new set of game folders, I have no professors, since all I'm running is the base game and Bluewater Village. 

And why, when you use the computer to hire new employees, do you get offered sims who already have jobs, when there are loads of unemployed ones about?  And why can't I seem to get the management option?  And, for that matter, why do sims who already have a business in the family still get job wants?  Do they (the sims) really think they can do both and not drop down dead from exhaustion?

[RabidAngel]

LOL!
I hear you, ZZ, some things have been really hard to get used to, and it's been even harder to understand the logic behind much of it.  Though, as I've played, things are unfolding a bit and I'm starting to get a handle on it (which means I'm liking it more and more.)
I'm still having the blue screen, but not quite as often..
As for the debug mode...I did run it...when I was having the constant blue screen, I was running it the entire time, and oddly, I had no errors at all....
Strange, indeed.
It's happening now only ever few sim days...We'll see if it clears up at all.

[Regina]

RabidAngel, I'm absolutely no computer geek but the past few days have had my nose buried in a ton of info on building a PC.  Could your blue screen perchance be being caused from your game pulling too many resources?  Of course if you have a screamin' machine that wouldn't happen, and of course I have no clue whether you do or not, but thought of it when reading about your problem.  If your game is generating sims I'm thinking it would be pulling more on your system resources (like possibly too many things trying to work at once and pulling down on your power supply).  I know mine comes near to a screeching halt for quite a while when sims are generated.  I won't even install OFB on here.

I nearly broke my brain today reading all that stuff! LOL

Edited to add:  I realize the profs seem to be buggy in OFB, but since this has been happening so badly and you weren't getting error messages thought it might be something else.

[Li'l Brudder]

LOL!
I hear you, ZZ, some things have been really hard to get used to, and it's been even harder to understand the logic behind much of it.  Though, as I've played, things are unfolding a bit and I'm starting to get a handle on it (which means I'm liking it more and more.)
I'm still having the blue screen, but not quite as often..
As for the debug mode...I did run it...when I was having the constant blue screen, I was running it the entire time, and oddly, I had no errors at all....
Strange, indeed.
It's happening now only ever few sim days...We'll see if it clears up at all.

If it doesn't have errors, it must be yet another feature!

[sanmonroe]

I get errors for servo and professors when they visit. I play with testingcheats on so I get the error box not a blue screen. Something is broken with them. I got it before I put my hacks back in the game.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I wonder if the NoMeetingProfessors hack would stop them coming in the first place?

[Charamei]

I've just come from a fascinating game session, which culminated in a bluescreen lockup and forced reboot. As I'm fairly certain RA and I are having the same problem, here are my observations:

1) I'm still not convinced that it's Professor-related. It might be Elder-related, though.
2) Contrary to what I initially believed, it happens on both home and business lots.

3) It may be resource related - it happens more as the number of people on the lots increases. However, my computer matches or exceeds every requirement on the back of the OFB box. Specifically:

OFB processor requirement: 1.0 GHz. I have a 2.67 GHz processor.
OFB RAM requirement: 256 MB. I have 1 GB.

My graphics card should also be above par - it's a GeForce 6600, though I can't remember the exact stats.

I know that running OFB, NL, Uni and the base game takes up more system resources than just running TS2 and OFB, but I can't believe it's that much more. I am forced to conclude that it's a bug, and possibly Elder-related.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, none of the elders in my game have had problems like that so far.  However, I haven't loaded a college or a downtown, so I don't get professors or the downtown elders.  It definitely doesn't seem to be either any of the new OFB elders or the original ones that are causing the problem.

[Charamei]

No, you're right, ZZ.

Update (again):

I reduced my graphics options down to mediums and lows, with only a few exceptions (I refuse to play without reflections on, for example). All tihs seems to have achieved is that the game now blanks out without hanging for a few seconds beforehand - it's crashing more smoothly

Also, I have now twice had it blank on me while I was in Build/Buy mode, when it could not possibly have been generating townies or anything else. Both times, I had not yet had a chance to place items. It also seems to like blanking out while I am transitting between floors (with the camera, not stairs/elevators), which is in my game often accompanied by a pause.

And it seems to be doing it more frequently, too. This is nothing short of gamestopping.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, Charamei, your specs and mine seem fairly similar, but maybe it's because I haven't loaded a downtown or a college in this game that I'm having none of these problems.  Have you considered renaming your present game folder, and then letting the game generate a new one, then playing a new game and also ignoring the college and downtown?  This would at least point to whether it's a computer problem or a memory issue.  I mean, if the game plays fine when you don't have a college or a downtown, it may be that having them uses too many resources.

[Charamei]

Well, Charamei, your specs and mine seem fairly similar, but maybe it's because I haven't loaded a downtown or a college in this game that I'm having none of these problems.  Have you considered renaming your present game folder, and then letting the game generate a new one, then playing a new game and also ignoring the college and downtown?  This would at least point to whether it's a computer problem or a memory issue.  I mean, if the game plays fine when you don't have a college or a downtown, it may be that having them uses too many resources.

I can certainly try with other neighbourhoods that have less connected to them - I'll give it a go in the morning

[ZephyrZodiac]

Hope that works!  I'm thinking of uninstalling OFB on this PC anyway, and just having it on the smaller one which just has the base game - I think in many ways there's just too much to cope with if you have all your popularity teens wanting to own businesses and go to college as well!  Gets so that just playing one family for one generation would take about a year(Real time!)

[Wolfee]

Just a thought: Has anyone who is having this problem checked to see if maybe they have unseen guests on the lot? Could that cause a blue screen to go up because the game is adding more characters, that is, more charactors you can't see.

[Ancient Sim]

Happened to me today playing a new business in Bluewater Village.  The screen froze for a short while and then a Professor walked by.  He didn't come in to by, just walked past with a wave.  A female Prof had walked by earlier, but as I recall the game didn't freeze then, just slowed-down a bit.  I don't know why the Professors are walking by if they're not going to come in and buy, because they can't be greeted only spoken to or whatever.  It must be peculiar to the neighbourhood, because they walk by Downtown lots and that doesn't affect gameplay at all.  Both these Professors were ones that had been in the game all along, not new ones, so they weren't being created at the time.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Ancient, do you have the nomeetingprofessors mod?

[Ancient Sim]

No Zephyr, I don't have that mod.  As I said, there's no problem when they walk by Downtown lots, so quite why the game would freeze when they walk by Bluewater lots I have no idea.  I didn't get a blue screen or anything and everything carried on as normal afterwards.  The fact that neither professor attempted to enter the house, just walked by and waved, seems odd in itself.  Why bother sending them just to walk by? 

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, ancient, I added sim state, but no professors have walked by any of my lots, so I'd suggest you try the mod.  It's one of Two Jeffs, and it's really useful, and you don't get any of the professor spam either!

[RabidAngel]

Charamei, You and I have the same Graphics card....I have come to an almost certain conclusion that it's my graphics driver in conjunction from OFB so, it doesn't suprise me that you happen to have the same card.
I still have the issue, though not as often.  Just once or twice during a gameplay session.
AND, it happened to me, same as you, while transitioning between floors!
I have the latest nvidia driver...I hope they update it soon.