Sorry about the necromancy, but Kazzandra sent me the new link for the guitars she fixed: 
http://www.mediafire.com/file/l0iltaa4onymi4w/Atavera%27s%20Guitars.rar

Try dragging your neighborhood folders out of the game, put your backups in, and run the game.

Macro->Eat on an apartment lot seems to cause the Sim to repeatedly make group meals and store them in inventory without ever serving/taking a portion.

I've heard rumors of a lot with 51 "closets" with apartment doors on them -- and the game generated a tenant for each!

You could edit the empty apartment building and delete all the doors to the apartments you don't want...

Try removing NeighborhoodManager.package from your game and let it regenerate.

On the odd chance that it's something causing the game to crash before it gets around to reading the thumbnails, you can put them back and try something else independently.  I rename the cache files too, instead of deleting them.


Thanks!  I'll recommend people drag out the whole Thumbnails folder instead of just the contents.

Better to lose the meal points than to get zero points because you couldn't get the Headmaster out of the hot tub!

Coolness!  Another file I can tell people to delete when they say "My game crashes!"

Or worse... A file you inherited from someone who installed it with the Maxis installer!

I zipped up all the stupid ugly Maxis people and pets and most of the Maxis 'hoods (except the Vacation 'hoods and the Hobby 'hood) and deleted them.  As long as you don't reset the Sim Index, everything is fine. 

The only thing I left was the pitifully few puppies and kittens in the adoption pool.  However, I might delete them too, since I now have a fix (Christianlv's Puppy/Kitten Generator, then call the officer for a large pick up).

Already did that.  Conflicts have been checked with the manufacturers or one of the offenders disabled.


Assuming I attached the correct file, the situation resulting in the attached file involved a teen girl sitting on a maxis loveseat skilling under control of macrotastics (can't play without it) when her mother attempted to call the family for a meal together.  I also don't have the leaf pile sofa, although I do have ACR.  ACR should not have been active, because everyone but the mother was busy skilling, and she was cooking.

I'm thinking I'll zip it up, so next time my game starts crashing on every lot, I can just replace it with a "good" copy.

Thanks for looking.

I have a mental list of suspects (things with obvious stupid errors, so they've probably got subtle stupid errors too).

Ah!  Is moving the N00x folder out enough, or should I make a backup copy of the NeighborhoodManager.package as well?

Actually, my testing was in a new hood which had never been Sync Timer'ed.  Never ran the existing hood without the Downloads folder as far as I know.

Well, I get to guess what the old settings were as best I can...

I've been getting errors when a Sim calls the family to eat.  Log attached.

I'm running with all EPs and most SPs and a large collection of JMP, TwoJeffs, Dizzy, and Inge hacks.

I'd be willing to contribute to the bribes too.  If you won't take money, how about chocolate chip cookies?

(My summoning spells are limited; no cool text messages pertaining to Necromancy.)

That's the fundamental problem.... I haven't played this hood since last fall, so I don't remember what day any of them were on, and they were spread across a 10 day (or so) span.  There's only about 10 houses, so resetting the timers isn't an onerous job.  I just need to recover the info saying the Todd family was on day X, the Mills family was on day Y, etc.

Try dragging the contents of your Thumbnails folder to a safe place on your hard drive.  The game will (slowly) regenerate them, and CAS should look ok again.

The reason why you can't recatagorize tops and bottoms is because the game has no provision to use them as Formals, etc.  They're everyday clothing only.

Longer version: I got several EPs and SPs for Christmas.  I've been playing new hoods with no problems. 

A couple days ago, I started playing an old legacy hood, where I was using lot sync timers to keep the houses at roughly the same "day."

I played one house for several hours, saved several times, and quit.  Next day, the game started and let me choose a neighborhood.  When I chose the same house, the lot crashed on load.  Figured it was the family, so I evicted and tried moving them into another house.  Crashed while loading the lot without moving the family into the house.  Tried moving them back into their original house, crashed while loading the lot.  Tried another house; that house also crashed on load.  Tried making a new family; crashed while loading the "family view."  Tried a house in another 'hood, crashed on load.

Finally fixed it by renaming the My Documents/EA Games/The Sims 2 folder, letting the game make a new folder, testing every theory of why the crash happened (with no luck), then moving the Neighborhoods and various custom content to the new folder. 

Everything was fine, except I lost the lot sync timer info.  Is there a way to find out what day the families were on, so I can hand-set their timers again?

Doesn't JMP have a moveinlotteryfix hack too?

Also make sure you've got the Seasons version of the hack.  I think the Pets version is very non-Seasons compliant, if I'm remembering correctly.

Just wanted to say... this is still working wonderfully!  <worships Ste>

I'd send my Sim, Angelita, over to make you very happy, but you'd prefer her cousin, Angelo... <runs off to create Angelo for Ste>

I will worship you above JMP if you manage this...