overloaded neighborhood

[linolino]

So, all neighborhoods are doomed to explode in a gigantic fiery fire ball visible from wherever you are because of the ever-increasing number of character files that will never be erased by the game.

We are all aware of that. We also know that the number of supported chars files before the game starts to melt has been increased with nighlife, and that we have some mods made by some great modders in the community that will delay the self-destruction. However someday the worst will happen.

Myself have 530 chars files in my neighboorhood right now, nothing serious, however i was thinking about creating a brand new neighborhood, deleteAllCharactes to have a fresh start, with different NPC than those we always have the first time (also i dowloaded a mod that adds lots of names, so i wanted to test it). However I wanted to keep playing my favorite families, so i'm thingking about something and i wanted you guys to give your oppinion on this, if it will work or not..


First, i create a new neighborhood and delete all characters. then i go to my custom neighborhood and package my 2 favorite families by moving their lots to the lot bin. I know that everyone they know will be packed with them. no problem.
Then I go to the new neighboorhood and without generating any NPC, I place those lots in it.
Now every character that was packed with the lot will have a file in the character folder.
I go there and check how many files were created: 150!

Now I go in SimPe and take note of the files belonging to the family (everyone that is on the family tree). Now i go to explorer and delete all the other files. So I will have only the files belonging to sim of the family.

There is no problem deleting those files, because when a lot is moved to the bin, the relationship pannel for everysim in that lot will be erased. so they will know no one execpt for other sims in that lot. However they will still have memories of "Met $Subjuect", but this shouldn't be a issue, since these memories aren't actually used for nothing. And you can use simPe to delete those memories.

this is a good solution, for startina a new neighborhood with only the sims i want, isn't it?

[Hook]

The cleanest way would be to use SimPE's sim surgery option to export your favorite Sims to package files, then use these in your new neighborhood.  If you want them to have specific attributes, testingCheatsEnabled will let you change almost anything by dragging the sliders once you have used CAS to get them back into the game and set up various family ties. 

Hook

[Regina]

I would definitely recommend going with the way Hook advised.  You'll have to do a lot of tweaking to get everything set back up the way it is now, but it should end up being a lot less problem-free.

You may also find that you don't want to use all of your current sims as playable sims, but perhaps make some of them into Townies using Inge's Teleporter-Plus shrub.  I use sims from other neighborhoods that way because all of the Townies generated in the game are still off the same templates, and these are sims that were created through families so are completely unique.

Basically, to make Townies you make a family in CAS and move them into a house.  Buy the shrub, click on it and choose 'Make me a Townie'.  At that point that sim is no longer selected although they still show up in the family bar.  Then click on the shrub again and choose the option for clearing away non-residents and that sim disappears.  At the point they're made into a Townie they get skills and a job.  You just repeat until the last one is gone at which point the game goes into Buy Mode.  Save the house and leave it and you've got eight brand new, unique Townies!

I use the notownieregen and have been using the teleporter-plus shrub for the Townies, then generating Downtownies with the NPC maker that's available in-game using the testing cheats code.  Unfortunately you'll end up with duplicates of ones in other neighborhoods, but there are many in that pool and I figure I don't have to use all of them in every neighborhood so at least a few things are unique.  One thing I will mention, though, is that this is a very painstaking and time consuming process.  If you generate a sim you don't want, you don't want to use the 'kill' option because its character file will be left in the game.  You want to exit the lot without saving and go back in and generate another and keep repeating as necessary.  That NPC maker also lets you generate Grand Vampires, Mr. Big, the Diva and the Slobs in addition to most of the other service workers.  I ran into problems trying to generate cops, though.  I kept getting an error message.  Later on I tried again, this time generating burglars first.  Once they were in the game I could generate cops.

[linolino]

ok thanks guys. i also must say that I tested what i posted, and it dosn't work propely.

I did it and it worked, however when i entered the house of my sims i messed with, They would jump when interacting with others, and they would also have sometimes a lot of bubbles going out of their buts.

Just a couple of questions: Instead of Inges shrub, can i use the dead tree debug object that comes with nighlife?

and how do i do the sliding bar thing for changing personalities and skills? i can't find out

[DrBeast]

and how do i do the sliding bar thing for changing personalities and skills? i can't find out

I've found out that sliding the bars (all bars, from Relations to needs to skills to interests) only works when testingCheatsEnabled runs from the userStartup.cheat file, not when you type it in-game. The rest of your questions I cannot answer, as I don't have NL.

[Lynda]

I've found out that sliding the bars (all bars, from Relations to needs to skills to interests) only works when testingCheatsEnabled runs from the userStartup.cheat file, not when you type it in-game. The rest of your questions I cannot answer, as I don't have NL.

You don't have to put it in the userStartup.cheat file to get this to work, you can simply enter into debug mode in the neighborhood view, then go into a house and you should be able to slide the skill/relationship/interest/etc bars.

[radiophonic]

1,208 and still running - what do you have to worry about?

[MissDoh]

ok thanks guys. i also must say that I tested what i posted, and it dosn't work propely.

I did it and it worked, however when i entered the house of my sims i messed with, They would jump when interacting with others, and they would also have sometimes a lot of bubbles going out of their buts.

Just a couple of questions: Instead of Inges shrub, can i use the dead tree debug object that comes with nighlife?

and how do i do the sliding bar thing for changing personalities and skills? i can't find out

If you type the "boolprop testingcheatsenabled true" in neighborhood view, you should be able to modify the zodiac sign (personality) and skills simply by clicking on your left button mouse and move the trait bar you want to modify from left to right (on top you will see the zodiac sign change).

If you do a delete all characters (i've been running test for the last few days) and you select a pre-made Maxis University you must do the "deleteallcharacters" while in the University neighborhood view otherwise you won't be able to load houses in which there were Sims in.  Also, you can create all the townies, downtown townies, university townie (from the college neighborhood) regular NPC using boolprop but I do not suggest you use the "DGB create EP2 NPC" option it seems (though I am not a 100% sure) to make the game do weird things, you are better off letting the game create them.

[Regina]

ok thanks guys. i also must say that I tested what i posted, and it dosn't work propely.

Just a couple of questions: Instead of Inges shrub, can i use the dead tree debug object that comes with nighlife?

Indeed you can.  The NPC creator has two modes for making Townies, one for regular Townies and one for Downtownies.  You have to switch in between modes.  Oh, and in order to get the dead tree, with testing cheats enabled, shift-click on your active sim, then click 'spawn' then 'more' and you'll find the NPC maker.  It'll appear at your sim's feet.  I, too, noticed something weird with trying to generate Ep 2 service workers.  I wasn't given the option for all of them and when I tried to generate a DJ I got a maid.  I've wondered if since I don't have University, perhaps the NPC maker isn't working quite the way it should in a couple of instances.

[nectere]

Has anyone else ever been able to interact with a DJ? In my game he/she acts like an object much the way Crumplebottom does and appears to generated solely when a DJ booth is placed downtown. I can go into build mode downtown and the DJ is standing next the DJ Booth like a statue. I have no interaction options with the DJ when click on him/her in play mode.

In fact, another thing, I have never seen an NPC worker cruising the streets in any of my hoods, not a single one. Is this a memory issue, a graphics issue or what? It doesnt make sense to me that NPCs would ever be cruising the streets because then they would be townies, not workers.

[Regina]

In order to 'meet' the DJ just have your sim be the disk jockey.  Although they won't have any relationship points they will at least have met.  While your sim is being the disk jockey, the real DJ pretty much acts like any other sim on the lot.  They go play cards or soak in the hot tub or what have you.  If you have multiple sims on the lot you could use the other sim to actually build up a relationshp with them while there.

[Motoki]

When I had one of my sims take over for the disc jockey, the DJ then went around socializing with other sims and using the spinny thing and my other sims could interact with him. It seems like you just can't bug him while he is working.

[Andygal]

you can also have your sim "request" music in order to meet the DJ.

[MissDoh]

ok thanks guys. i also must say that I tested what i posted, and it dosn't work propely.

Just a couple of questions: Instead of Inges shrub, can i use the dead tree debug object that comes with nighlife?

Indeed you can.  The NPC creator has two modes for making Townies, one for regular Townies and one for Downtownies.  You have to switch in between modes.  Oh, and in order to get the dead tree, with testing cheats enabled, shift-click on your active sim, then click 'spawn' then 'more' and you'll find the NPC maker.  It'll appear at your sim's feet.  I, too, noticed something weird with trying to generate Ep 2 service workers.  I wasn't given the option for all of them and when I tried to generate a DJ I got a maid.  I've wondered if since I don't have University, perhaps the NPC maker isn't working quite the way it should in a couple of instances.

You are making me think too, see I created a few custom neighborhood deleteallcharacters and from the moment I created the "ep2 npc" in the game it seems to have cause weird things.  The Sim I create in CAS afterward all have mismatch LTW/aspirations, I was still wondering yesterday if it was cause by that and so far it seems to be it.  I created 2 custom neighborhood add all the townie, downtownie, University townie and regular NPC in the game and no Sim I created afterward had the LTW/aspipration mismatch.  In all the others I created previously in which I added the "ep2 npc" the mismatch happened.

[Andygal]

I have noticed that the Grand Vampires in my game have odd LTW  wants that don't fit with their aspiration (one wants to marr yoff 6 kids).

I wonder if that could be connected and if generating the NL NPCs somehow spreads that weirdness to all sims.

[MissDoh]

Well so far it seems a few of us did end up with that problem after creating EP2-NPC with testingcheatsenabled , so I think it would not be unreasonable to think it could be the cause of the mismatch LTW/aspiration.