More Awesome Than You!

Hi all,

Im new to the sims, infact i only got it a few hours ago!

I have installed the sims on both my desktop (for when im at home) and on my laptop (for when im away on holiday etc) i was wondering if their was anyway to share my game saves? Both the desktop and the laptop are networked togetger, without having to always copy files across, if not can someone still tell me how this can be done jst by copying the files over.

Hope someone can help.

Cheers

You can do it with the Sim Enhanser, upgrading the neighbourhood at a certain point on the lap top, then copy the neighbourhood, and paste it instead the existing one in the other computer.

You can do it with SimPe too, but I am not quite aquainted with it - may be some other player will help here.

I'm sure it's possible - you could pretty much save the entire My Documents->EA Games->Sims 2 folder and move it over to the other machine - but keep in mind that this is going to be a very large file, going into the land of absolutely huge if you download a lot of custom content. You will have to copy the files over every time, the way the game is structured - it isn't like a lot of games where you just have one or two files that is a game save, but an entire folder for each neighborhood, and each house and sim has it's own file as well. If you got them out of sync, it could cause very bad things to happen.

Unfortunately, as far as I know, there's no way to keep your main save game on one machine and access it from the other, because the game insists on looking in C:\Documents and Settings\your_username\My Documents\EA Games\Sims 2. This is so that multiple people can play the game on the same computer and each have their own set of saved Neighbourhoods and Downloads. This is occasionally useful, like if you want to have adult content in one user's game but only kid-friendly stuff in another, but mostly it's a pain. I think some people have managed to get the game installed on another drive, like D:, but unless you have user profiles that are somehow shared across the network, I can't see you being able to have a single save for both computers.

However, the backup process isn't as horrendous as you might think, if you know anything about Windows' date stamps and recursive folder processes. I run an incremental backup on my Sims 2 folder every couple of days, simply because I'm paranoid. The way I do it is fairly manual - I start a new WinRAR archive named according to the day and the Neighbourhood/s included, then go to Add... and click everything in the My Documents\EA Games\Sims 2\Neighborhood-whatever folder, then Date... and choose Files Newer Than, and type in 7 days, or 10 days if I'm feeling really paranoid. The backup then runs only what has been modified within the last 7 days. This combines nicely with my regular complete backup to ensure that if my game turns into a Big Firey Ball Visible From Space, I have plenty of old saved games to go back to.

I also keep my complete backups forever, because I'm paranoid. Once The Sims Unleashed ate my game and I had to restore from a backup 6 weeks old, as the corruption went back that far.

I'm pretty sure there's a way to get Windows to copy only files that are Newer than the most recent version. You certainly could do it in 98 - I haven't really tried in XP, I prefer to do it by getting XP to sort the folder by Modified, then cutting & pasting it myself  - because, er, I'm paranoid ;).

Edit: My partner has just pointed out to me that there exists something called My Briefcase which is supposedly for this purpose. Might that work? We don't know anything else about it, except that it was written by Microsoft so it probably sucks :D.

Edit 2: You are using Windows, yes? Not a Mac? ???

I think My Briefcase was a feature of Windows ME, not XP.

I also run multiple copies of the sims, Laptop, Desktop 1 and Desktop 2, but I normally run separate games in each. However, if you are networked, it's simply a matter of copying across your Sims2 Folder from My Documents from onePC to your EAGames Folder in My Documents on the other.  It may take a while, but if you do that when you come in from work, go and make coffee, shower, or whatever, then the whole thing should be on your desktop by the time you're ready to load your game.  (Bear in mind, though, that the game must be closed when you do this, and you will need to move your Sims CD or DVD to the desktop.  However, once you have loaded your game, you can continue playing without the disc.)

I suggest simply copying your Neighborhoods and your Downloads folder. Unless you have other files in other folders that you wish to have as well, that you may have modified.

Neighborhoods and Downloads are really the only essential folders that you would have to copy.

Other folds may include Music and Movies (if you've added your own personal files)
Config, Cameras and Collections if you've modified those in Any way with custom content.

Other than that, you shouldn't have to copy your entire EA Games/The Sims 2 folders.

You can also use a simple program, like FileSync, to syncrhonize your files between your Desktop and Laptop. :)

Ste

Basically, I just tend to copy everything, it's less bother than selecting what I do want, and I don't have to baby the computer while I'm doing it - but then I'm lazy!

I believe Filesync does do what you say, but (a) it isn't free, and (b) I thought when I looked at it that it was pretty complicated to use.

If you are just copying folders, you might also need Saved Sims and Packaged Lots, if you wish to use anything that's in either of them while you are on the desk-top.  (That's if you've added anything to them while playing on the lap-top).

Why are you doing things so complicated?

1) You play on the Laptop computer in work (won't you be fired? ;D).

2) At the end of the day, copy the played neighbourhood (1,2,3,4,5) to a disk, or a diskette.

3) Return home.

4) Put the disk in the driver, and copy the played neighbourhood to the desktop.

5) Paste it instead of the existing one in my documents/EA games/TS2/Neighbourhoods.

6) Continue playing the game from the point you stopped. Backup the neighbourhood again.

If you added CAS sims, or downloaded new objects/clothings (I don't recommend you to do this at work) - you have to copy the Downloads folder too to the disk, and paste it instead of the existing one.

Why copy it to the desktop first and not directly to the Sims2 folder?

To make sort of "backup neighbourhood", and to be sure that you copied the right file - I don't trust myself that I copied the right file, until I see it with my own eyes...:).

Well, I see your point!  But I'm trying to sort out loads of unnecessary back-ups which are taking over my second hard drive!