unlinked characters - deletion

[Liss]

I have a neighborhood where I imported sims from other neighborhoods that were overpopulated.  It was only just a few characters but now I have over 900 characters in that neighborhood's characters folder.  When I look at them in Sim PE, they are all greyed out, and say "unlinked character" or no information or something like that.  This includes several duplicate dead copies of characters I imported.  Is it safe to delete these character files?

[J. M. Pescado]

No, it's not really safe: You'd have to properly set all of the family tie entries, memory references, relationships, and a ton of other crap. By doing this (we've explicitly said not to many times), you've essentially buggered your neighborhood, unless you're a SimPE expert and want to spend a few hours hacking and slashing at it.

[HRH Posie]

No, it's not really safe: You'd have to properly set all of the family tie entries, memory references, relationships, and a ton of other crap. By doing this (we've explicitly said not to many times), you've essentially buggered your neighborhood, unless you're a SimPE expert and want to spend a few hours hacking and slashing at it.

I think it would take more than a few hours but here's what you need to do:
To manually remove characters you need to make sure they are not mentioned in any sim's memories.  Then remove their sim descriptions (Sim Description under Filetypes in SimPE) and the corresponding character file from the \My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Neighborhoods\N00X\Characters folder.  Note X is the number of the neighbourhood.

I guess it depends on how much you like the neighbourhood...

[J. M. Pescado]

Well, it would take *ME* a few hours, assuming intimate familiarity with the neighborhood, to relink all entries together to a single stub, and purge all of the "false" stubs. Assuming you LACK an intimate familiar with both SimPE and your neighborhood, this task is pretty much impossible. Your neighborhood is just simply buggered.

[Liss]

So even though there are only a few characters in the neighborhood, the number of characters in the actual folder will cause a problem?

Also, what about the duplicate copies of the same character? That would thin out the folder a LOT.

[Brynne]

I think it would take more than a few hours but here's what you need to do:
To manually remove characters you need to make sure they are not mentioned in any sim's memories.  Then remove their sim descriptions (Sim Description under Filetypes in SimPE) and the corresponding character file from the \My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Neighborhoods\N00X\Characters folder.  Note X is the number of the neighbourhood.

I was up all night doing that. Literally. It's 2 pm here and I still haven't gone to bed yesterday. And I just found out I may have caused problems in my neighborhood by deleting the cellphone tokens from a few sims in Simpe. Sims 2 is a blast, I tell you!

[veilchen]

Posted by: Brynne
I was up all night doing that. Literally. It's 2 pm here and I still haven't gone to bed yesterday. And I just found out I may have caused problems in my neighborhood by deleting the cellphone tokens from a few sims in Simpe. Sims 2 is a blast, I tell you!

Oh my goodness Brynne. Your coffee machine must be on the brink of a melt-down. I hope that at least your laptop is behaving now.

G.

[J. M. Pescado]

So even though there are only a few characters in the neighborhood, the number of characters in the actual folder will cause a problem?

Yes, number of character files is what causes the long-term problems. Slowdowns and outright errors will start to occur with excessive character files in badly written pieces of Maxian code. Some of these issues can be fixed by critical-fix hacks, but more will surely be introduced with each expansion pack, and some issues will probably be unavoidable in cases of massive bloat.

Also, what about the duplicate copies of the same character? That would thin out the folder a LOT.

Thinning out duplicate entries is not easy to do. You can't just wholesale delete, that screws up fambly tie links and memories, since each of those duplicates is actually referenced. You'd have to relink everything. Manually.

[Ancient Sim]

The problem is that each Sim you exported took a memory with them of everyone they'd met in the old neighbourhood.  The only people who will have a 'live' memory of that Sim are those who were exported in the same household.  What you need to do is remove all the greyed-out copies of these Sims, as although in theory they relate to the same Sim, in practice they don't.  You then need to change every memory relating to those 'dead' Sims with the name of the 'live' one, so instead of it saying "Met Unknown" it would say "Met Cassandra Goth" or whoever.  Anyone who appears related to a dead Sim who has actually been transported to the new neighbourhood needs to have that relation changed to the 'live' Sim.  When all this is done (and it does take a while!) you need to remove all the duplicate character files, leaving only the ones that relate to Sims actually in the neighbourhood.  If you want them to remember the Sims who haven't gone to the neighbourhood but are still alive in the old one, you need to leave one copy of their file behind and make sure everyone relates to the same one in their memories - if you don't want them remembered, you need to delete their files and also all memories pertaining to them.

Complicated?  A bit!

[Liss]

bah i guess i'll just play the neighborhood til it breaks LOL

[J. M. Pescado]

Well, don't get too attached to it.

I'd suggest that you, ideally, just bulldoze it and start over from scratch. Perhaps after first creating your University, and then deleting all characters.

[Liss]

Just to show ya how crowded a neighborhood can be from the offset, I made a brand new neighborhood, deleted all the characters, generated new townies and NPCs, and I have exactly 4 CAS sims in the neighborhood.  There are already 211 files in that 'hood. Sheesh.

[J. M. Pescado]

Doesn't it kinda defeat the point of deleting everyone if you just generate more?

[jrd]

Depends on how you generate them. I use the townie/npc generator by dizzy2 and my name mod, so I end up with exactly as many townies and npcs of exactly the gender, age, and sex I want.

[Liss]

That's what I did.  I generated the townies and NPCs with that mod and used the better names thing...in the readme thing it says you should make at least 26 townies and 26 YA's, and 3 of each kind of NPCs and the professors, or the game will do it itself anyway.

When I start a new hood I don't like to use a *lot* of CAS sims, just 2 or 3 families, and I utilize the townies and dormies a lot as mates.  (After I run them through the plastic surgery thing, I have an aversion that verges on psychotic to ugly sims).

[J. M. Pescado]

You will always get 3 NPCs of each type, but townie and dormie regeneration can be deactivated.

[witch]

So what happens when a new n'hood is created, all Maxian sims are deleted, no dormie or townies are regenerated because of a hack, what happens then? Does the game generate certain NPCs as it needs them?

I made a new n'hood, had a lot of fun killing dormies with boolprop cheats but noticed the game was starting to behave oddly so I trashed that experimental n'hood. Now I'm kidnapping townies as they walk by, trapping them in fences and burning them while my families sleep. I have seen odd things starting to happen in that n'hood now too. I have imported one lot with a couple of sims, my bad, but thought I could get away with just one. I have the noregen dormies or townies hacks. I'm getting oddities to do with incomplete processes, like a chance card that vanishes without clicking anywhere, or a sim growing up and not letting me choose an aspiration. I'm thinking of starting a clean n'hood - again.

So back to my original question, what's the cleanest way to start a new n'hood always keeping in mind, 'DO NOT IMPORT ANYTHING' except bodyshop sims!

[J. M. Pescado]

So what happens when a new n'hood is created, all Maxian sims are deleted, no dormie or townies are regenerated because of a hack, what happens then? Does the game generate certain NPCs as it needs them?

Yes, the game will automatically generate NPCs. Often too many already, as I'm at a loss for why we need 3 of every type of NPC, really.

I'm getting oddities to do with incomplete processes, like a chance card that vanishes without clicking anywhere, or a sim growing up and not letting me choose an aspiration. I'm thinking of starting a clean n'hood - again.

I dunno about the chance card, but the aging thing sounds like the Too Many Sims Age Transition bug.

So back to my original question, what's the cleanest way to start a new n'hood always keeping in mind, 'DO NOT IMPORT ANYTHING' except bodyshop sims!

The currently accepted way to start a "clean" neighborhood is to create the neighborhood and attached University, then delete all sims. And never, ever, import an occupied lot or family. Empty lots are safe...if you sweep them for hacks.

[witch]

Just one more off-topic query... 

Will it affect my game in any way if I delete the Maxis default n'hoods before I start playing? I heard talk that the pollination tech was required for alien babies.

or two...

Does deleteAllCharacters include current NPCs?

or more...

When good n'hoods go bad, does it / can it affect core game files? I used to have several the sims 2 folders and renamed them as required. I had a clean one for lot building and so on. Since I got JM's critical fixes I've become lazy.

I'm aiming for a lean, mean, clean sims 2 game! 

[Brynne]

Posted by: Brynne
I was up all night doing that. Literally. It's 2 pm here and I still haven't gone to bed yesterday. And I just found out I may have caused problems in my neighborhood by deleting the cellphone tokens from a few sims in Simpe. Sims 2 is a blast, I tell you!

Oh my goodness Brynne. Your coffee machine must be on the brink of a melt-down. I hope that at least your laptop is behaving now.

G.

I got a new laptop. The other one was a lemon and was sent off to be repaired three times in June. I bought it in February. This new one is treating me well. It's not a Compaq. 

[jrd]

Will it affect my game in any way if I delete the Maxis default n'hoods before I start playing? I heard talk that the pollination tech was required for alien babies.

True I think. Although if you use dizzy2's townie and NPC maker you can regenerate a new one.

Does deleteAllCharacters include current NPCs?

Yes, it includes anything that is a Sim.

When good n'hoods go bad, does it / can it affect core game files? I used to have several the sims 2 folders and renamed them as required. I had a clean one for lot building and so on. Since I got JM's critical fixes I've become lazy.

It shouldn't mess up anything other than itself, however we know the objects.package file can become damaged by normal game play. Don't bet on any file in TS2 being save.