More Awesome Than You!

Anyone else running into problems with the DeleteAllCharacters cheat in OFB?

I have made a new neighbourhood, added a uni, the downtown, and the shopping district, and then cleaned it with the cheat.
After adding a family the 'business'/'management' and 'real estate' options are completely missing -- as if the game expects to find some Sim or NPC.

Additionally one townie is somehow generated or left behind each time I d-a-c. I have tried generating all NPCs and some townies, but the options stay missing.

No such problems if I add a shopping district 'after' d-a-c.

Do you actually add the Bluewater district, or is it a blank neighbourhood?

Doesn't seem to matter. In case your next question is 'are there any buyable lots?' -- yes. I have several (unowned) comm lots in various subhoods.

The community lots shouldn't really make a difference because they are empty of all characters until you actually load them anyway. I am wondering if it is because there are sims left in your sim bin? I had a problem with the DAC when I decided to empty Pleasantview. The Burbs and the Oldies were not removed from the bin, but were reduced to the toddler life stage. I had to reload the base n/hoods and delete them from the sim bin before using DAC.

Err... no, I deleted ALL characters.

The only Sims in the game are my CAS created Sim, the default NPCs pulled from objects.package (crumplebottom, therapist, abductor etc.), and --if I chose to generate them-- the townies/NPCs generated by the spawnable tree. Before generating I have exactly one (1) character file -- you can't get any cleaner than that.

I don't know if this is related, but I created a new neighbourhood, and added a uni, downtown and shopping district. I went into some of the downtown community lots in build mode to change them around and stuff, and every lot that had a restaurant in, the chef was standing there! It was the same chef everytime, an elder woman with a ponytail... ??? I am going to create a blank neighbourhood, make a restaurant, save and exit, then re-enter in build mode to see if a chef has been generated.
Something is definitely screwy....

I've gone into community lots and had npc types there during nightlife.  This was with all characters deleted, and even in my base neighbourhood.    The lots tended to be slow loading, so I figured there must be something wrong with them.  I did find that taking the npc related object out and then saving and reentering the lot made them vanish, but there was still character files added.  I'm not sure if it is quite the same problem, but the characters were in build mode.  I had this happen with the chef, dj, bartender etc.

I've had NPCs appear in build mode as well, but so far when it has happened they have always been NPCs that were already generated in my neighborhood, so there were no new character files added.  No idea why it does that... I thought it might be some weirdness with imported lots, but I had it happen with the Maxis community lots that appear in the lot bin after installing OFB.

I don't deleteallcharacters, I find it very untrustwry, considering it told me it was going to take a little bit afterwards to create new Townies and NPCs whichis the whole reason I deleteallcharacters in the first place.  Anyways, I use the trust cursor to rip all of the Character Files into the garbage.  Same effect, with no useless sim regeneration.

The reason it tells you it's going to make new Townies is that if you don't have the notownieregen mod in your game, that's exactly what it does, but only at the rate of one Townie per visit to a lot.  With the mod, they simply won't be spawned.  I wipe my neighborhoods all the time and the ONLY character files I get are the ones I create or NPCs as needed (for example, if I want to have pizza delivered, a delivery sim is created).

If you randomly rip character files from your neighborhood you could be setting yourself up for BFVFS syndrome.

I have had a weird problem after I deleted all characters in a new hood.

I added a downtown section and University but not the business section and after adding them I deleted all the characters.

Created a couple I place in a house.  Turned-on the "boolprop testingcheats" to create townies and NPC's.  Creation of NPC was as normal, I did not experience any problem with it.  But when I "dbg force to create townie" some ended-up with the Grim reaper head, Mrs crumplebottom or the psycharist!!!  I even had a pop-up because there was some problem in creating the townies I needed to hit reset the process started over again and after creating 2 or 3 the pop-up came back again I had to hit cancel since it was the only way out. I went back to neighborhood without saving, try it again with the same result.

Anybody else experience that problem and is there a way around it? Maxis seems to have screwed-up the townie gen tool.

I just happened to be starting a new neighborhood last night so went through a ton of rigamarole and ran across a few weird things being described here.  First off, I used deleteallcharacters (DAC), so the that neighborhood was empty.

I was able to use the dead tree to make Townies with no problem.  I also made 18 Downtownies using CAS and the upgrade of Inge's shrub.  There's been absolutely no problems with any of that.

I did, however, run into one of those NPCs standing in a restaurant lot I went to fix up.  This is a lot I picked up from another neighborhood.  I actually have two copies of the lot in this hood, one a swingin' teen hangout and the other an upscale restaurant.  I never checked the teen hangout (which was the original), just played it as usual with some visiting sims before I deleted all the characters in this hood.  However, when I went into the second copy of the lot I'd placed, there was a DJ that had traveled over from the old neighborhood.

Now there's one thing very odd about this DJ.  After starting that hood with the first family I put in it, before DAC, I noticed this DJ in SimPE.  I thought it was odd because I hadn't taken any of those sims to a community lot and she looked very familiar.  Now that I think about it, the reason she looks so familiar is because she came from Strangetown!  Of course, that might explain everything! LOL

I wish I had some good info to add to this thread instead of just saying, 'Hey, this basically happened to me too.'

Sorry to say but what do you mean by "I was able to use the dead tree to make townies".  Were you talking about the same option I did in testingcheats or another option?  What is that "dead tree" you are talking about?

With testingcheats, there is a Spawn...NPC & Townie Maker.  It's a tree object that spawns.

So it is not the same as the "dbg force create townie" option I guess?

I dunno, I've never used that one?

Ok, I use the mailbox to create townie so we are probably not talking about the same option.

I was not aware there was another way to create townie.. Blue is the option you are talking about avaible on the Tombstone of L&D?

The dead tree is the NPC spawner that came with NL (looks just like the dead tree available for purchase in the Garden section).

You enable the testing cheats, click on the selected sim and choose spawn>NPC maker.  It generates the dead tree.  You click on that and choose from the options.

I have an NPC maker collection that I downloaded a long time ago and with that I have access to the object without testing cheats turned on.  I just find the tree and plop it in and go to work.

It has tons of options.  You can choose gender, skin color, townies, downtownies, service workers, etc. (just don't try to generate a burglar without first generating police).  If you don't like the results spawned, you just exit to the neighborhood without saving, then return to the lot.

Don't ever use the 'kill townies' or 'kill' feature, though, because this will just make them all dead and their character files will still be in your game. 

Thanks Regina for all the details.  Probably the collection you downloaded is helping you out in some way since I have the same results weither I use the mailbox to create townie or if I spawn the dead tree.

NPC's are not a problem, only townies and downtownies.

I remember reading about this a few days ago, someone did have the exact same problem as me, I know I am not alone. 

I even deleted the Sims 2 folder and try it without any hacks in and I still have the pop-up coming when I create townie, again with npc's there is no problem.

Something is definitely wrong since I never encounter any problem prior to OFB.

EDIT:  I added an error log in case someone can look it through and find out what is wrong

Please look a few post below for the right error logs

If I think about it I'll try using Testing Cheats Enabled and see if I have the same problem.  It always amazes me when even the 'cheats' are bugged!  :P

I sent the error report to Maxis too whatever this will worth  ::)

I see that nobody have an idea yet of what is wrong.

Oh well.  I guess I am stuck with Maxis default townie for now, sure hope they will fix this.

EDIT:  After looking I notice I included a log that was generated when I tried to create headmaster, here are 2 new error logs directly related to making townies.  I also notice the game added a file call cigen.package in  c:/mydocuments/Thesims2 folder, it was not there prior to trying to make townie with the dead tree or mailbox.  If I can, I will join this package file too.

[404'ed!]

I have the cigen.package too, but no idea what it is or what it does.

I think the cigen package is related to bodyshop, I didn't have it until I ran bodyshop for the first time....I could be wrong though :)

I think so too, as far as I've seen it will be there after I have used Bodyshop. I usually delete it, a couple of times my game wouldn't start and I found a thread where that advice was given. It worked so both times so now I delete it as soon as I notice it.

So, cigen.package can be deleted?  Cool beans.  I delete the groups.cache every time now, and I've started deleting the CAS thumbnails on a regular basis.

MissDoh, funny you should post this ...  just today I decided I was sick of the premade families (lazy, sloppy bunch that they are in Pleasantville) and decided to do the same with the same results as you.

I don't look in SimPE or anything though so I am not sure on specifics but - I created PV, a downtown, a college (Sim State) and Bluewater.  I don't know how deleteAllCharacters works exactly so I went through each neighborhood and did it and then manually deleted the ones in the bin(s) including the college.

I created 4 families and used the mailbox to force create townies, got the grim reaper head, a few pop up boxes I had to answer reset, and the box never went above 0 townies created (I know it used to go through each face with a count).  I tried both create townies and create downtownies options with the same results.

After all that I said oh well, bunny breeding time :) and went on with my playing only to find out that townies MUST have been generated because they kept walking by my houses.

I also noticed that the businesses that used to be owned by the BW sims are greyed out and can't be bought now.  I guess the deeds got deleted with their owners.

I didn't know about the spawning tree though so I may try that one.  I may have to go do it all again and see what happens.

Sintrinity when I have that bug I always open my characters folder to see how many I have before I start. Eventough it mentionned there was 0 townie made there was indeed some. Reset and starting again won't clear the townie that were created and hitting cancel won't delete them either, you are better off going back to neighborhood view without saving since you could easily end-up with 50 or 60 townies without knowing it.

I found a way around it though and was able yesterday to create all the NPC and townies in all sections without a problem.  Even if they appear with Mrs. Crumplebottom face or the reaper they don't actually have it when they appear on community lot or at your Sim house.

Now the way around it is simple but a bit long:

Instead of using the mailbox you must use the dead tree to create your townie, to get the dead tree you left+shift clic on your Sim, select spawn and go to the second page option and select npc & townie maker.  A dead tree will appear next to your Sim.  Now I must say that I added only the business section and deleted all the characters in the other section (except for the business section) in my hood at that point so I would have results for the next part I will describe.

The dead tree must be place outside and your Sim must be inside in order for the next things to work.  Now it is important you save your game before you go to the next step.

1st, shift+clic on the dead tree and select show all townie.  The game will freeze and all the created townie as of now will appear on your lot.  Be prepared to hit the "pause" key otherwise they will start to interact with each other and having 50 Sims on a lot at the same time is heavy on a computer.  Once they appear, go back to neighborhood view without saving.
2nd, reload your lot and shift+clic on the dead tree again and select the option to "show all NPC".  Be prepared to hit pause again and once they all appear you go back to neighborhood view without saving.

For some unknown reason, once you do that the process of making townie, NPC, downtownies and YA will no longer make an error screen appear until you quit your game, do not turn off Boolprop either until your done making all the NPC + townie in all sections.  At that point, you can either use the dead tree to create your NPC and townie just by left clicking on it, it will show you different option. While you create them they will still appear with Mrs. Crumplebottom face and reaper but it will go from beginning to end with no problem or error pop-up.

Tedious but it works.

In case you did not know, to create YA you must place a YA in a University house (I used the familyfunds cheat so I could place the sim in a house instead of a dorm, you must type the name of the gang you gave not the last name of the Sim or it will not work).  Once place in a lot, you select the option to create townie on either the mailbox or the dead tree and the game will then create 50YA + professors.  I did not found a way to create the other NPC for University yet but most will be created when needed.

Thanks so much.  This will save me a lot of grief for my next batch.  You would think it wouldn't have to be this difficult.

I did check SimPE on that hood just before I deleted it and it had created 4 teens and 4 adults, the usual 4 downtownie popularity sims that pretend they know your sims even when they have never met by calling all the time, one mailman, 2 paperboys and 4 repairmen.  I don't even know why on the repairmen.  I didn't use force create NPC and I hadn't called one... hmmm. 

Back to the drawing board.

Thanks again! 

I am happy somebody can benefit from this, it took me a few hours to found a way around it so I thought it was important I share the solution.

Just note this, eventhough you choose to make "EP2 NPC", the game won't create Diva, Mr Big or Vampires but will when needed.  It only creates Gypsylady, cooks and Maitre D'.  Also, when you create downtownie it will actually create 30 townies like in the basic hood (18 adults, 8 teens, 6 kids), it does not create any elders like we normally have when we add the Maxis downtown.  All the EP1 NPC were created normally when needed while I play the University section yesterday.

My custom hood works fine so far.

I personally did a back-up of my hood before I started to add any Sims in it since I don't want to go through this all the time. :P

The problem I had with shift-clicking the mailbox to Create all Townies, was that it was generating the npc's like Grim Reaper, Father Time, Toddlers in the Townie pool.  I've given up with this method for now because I don't trust it anymore  :( 

Miramis if you use the dead tree instead of the mailbox to create your townies and NPC and follow the steps I mentionned a few posts above it will work like a charm.

My cc hood runs like a charm and there is no weird townies or strange behaving townie in that hood (well not any weirder than usual  :P )