One of my favorite Sims is Fubared

[windy_moon]

 

Glitches are one of the most frustrating things about the Sims.  I have a number of performance issues, on a computer with specs that should theoretically play the game easily, but this is my first FUBAR.  I hope I can explain the problem clearly enough that someone can help me.

University recently installed, no Nightlife

I put my first two Sims thru University, Beau (Broke) March & Penelope Pleasant.  They spent their last two years of University in off campus housing.  Graduation day, Beau threw a graduation party but at the end of it, nothing happened.  (I thought there was some automatic, 'kay I'm outta here, but maybe I'm wrong.)   So Beau used the phone to move back to Pleasantville, leaving Penelope.  Penelope used the phone, the taxi came (I got the "you're moving your last playable Sim, do you want to reset the lot?" message and I said yes.) And then....

Nothing.  I was left with the lot, but my controls were grayed out and I couldn't do anything...save, go back to the neighborhood, nothing. I couldn't select Pescado's lot debugger to renable the controls, either.

After 15 minutes of staring at the empty house, with nowhere to go, I shut the computer down to start over again.

Groundhog day, back at it again.  First thing I did was to go to the lot debugger which had the "fix stuck move out" option showing.  I did.  It "fixed 2 objects".  This time no party, just get to the damn phone and get us out of here.  This time it worked.

Back to Pleasantville. I moved Beau into a new house. No problem.  Then I tried to combine Penelope with him (they are very much in love and engaged).  Game froze.  Did this three times, same result.

Okay, this is where I did a dumb thing.  I decided that Penelope should try to move back home with Kaylynn and help her get thru the recent loss of Daniel.  First time, didn't work, game froze.  Second time it did work.  Yay?

Only, that fubared the lot.  The lot froze on me within just a minute or two of her move in.  Rinse and repeat that three times.  Lot debugger didn't show me any unusual options (that I remember).  I believe that at this point, the lot stopped being able to load entirely.

Being the sort of gamer who really only knows how to push buttons, I moved Kaylynn and Penelope out and nuked the lot.  (This was pretty bad as it is a mature lot I care about and it has/had Daniel Pleasant's urn on it!) 

They cannot move anywhere now.  Everytime I try to move them into a house, different houses, the game either freezes or endlessly tries to load the new lot but never gets it loaded.

Penelope is FUBARd!  She can't be.  I love her.  Please help me?

 

(I have game backups.  I don't back up as much as I should, but I probably have a couple of back ups of post Uni install.  I'll be very depressed to dial back that far, but more depressed to lose Penelope.)


edit PS - I've looked at Penelope in SimPE, and there's nothing I can see that's wrong with her, but I don't know much other than her check boxes of life stage and such seem to be correct.

[Motoki]

I'm trying to think what could have gotten screwed up about her, especially since Beau went through the same thing and seems fine. In SimPE is she marked off an an adult or young adult? I honestly forget where to look for that, but it should be there somewhere. If she's a young adult, try making her an adult.

If all else fails, and this will be a pain in the butt and you'll lose memories, you can always use sim surgery to export her looks, and make a new sim with her looks and then go into SimPE and set her skills, relationships, university major etc and then use the lot debugger or Twojeffs hacked money tree to update her with the extra wants and lock.

[windy_moon]

I'm trying to think what could have gotten screwed up about her, especially since Beau went through the same thing and seems fine. In SimPE is she marked off an an adult or young adult? I honestly forget where to look for that, but it should be there somewhere. If she's a young adult, try making her an adult.

If all else fails, and this will be a pain in the butt and you'll lose memories, you can always use sim surgery to export her looks, and make a new sim with her looks and then go into SimPE and set her skills, relationships, university major etc and then use the lot debugger or Twojeffs hacked money tree to update her with the extra wants and lock.

Thank you for trying to help me.  A thread where folks know how to help ("that's happened to me before!") usually has a bunch of responses, so apparently I've encountered a more rare FUBAR 

The check boxes (adult/young adult) were the only thing I really knew how to check in SimPE, so I did make sure her check boxes are right.

Guess I have a few choices to make -  learn how to use SimPE beyond checking and unchecking boxes (shiver with fear), reinstall backup and hope it doesn't happen again, move away from the Sims until the bitter disappointment of the this FUBAR fades...( amonth or two) and decide then.

I did just get a new DVR at home.  I have 11ty hundred episodes of Law & Order/SVU/CI recorded already.  It's an option. (The drama in my Sims is better....)

 

Thanks.

[ari_]

Have you tried going into Beau's lot and moving Penelope in with the Simlogical Teleporter Plus?

[Motoki]

The only thing you really have to do in SimPE if you want to try and recreate her is load the neighborhood, then the sim surgery plugin, select her at the patient, then check off the box to export the sim, save her looks to a file, then load the game and make a new sim with her looks in the CAS. You can do boolprop testingcheatsenabled true in the neighborhood mode, then load the lot and you should be able to drag the bars to make this new clone sim have the same skill and personality stats as the original. The lot debugger can upgrade her and give her the extra uni wants and lock. I don't think there's really any good way to re-create her relationships or memories outside of SimPE, so I suppose she'd just have to meet Beau all over again.

I know how very frustrating it can be to lose hours or even days of play time because it's happened to me more than once.  Sorry this happened to you. If I can think of anything else that might help I'll post again.

[C.S.]

Or try what Ari above said, use Inge's Teleporters from Beau's lot to move in Penelope, but make a backup first in case that fubar Beau too. After Penelope's moved in, exit then re-enter to see if the lot's still freezing up because she's on it. If it doesn't, then proceed to move Kaylynn onto a lot of her own and see if you can play Kaylynn just fine. I suggest moving Kaylynn onto her own lot first because sometimes, the game doesn't seem to register when a sim has moved out even though they've been moved onto a lot from the Family Bin. Then play both lots for a few sim days to make sure everything's okay. If none of that works, restore the backup before trying the Teleporters, then decide which is less painful - restoring the backup made before their graduation or recreating Penelope like Motoki suggested.

[windy_moon]

It worked! 

So far, that is. 

I won't get to play the houses for a few Sim days until tomorrow (decorating new houses takes me a bit of time, cough, alone, before we can play)...but so far, so good.

To start, my last attempt to move Kaylynn and Penelope into a house had apparently "worked".  When I went back in today (after a few days watching DVR) they were there, and the lot didn't freeze when I went in.  That was it though.  Their want slots spun, and spun, and spun and...you get the idea.  Never stopped.

SO, because I read CuriousSpurious's instructions backwards    , I used Inge's shrub to move Penelope in with Beau. 

And she was normal! (to alll first appearances and a few minutes of play)

Went back into the lot with just Kaylynn, now she was still FUBARd with spinning want slots...moved her out, and then moved her back in again...and normal (to all first appearances and a few minutes of play).

Oh, thank you all.  Fingers crossed, I'll report back tomorrow that all is well after more play.

*kiss*

[windy_moon]

Okay, I couldn't wait.  I kicked the kids off the computer and played this afternoon.

Penolope plays fine. 

Here's what's odd about her, and what must have (call me Monk) made her all screwy... she graduated from University twice. She has two memories (Suma Cum and just Cum) and her family members have two memories of her graduating as well.

Beau who (as another poster pointed out) went thru the same Groundhog Day glitch, only has one.

This game is something else, isn't it?  Anyway, I don't really want to muck about in SimPE deleting memories, but if someone More Awesome Than I thinks I should as a prophylactic measure, let me know.  (And any idiot's tips for same would be appreciated.)

Thanks!!

[ZephyrZodiac]

I'm wondering if mobile phones might have caused your original problem.  If so, then replaying from your most recent pre-glitch back-up would probably make everything run smoothly.  It's also worth using TwoJeffs graduationNoMoveOut fix and MoveOutControllerResetter from MTS2 rather than the FFS debugger - but then remove them from your game as I found they do cause problems if you want to move out a neighbourhood sim - and remember, never EVER save your game if someone's using a mobile!

[windy_moon]

I'm wondering if mobile phones might have caused your original problem.  If so, then replaying from your most recent pre-glitch back-up would probably make everything run smoothly.  It's also worth using TwoJeffs graduationNoMoveOut fix and MoveOutControllerResetter from MTS2 rather than the FFS debugger - but then remove them from your game as I found they do cause problems if you want to move out a neighbourhood sim - and remember, never EVER save your game if someone's using a mobile!

*turns white*

Oh, ZZ, all the reading I did before installing Uni recently, and I completely forgot the instruction not to save while using a mobile phone.  Betcha dollars to donuts that's what I did as I'm a very zealous saver.  (I have performance glitches which i've given up trying to track down, so I compensate by saving frequently, never knowing when my next crash/game freeze is going to happen.)

I have so much game play between my last backup and Penelope's FUBAR that I'm going to throw caution to the wind and not go that far back.  When I'm crying a week from now, you can point and laugh...most likely you'd try to help me but you can point and laugh if you want.

List of things to do:

1.  Never save while using a cell phone
2.  Download TJ's move out fix, just in case again
3.  Download MTS2 move out fix, just in case again

Cell phones!  *bangs head*

Thanks.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Sorry, I didn't put it clearly - both fixes are by TJ and both are available at MTS2.

In my new neighbourhood, no-one's allowed a mobile phone, however much they want one, and everything's working really smoothly!  Just wish there was a way to get rid of them from sims in other neighbourhoods who have them.  I mean, you can sometimes manage to click onto the phone with moveobjects on, and you could no doubt dlete it, but I don't know if it's safe!  I recently tried moving a sim and got his engagement ring instead - if I'd deleted that, I wonder if he'd have become unengaged?

[windy_moon]

Sorry, I didn't put it clearly - both fixes are by TJ and both are available at MTS2.

In my new neighbourhood, no-one's allowed a mobile phone, however much they want one, and everything's working really smoothly!  Just wish there was a way to get rid of them from sims in other neighbourhoods who have them.  I mean, you can sometimes manage to click onto the phone with moveobjects on, and you could no doubt dlete it, but I don't know if it's safe!  I recently tried moving a sim and got his engagement ring instead - if I'd deleted that, I wonder if he'd have become unengaged?

I use twojeff's money tree thiingie to give my Sims cell phones...it also has a pie menu option to take cell phones away. That should work for you, yes? 

(I really have to use mobile phones.  My Sims are very social.  I often have three in a household chattering at the same time...with Pescado's phone hacks, no one other than my neighborhood stalker  wakes them up with the phone.)

[ZephyrZodiac]

Thanks, I'll certainly try the money tree thingy!  I know it's a big problem managing without mobiles, but I've some houses I've built and worked on for hours, and I'd hate to lose them the way I lost Brandi's lovely mansion by forgetting that one of the sims was still awake and on the phone!

I don't actually have a neighbourhood stalker at present, as I've not played the main neighbourhood, and when the phone does ring at 2 am, it's usually the sim who was last being chatted with ringing back to continue the conversation!  But then, if you don't have to go to class till 8 pm, why go to bed at midnight?

[SciBirg]

Windymoon, THANK YOU for asking about this!
I went to the site today specifically to ask about this as it happened last night to one of my sims.
No, off to check the mailbox for NL...

[ZephyrZodiac]

I use twojeff's money tree thiingie to give my Sims cell phones...it also has a pie menu option to take cell phones away. That should work for you, yes?

I had a look at VS for this and couldn't find it.  Could you let me know the actual name of the file I'm looking for?  Thanks in advance.

[nectere]

its called a personal electronics organizer

http://www.variousimmers.net/vsimforum/showthread.php?t=432

[ZephyrZodiac]

thanks again, nectere!  I've found it and it should definitely come in handy - I like the idea that I can give my sim a cell phone for just as long as is necessary, then take the darn thing away again!

[Karen]

I like the idea that I can give my sim a cell phone for just as long as is necessary, then take the darn thing away again!

It's also handy for satisfying those annoying "Buy a Cell Phone" wants that pop up even when your Sim already has a cell phone.  Use the money tree object to "Remove Cell Phone", then "Give Me a Cell Phone".  You get the aspiration points without the hassle.

Karen

[ZephyrZodiac]

Sims are sooooo stupid - I mean, at least it could be "Get a new video cell-phone" want!