It really disappointed the hell out of me when I learned that. They should have, at the very least, created some traveler aspiration or ltw to fulfill when you received that last memento. It especially bites when you don't know that and jump through hoops to get them all. Ah, well. But I still have some anal retentive need to get them all once I've started. I get fixated and annoyed when there are holes. I think this is probably something I should get help for.

You ever wonder if they do crap like that just to frack with our heads? I consider it a very real possibility that they spend 8 hours coming up with stupid ideas like that to mess with people instead of working on the code. But then, I think most people are basically evil. Some just aren't as ingenious with it.

RE: Charlatan. Thanks for the advice. I wasn't going to try it until someone said one way or the other. I have nightmares of NPC drama with my game files.

I am having issues with the big hairy guy too. Aside from gagging a little when I watched him picking his own fleas(?) and eating them, I sent three sims to his lot all at once, all three with maps. Let two of them make friends with him via Macro, Socialize. daily 100s and lifetime at least 15s for each. The other chic just met him and the friendship is low. No memento for any of them. We slap danced and fished and sat around the fire and everything else you can do. Nada. I'm using only the DC awesomeness in hacks/mods now.

Off topic a little, I also just realized that on South End Beach in Twikki Island, there is a urinal in the girl's bathroom but not the guy's. Odd. And my current Charlatan is kind of hot for a sim, and doesn't wear a monacle. Also odd, as I understand it. Anyone know if there would be wonkiness if I hooked him up with my single girl?

The only problem I see with this is that, if you take antiredundancy out, you start spawning tour guides again (unless you installed the patch, presumeably).  I know I have a charlatan in my game who has shown up once even with antiredundancy loaded.
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I thought of this beforehand so I didn't visit the vaca lots. I hung around the little pet store for awhile and he showed up fairly quickly. I (in all my non-awesomeness, late to read the threads thouroughly) actually have the patch installed, but don't automatically trust that it will fix what it says it does. I immediately went home, quit the game, and put anti-redundancy back in JIC. But thanks though.

You said this and I got this picture in my head that cracked me the hell up. I thought, "Surely not!" I thought wrong. Took out anti-redundancy and waited. I knew who he was at first sight. That's amusing. And thanks for the help!

I have all of the updated DC (as of two days ago) and I also have the issue of other patrons stealing my food from under my nose in a hotel restaurant. The server came and put the plate down, and before my sim's water glass could disappear, some other vacationer came over and took the plate. Bastard. *Edit - I still have to pay for each plate too, no matter how many times this happens. I'm hoping this is a bug and not a feature. The price of my total dinner after feeding three of these sorry, fraggle rockin mooches was ridiculous.*

I have only managed to be able to capture the ninja by making my sim's wife meditate. If you go to the Zen Garden and meditate the ninja appears the first time you do it every single time. I couldn't catch him, so I went back to the vacation home, then walked back to the lot, rinse, repeat. Finally I had her meditate, made my other sim active immediately, and as soon as he appeared I clicked learn to teleport for my guy and it worked fine. I have yet to figure out how the hell to catch him if my sim is alone. Bastard.

What does the pickpocket look like? I've played all the lots for two rl days and have yet to see him.

Finally, my sim has all the vaca memories and nothing special has happened to him either. Not that I'm aware of anyway. And no, I don't have the prima guide either. Could barely afford the expansion as is. I would appreciate the suggestion of someone linking to the information that was made earlier.

Off to pirate some boo-tay.

Your method works perfectly. Also thanks to Invisigoth for info.

Even re-installing all the paid for copies was one big monkey fucked circus. The ass crackers at EA aren't getting another dime from me until they take that fraggle rockin SecuRom horseshit out of the game.

Never mind. Thanks to all. I tried reinstalling two more times. On the second try I let the game connect to the internet in one of those "what the hell, I'm getting desperate" moments and after that it installed perfectly. Son of a bitch.

No, it isn't that. I reformatted my hard drive a couple of months ago and never reinstalled the game. I'm just getting around to it now. So I started a fresh install last night. Got base thru Nightlife installed with no problems. Ran the game, went to the 'hood screen to check that it was working, exited, then tried three times to install OFB, which worked just fine before the reformat. I take good care of my game discs.

The first time I got an error on another file, took the disc out and cleaned it though it looks spotless, got rid of the residual files, ran CC, restarted and tried again. The second time I got the same file error, so I copied the files to the hard drive and tried the install from there. It got past the first file just fine, got almost all the way to the end and gave me the error on the big file, the exe. So I cleaned up again and tried the disc again, won't read that file.

*Edit, I tried to copy the disc to the drive again and check the attributes of that file. On the HD it's not marked as read only, so that should be ok.

I'm having an issue with a file that cannot be read while I'm trying to reinstall OFB. I've copied the disc to a folder on the hard drive and tried to install from there. It gets to around 97% then says it's having a problem copying the file \TSBin\Sims2EP3.exe

Could anyone perhaps copy that file from the U.S. OFB disc and upload it or send it to me at dakotaskyehs@aol.com?

I'd be really grateful. I'm already beyond aggravated with reinstalling these discs. Much grassy ass.

Ok I am a little confused by the varying methods here. I first read the FAQs where JM explained how to play a "legally backed up copy". I've never done this before. I am currently "backing up a copy" of BV from firelight(?I think this was the name). I have installed NOTHING yet. I have XP home and a few programs that SecuROM would be against, I'm sure.

Because of JM's instructions I dled Daemon Tools and SecuROM Loader. Again, I haven't installed anything. Then I read moron's instructions in this thread and just in case that was the method I needed, I dled the mini-image and YASU.

So what I want to do is re-install all the EP's up to Seasons and the SPs Glamour and Family. That's the stuff I bought and paid for. And the patches. This part is mostly a no-brainer. I would like to ask though, are the patches necessary if you have the next expansion cd, or do you still have to install each one?

I also bought a copy of Celebration (afraid to install this now) and now the "backing up" of BV from firelight(?). That's where I need the help. Is there anyone who would be willing to tell me which method I should use and/or walk me thru it since I've never done this and don't know a thing about these programs?

Also, should I install the Celebration SP or download another "backed up" copy of this from somewhere, and how will it affect/when should it be done regarding the BV installation?

This is a pain in the ass, I know, but I've given them so much money for the headache it's given me and I don't want to shell out for BV yet. I'll pm my AIM name or email if anyone is interested in helping me out. It just seems like everyone is doing it slightly differently. Thanks.