How is the new OFB patch working for everyone?

[t r a c y]

btw, regarding the problem of not being able to delete recolours - would uninstalling and then reinstalling OFB solve this or do patches alter core game files, leaving the only option to uninstall the base game and all the eps ?

That's happened before. She's scared her housemate'll try and read her diary or something.

The logic of that really confuses me. I mean, why would you scribble things in a book for everyone to see, then try to pretend they won't see it? Wouldn't it make more sense to intentionally fill it with lies and deceit designed to bring about the painful and gruesome demise of anyone trying to exploit it?

i did exactly that, waaaaaay back when i 13, when i found out my step-mother was reading my diary - i filled it with so much slightly plausible scandal that it drove her batshit insane.

[radiophonic]

Patchie workie fine.

[Ellatrue]

I have only one issue with the patch.

Before i installed it, i could select multiple members of a houslehold to go to a community lot, and leave some at home. Now, i can either go as 1 single sim, or the whole household.
I liked it that i could bring the father and the eldest teenager to the business, and leave wife and two children at home.
bah!

I was never able to do that in the first place- it has always been that way for me. How did you get the option to choose who would go?

[anelca]

btw, regarding the problem of not being able to delete recolours - would uninstalling and then reinstalling OFB solve this or do patches alter core game files, leaving the only option to uninstall the base game and all the eps ?

apparently no, uninstalling and reinstalling OfB doesn't solve it nor does removing cc, restarting the game then outting back the cc (with the intention of resetting the game)
i've not tried either because its not too much of a hassle to me to delete from the download folder with assistance from SimPe where necessary, or via Clean Installer

[Paperbladder]

Well, first of all the Phone Hack has to be installed to have the option for who stays at home and goes to a community lot.  There's also certain requirements that must be met even if you have the hack, like having more than 1 sim that is able to go downtown.  I've had the thing work with OFBp0 but It could just have been a figment of my imagination since I only have about 1 or 2 houses which have more than one sim.

Can you remove the CC from the game manually from the downloads folder?  Chances are, you'll need to do it like that if it can't be deleted other ways.  If you don't feel like doing that, you could always try clearing the groups.cache and see if that does anything.

[t r a c y]

btw, regarding the problem of not being able to delete recolours - would uninstalling and then reinstalling OFB solve this or do patches alter core game files, leaving the only option to uninstall the base game and all the eps ?

apparently no, uninstalling and reinstalling OfB doesn't solve it nor does removing cc, restarting the game then outting back the cc (with the intention of resetting the game)
i've not tried either because its not too much of a hassle to me to delete from the download folder with assistance from SimPe where necessary, or via Clean Installer

damn, that's too bad - i haven't yet used simpe to delete downloads, so i'll try that, thanks.  what's the CC ?  i haven't come across this term yet, please alleviate my stupidness...

custom content ?  doh.

[anelca]

i clear groups cache each time i shut my game down so i don't think that'll solve the problem of the missing dustbin

tracy....i don't actually use SimPe itself to delete anything, i use it to open a file if i don't what the hell a string of some random numbers are. i try not to have those in my game though. if i am missing some recolour then so be it. but SimPe will identify them and show a texture image so you know what it is
but you can use SimPe to delete your files, it just takes a bit too long to generate the list and i am kind of impatient

[t r a c y]

i'm the impatient sort myself too, heh.  i used clean installer to get rid of a bunch of recols i didn't want this morning, but it's not always possible to identify files that way.  since i installed OFB on a fresh install of the base game and have only been playing the new ep for a week, i think i will just uninstall the whole shebang and start anew without this blasted patch.  the few lots i've built are already packaged & i've only made one sim which 've barely played with.  the piss off is all the townie makeovers i've done - don't wanna have to do that again !

[laeshanin]

Patching software isn't just a matter of going "oh, that broke?  here's the fix!" and being done with it.  The speed with which this patch came out means that it was in progress when the game shipped.  When a game goes gold, QA doesn't stop.  All it means is that the people in charge of the project felt that it was "complete enough" to ship out and that there should only be minor glitches remaining, if any.  When the patch we just received was going through QA, they were probably already looking for other things to fix and writing those fixes.  Personally, I think most games that are released need about three patches to get "right".  It's not a matter of them not listening or being incompetent, it's a matter of having finite resources to test things with.  The playerbase will always find things that are missed.

That said, there is very clear evidence that EA needs to rethink their regression testing practices, because they routinely muck that portion of it up.

Oh my. I consider myself well and truly chastised. However, as the plebs do manage to sustain a pretty healthy business do you not think that more attention could be payed to the little details that make the game more enjoyable? If they did then we wouldn't be here on MATY overcoming the issues that are raised. Just a thought.

As for the phone hack... you know, sometimes I am completely overwhelmed by my stupidity. Course it allows you to choose who goes out with you! *slaps face several times*

[cwykes]

i'm the impatient sort myself too, heh.  i used clean installer to get rid of a bunch of recols i didn't want this morning, but it's not always possible to identify files that way.  since i installed OFB on a fresh install of the base game and have only been playing the new ep for a week, i think i will just uninstall the whole shebang and start anew without this blasted patch.  the few lots i've built are already packaged & i've only made one sim which 've barely played with.  the piss off is all the townie makeovers i've done - don't wanna have to do that again !

I usually disable stuff with cleaninstaller - that way I can change my mind later if I need to.  I just leave the disabled stuff where it was.  I've only ever come across one package that caused a problem by being in the Downloads folder as an .off package (an old hack).   If you want to move them out of the way, you can also do that in cleaninstaller or else quit cleaninstaller and move all the  .off files somewhere else.

Re-installing doesn't usually fix a problem to do with downloads and CC.  If a download in My documents is messing things up, changing stuff in program files by re-installing, isn't going to make a scrap of difference. 

[t r a c y]

yah i'm aware a reinstall isn't going to fix a bad .package file - my question was will uninstalling OFB get rid of the patch, or do i have to uninstall the entire game in order to be rid of it.  does the patch for OFB alter core game files?  apparently yes.  the problem with not being able to delete recolours is not solved by disabling them, when one doesn't want hundreds of useless files laying around the game - i'm way too retentive to have a disorganized downloads folder, i need it to be tidy and only have files in it that i'm actually using *daffy duck sounds*

even if disabled .package files don't contribute to the game's load time (do they, don't they??) i don't want them in there; they're my version of wire hangers, if you know what i mean 8-)  this is why i need to get rid of the patch - it was retarded of me to have installed it in the first place, since my game wasn't broken to begin with.

[anelca]

neither was my game broken but i installed the patch anyway and aside from the weirdness with the reading and the recolours, i haven't had any other problems.....as yet
my replacement Uni game arrived today (a legit one) so i'm going to see if that fixes the reading thing at all, and a couple of other things i noticed which i think are to do with not having that in for a few days (i lost my disc 1. no doubt it'll turn up somewhere now ). i had to do a reinstall to fix the split level tool

[cwykes]

yah i'm aware a reinstall isn't going to fix a bad .package file - my question was will uninstalling OFB get rid of the patch, or do i have to uninstall the entire game in order to be rid of it.  does the patch for OFB alter core game files?  apparently yes.

Sorry - mostly I post on a less awesome board. 
The patch fixed things in two ways.  sometimes it created new coding which sits in the OFB folder and is used instead of the old stuff, but other times it is actually modifying files in the Uni and base game folders.  One of the guys kindly explained that to me here in another thread (a thread on the 2nd NL patch I think).  I can't see you getting the old files back during an uninstall can you?

Just because you haven't had a problem yet, doesn't mean you won't get one in the future.  Prevention is a damn sight less work than curing problems after they've happened.  I'd stick with the patch. Also any mods will assume you have the patch.

the problem with not being able to delete recolours is not solved by disabling them, when one doesn't want hundreds of useless files laying around the game - i'm way too retentive to have a disorganized downloads folder, i need it to be tidy and only have files in it that i'm actually using *daffy duck sounds*

I'm coming at it from the other direction I think. If you're trying to ID what works and what doesn't disabling things is a good temporary measure.  Disable some things you think might be the recolours you don't want.  When you've ID'd them, then delete all the .off files.  My objects and hacks are all in subfolders by creator.  I'm anal about that.  The clothes are only a mess because we couldn't use subfolders when I got them.  I keep all my wire hangers I'm afraid, just in case I need them some day!

even if disabled .package files don't contribute to the game's load time (do they, don't they??)

Good question!

[akatonbo]

yah i'm aware a reinstall isn't going to fix a bad .package file - my question was will uninstalling OFB get rid of the patch, or do i have to uninstall the entire game in order to be rid of it.  does the patch for OFB alter core game files?  apparently yes.  the problem with not being able to delete recolours is not solved by disabling them, when one doesn't want hundreds of useless files laying around the game - i'm way too retentive to have a disorganized downloads folder, i need it to be tidy and only have files in it that i'm actually using *daffy duck sounds*

even if disabled .package files don't contribute to the game's load time (do they, don't they??) i don't want them in there; they're my version of wire hangers, if you know what i mean 8-)  this is why i need to get rid of the patch - it was retarded of me to have installed it in the first place, since my game wasn't broken to begin with.

The idea is that, since disabling files is done by the very basic method of changing the file extension from .package to .off, then, after you've gone into the game to make sure you didn't accidentally disable something you wanted to keep, it's then extremely easy to find the files that you previously disabled and delete them -- just go into your downloads directory and sort by type and all the .off files will be together. (If you find you did make an error, you go back into Clean Installer first and re-enable the file you want to keep.)

[ZiggyDoodle]

Okay, folks, does installing the patch reset your Sims?  I think Blue said it did and another said it didn't.

Had the college exam/class bug pop up last night so something is broke and needs fixing.

If it does reset everything, then I want to be sure everyone is home and in bed lest a Sim lose a grade or a job by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Thanks......

[Pegasys]

Yes it does do a reset.

[ZiggyDoodle]

Thanks, Pegasys....guess I'll be playing Wee Willie Winkle tonight....

[buddha pest]

Is the thing with the speakers really fixed? I'm still having a problem with them. I can't change the music in my stores to shopping even when I buy a stereo to try to change the station on the speakers, it just stays at R&B or whatever station it was on when I first bought the business.

I don't have much experience with the speakers prior to OFB, so I may just not know what I'm doing.

[KellyQ]

I've always wondered about that too, buddha pest (love the nickname btw, lol). I can't change the music coming out of the speakers either.

[buddha pest]

(love the nickname btw, lol).

Thanks, ha.

I should probably mention too, that I've tried deleting the speakers and replacing them, and they still go back to the same damn station.

The description of the patch said something about fixing the speakers defaulting to techno, but mine default to random things that vary from store to store.

[Pegasys]

The speakers will always play the station they're designed for, and nothing else, that's how it was intended. The problem pre-patch was if you used the white Shopping speaker, left the lot, the next time the lot was loaded, the speaker would play Techno, not Shopping. Only solution was to sell the speaker and buy a new one. But the patch did fix this problem.

[jsalemi]

Is the thing with the speakers really fixed? I'm still having a problem with them. I can't change the music in my stores to shopping even when I buy a stereo to try to change the station on the speakers, it just stays at R&B or whatever station it was on when I first bought the business.

I don't have much experience with the speakers prior to OFB, so I may just not know what I'm doing.

You can't change the music on the speakers -- you have to change the speakers themselves to get a different type of music.

[buddha pest]

Ohhhh. The different colors coincide with the different stations? Well slap my ass and call me an idiot.

Thank you much.

[jsalemi]

No problem -- took me a while to figure that one out too.

[DoomPuppy]

OnG1!11! Teh patch br0keh mi game!1! *lmfao* Couldn't resist, my apologies.  I installed the patch and hated what it did to my game, as far as not being able to delete CC in my game and it completely FUBARing other objects..I don't know what I expected from Maxis but anyway.  My question is do I need to installed the damn Nightlife patch again or did they nclude it with OFB (haha)?  I really don't want to think about downloading it again with this dial up piece of shit connection but I suppose I could.