Sims reverting to previous 'landmarks'

[rampancy]

Here's the deal:

I'm playing on a new neighborhood, and I eventually decide to pawn of the Critturs to an elderly sim to train. I load that lot one day to find that not only are the Critturs back to in the family bin, but the elderly sim has no memories of knowing the Critturs. I attribute this to the Critturs themselves, and delete them and the family bin.

I'm playing the Rammawhatevers as well, but get bored of them and delete them too. I reload the game later to find that they still exist on my neighborhood. So I delete them again, and all is well.

However, I just had an odd experience, and I'll explain it in an ordered list since that's the best way to do it:

- I play Guy for a while, saving before I'm done with a vacation.
- I play Guy for a while after that, saving regularly as I do.
- Eventually, Guy falls in love with another person (Girl), and Guy moves in with Girl. I save the combined Guy+Guy family.
- Turns out, one of Girl's cats is in one of those "My Fun and Scratch bars are red and I'm not going to do anything to actually correct that" mood, so I decide I'm going to reload and debug his stats up. I do it, save, and go to the neighborhood.
- As I'm going to reload, I notice Guy's lot has the "Someone Is At Vacation" plumbbob over his house. Turns out, Guy's lot has been reverted to the very first point I listed here. I tell him to go home, and he goes home to his now-completely-unfurnished old house.

Now, I realize that I can just pull him out of the lot and merge him into his fiancee's house, but I'm curious if anyone has experienced this kind of issue. No recent hacks with the exception of a Multiple Pollination Tech mod (which I don't quite know why I added, tbh). I suspect that it might have something to do with it - I've never had an issue like this - but it's certainly possible its either a BV issue or a mod issue. Or, perhaps, I'm wrong and this has nothing to do with either.

So, has anyone else experienced this?

[J. M. Pescado]

This is usually a result of stupid Windoze file locking. Reboot the computer and it should go away.

[rampancy]

I thought that as well, but I've restarted a few times since this started happening. As I was going to bed last night, I realized both situations had something in common - I had used the debug cheats. With the Critturs, I had used them to spawn a pet-training debug item to un-train them from Eat Only Human Food, and with the next situation, I was going to change a pet's abnormally-low needs.

Because my brother has used the debug cheats to no ill effect with BV, how possible is it that a Muiltple-PT hack, combined with the debug cheats, caused something like this to happen? I realize it's a completely off-the-wall guess, but I'm trying to figure out the situation in common...

[Kyna]

Like many players, I turn debug mode on in my userstartup.cheat file - it's always on in my game.  And I did have the multi PT hack in my game for a while.  I haven't had this problem in my game.

You haven't set your neighbourhood folder to read only, have you?  Or are you launching the game while SimPE is open - this locks the neighbourhood files, and nothing you do will be saved.

[Invisigoth]

Debug mode doesn't cause errors; it reports them when they occur. I use the multiple PT hack and I also turn debug mode on with my userstartup.cheat so it is on every time I play. I agree with Kyna's assessment; you probably set your hood folders to read only by mistake.

Another thing, you should poke around this site for awhile and read everything that you can, especially in the war room. You've already messed up your hood by deleting sims from the family bin. This is NOT the cause of your current problem, and you probably won't see any problems for a little while, but in a few weeks or months (depending on how often you play, how lucky you are, and how many bad things you've unintentionally done to your game) you will see problems. One problem that you may see is toddlers with inappropriate wants (woohoo in bed, get a job, etc.). I can't even begin to list all of the damaging things that you can do to your game if you don't know any better, but I know that you can find this information by reading the site because that's how I learned this stuff. If you really just don't want the Maxis made sims to appear in the sim bin when you create a new hood you can look in Peasantry for SaraMK's clean and empty templates thread. She explains how to use the templates very clearly using simple, non-technical terms, and I feel confident that even someone with limited computer experience could follow the instructions with ease.

Finally, you should check out the armory and the firing range and get at the very least the hacks that JM lists as critical or important. Some of these hacks will prevent damaging things from happening to your game (Vampire and Werewolf Fixes springs to mind). If you haven't already, make sure that you read the Guide to MATY stickied in the Podium.

[rampancy]

It should be said that I know the debug cheats don't cause problems; I was just noticing it as a commonality between the two situations.

you probably won't see any problems for a little while, but in a few weeks or months (depending on how often you play, how lucky you are, and how many bad things you've unintentionally done to your game) you will see problems.

While I appreciate the warning - really, I do - but I've learned to take any predictions on errors in Sims 2 with a giant-ass brick of salt. I've played Sims 2 since it came out, and this is the first error I've encountered. I know this sounds really arrogant and whiny, and I'm damned sorry for it, but there's no completely tactful way of saying that I don't trust most of the doomsaying when it comes to Sims 2 errors.

Finally, you should check out the armory and the firing range and get at the very least the hacks that JM lists as critical or important. Some of these hacks will prevent damaging things from happening to your game (Vampire and Werewolf Fixes springs to mind). If you haven't already, make sure that you read the Guide to MATY stickied in the Podium.

I've lurked here for quite a long time; I'm aware of the hacks. I use a few of them, but most of them (for me) fix non-issues and/or things I don't want changed (I'm a bit more of a purist than most people here).

Besides, in any game that lets you change anything, the likelihood that something will go pear shaped becomes 1 when there's enough player-created modifications.

(I'll stop there, since this would inevitably get into a discussion about that, and I'm too damned tired to.)

[snabul]

Yes, i have experienced this. In my case the sim was lost completely, stuck in between.....

When i had this problem shortly after installing BV, i took out my latest working backup.

To play it from that point on was less annoyng than trying to repair it.

[cwykes]

The magic wand might help you get a lost sim back - that's what it's for apparently.

I was just wondering how you were doing for disk space?  I'm not particularly techie, but I think running low on disk space can mess up a save.  When I first installed BV, I had problems with a couple of saves - the game crashed mid-save and a couple of occupied lots disappeared.  I freed up disk space and it hasn't happened again, though that could be co-incidence of course!