Correcting the DNA of Strangetown premade characters

[Motoki]

nectere: I'm not sure why, but IIRC, it's fairly easy to change a sim from linked to unlinked in SimPE, I believe you just change a value from 1 to 0. There should be a field for linked if you open up a sim's info in the Sim Browser. Find a linked sim and see what value they have and changed your unlinked sims to that one, commit and save.

cwykes: I guess it's just the I can't part I take exception with. I think it's perfectly valid to say 'You know what, I bought this game for recreation and enjoyment and I'm not willing to invest a lot of time and frustration learning a technical tool to fix a bug that was really the responsibility of the creators to fix in the first place'. I mean after all, we paid $50 or so for the game, or someone who bought it as a present did, so we really shouldn't have to work for it.

I've known some young teens who could run circles around me for techie stuff and was quite envious of them. Maybe I'm just splitting hairs over the whole thing *shrug* but I don't think people should put limits on themselves like that.

As for the file, the N002_Neighborhood.package is 2.21 MB. It should be possible for someone to take a new untouched Strangetown, fix the DNA and post that package instructing people to install it to My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Neighborhoods\N002 with the caveat that it's only to be used on a new, untouched and unplayed Strangetown.

[nectere]

Motoki, yeah I know how make them link changing the value, I am just wondering if it matters if they remain unlinked? I am not really interested in resurrecting a bunch of long dead sims pregame but if I do resurrect a few here and there I wonder if it matters that I leave them unlinked. Since Lyla was only second resurrected sim with the nomitron thingie I never noticed before. That Spector broad has a very interesting history though...I guess I will just wait and see if it blows up!

The "I can't do it" thing drives me insane, I think its just fear and a lack of confidence in ones self, or perhaps more probable, the fear of failure. I cant tell you how many times I have completely hosed a neighborhood or the entire game goofing around in simpe or with testingcheats, but stuff like that doesn't bother me, its all for the sake of learning and realizing "hey I am not that stupid afterall!" heh. I guess this is why everyone says, use a clean neighborhood, one you wont mind losing or a different account and make backups often, although I don't bother, its just a game and I don't care how many times I have to start over because I fubarred something. I think its funny, plus the lessons learned really stick! My mother drives me insane with this, she asks for all these electronics and I buy them for her and then she refuses to just dive in a learn how to use them, no matter how simple, its always some excuse. *sigh*

[cwykes]

Unless I'm misunderstanding how it works.  I'd put the file in C:\.....\TSData\Res\UserData\Neighborhoods so that you get a new corrected hood when you re-initalise the game.  Obviously you'd have to redo that every time you re-instal like putting the script files back for modular stairs and pool colours.  I re-initialise fairly often when I'm trying to check where a problem is.  I'd fix the gardens too.  OK = I'm thinking about doing it... I have the time.

I think all my Sims lost their memories because I did something silly in SimPE.  Could have been a small fiery ball due to all the mess in the 'hood though.  Yeah it's just a game, but I was so upset!

People need lots of support to get past their technophobia and master something new.  You can't just explain once and leave them to it. If you have the time and persistence to help over a week or two,  it's amazingly rewarding on both sides.

EDIT - I found original sims up for download on Simsestates2.  I posted saying fixed versions would be really useful.

[hedgekat]

Resurrected Sims     Over a year ago I used Simpe to resurrect all the Goth and Crumplebottom ghosts in  a separate version of Pleasantview.  Changed ages, etc as needed to make Mortimers grandparents adults and his parents teens.   Played both families for quite a few days.   Never any problems with any of them.   Just checked with Simpe and they are still listed as unlinked in Sim Browser.  I haven't ever tried resurrecting anyone with the Nomitron.   Haven't had Uni long enough to acquire it. 

Question about Sim DNA   The lines of DNA that determine what skin tone is to be passed on puzzle me.   It seems to me that if a sim has heterozygous skin genes then the pass on strings should have both the dominant and recessive genes available.   But looking at my sims genetics very few of them have it that way.   Most of them appear only able to pass on their expressed skin tone.  This applies to born-in game sims as well as Maxis ones.  I have one girl who is S2.  Her parents are S1 and S3.   She shows S1 and S3 as her inherited genes but has only S2 in he pass-on strings.   This does not make sense to me. 

Alien genetics  The alien skin tone is not completely dominant.  I have an alien created in CAS who has normal alien genetics.   Yes,  all 5 of her children were born with green skin.   They all have S3 as their recessive skin tone.  Of her more than 20 grandchildren only one has green skin.   BUT several of them carry the gene for alien skin even though they do not show it.   However it is not in their pass-on strings.   Or wasn't until I changed them.       Without alien skintone, alien eyes show up as normal human brown eyes.   My CAS alien married a sim with gray eyes.  All their children had the black alien eyes.   One daughter had a child with a homozygous green eyed sim.   That child had brown eyes.  Looking in his DNA his eye genes are for green and alien.  With the alien being the expressed gene.   His green skinned younger brother got the father's green eyes.   

[questar]

Olive Specter and Nervous Subject
I think that their DNA doesn't match because Olive adopted him.  If you check in Olive's memory banks, in between the memories of tons of people dieing (!), you'll find that she has the memory of having her adopted child taken away.  (And just how did all those people die on her property? Hmmmm) The game includes a photo of a couple wearing mohawks putting up a baby for adoption.  I assume  that that baby was Nervàous.  I'll open the game and check to see wherther Nervous has memories of beig adopted and of who raised him.

Also, I don't get why you say that Alien skin is dominant.  Why would that be the case?  If an Alien were to inseminate some unfortunate human, I would think that its genes would ALL be recessive since they are reproducing in a foreign, if not hostile environment and under artificial circumstances. I'm thinking that the alien genes would be at a disavantage, hence recessive.  If you know something about why alien skin is dominanat then tell on.

Signed
Ears wide open

[baratron]

Also, I don't get why you say that Alien skin is dominant.  Why would that be the case?  If an Alien were to inseminate some unfortunate human, I would think that its genes would ALL be recessive since they are reproducing in a foreign, if not hostile environment and under artificial circumstances. I'm thinking that the alien genes would be at a disavantage, hence recessive.  If you know something about why alien skin is dominanat then tell on.

Because "dominant" is the way Maxis wrote it in the Sims 2 code  . Maybe it doesn't make logical sense, but nor do light blue eyes in dark-skinned people.

[IgnorantBliss]

For some strange Maxian reason, the alien skintone is only dominant when one parent is homozygous to it. That's why babies born from abductions are always green (excluding custom skintones). However, when a parent has only one green skintone gene and one "regular" Maxis skintone gene, the green skintone turns equal with the other ones. Therefore if one parent's genes are green/regular and another parent's regular/regular, each one of their children has a 25% chance of expressing the green skintone (another 25% will have the green skintone in their DNA but they are expressing another).

By the way, to answer a question posted earlier in this thread, if a sim inherits two recessive eye color genes, like grey and green, for example, he can express either one of them, with a 50/50 chance. The same applies to all the other hair or eye colors that are equally recessive or dominant. Also, if you create a child in CAS out of two parents, then their DNA will be mixed accordingly, which is nice, and they won't be homozygous to their genes like their parents.

And thanks for this great tutorial, this has been of great help in restarting my neighborhoods .

[cwykes]

Please can someone take a minute and tell me how skintone is determined when 2 parents have differet skintones - ignoring alien skin completely.  Suppose you marry two sims with skintones S1 and S4 who are both homozygous.  We know it's not a 50-50 chance of either S1 or S4, but is there an equal chance of getting S1, S2, S3 and S4 skin or is it more complicated than that?    If the two sims were S1 and S3, how do the odds work then and can a kid end up as S4?

[RainbowTigress]

Since there are no dominant skintones in the S1-S4 tones, the child will express a random skintone anywhere between the two skintones received from the parents.  So if one parent is S1 and the other is S4, then the child can be any skintone:  S1, S2, S3, or S4.  In my first run of Pleasantview, Lilith (S1) and Dirk (S4) had 4 children.  The first two were twins (S4 and S3) and the last two were both S3.

[LadyDragonair]

Since there are no dominant skintones in the S1-S4 tones, the child will express a random skintone anywhere between the two skintones received from the parents.  So if one parent is S1 and the other is S4, then the child can be any skintone:  S1, S2, S3, or S4.  In my first run of Pleasantview, Lilith (S1) and Dirk (S4) had 4 children.  The first two were twins (S4 and S3) and the last two were both S3.

That is exactly right although when they have kids they will only pass on s1 or s4 even though they express s3. All the kids Lilith and Dirk had were s3 in my game but passed on s1 and s4.

[cwykes]

OK thanks people.  Equal chances of any skintone within the skintone range of the parents and no chance of a skintone outside the range.  The inherited bit is definitely weird though - their own and one of the parents might have been a more obvious choice.

[IgnorantBliss]

That is exactly right although when they have kids they will only pass on s1 or s4 even though they express s3. All the kids Lilith and Dirk had were s3 in my game but passed on s1 and s4.

This may have been the case before any expansion packs, I'm not sure, but now, the sims only pass on the skintone they express. This has been confirmed by Maxoid Tom. It was changed from what it originally was meant to be.

[Process Denied]

I finally broke down and bought the TS2 Enhancer and the genetics are so screwed up.  Not only does Strangetown and Veronaville have missing DNA but a lot of the DNA is wrong.  I had custom Sims that I created for the adoption pool and --so they should only have their own DNA but I noticed that the adoptive parent's DNA was in there??  Anyways I went and changed everyone into custom skins and eyes--pretty cool.  Thanks so much for this thread--I makes a big difference cause when I put two people together, I always have to think about genetics--now everyone is equal--well, except for the hidious.

[questar]

Barathon;
You piqued my interest when you mentioned the connection between the Grim Reaper and Nervous.  I took a look at the Grim Reaper - I'd never thought to do that before.  I discovered that it's a woman (how sexist can you get) fair, brunette and fairly normal looking.  But you say that Nervous is her clone and gender inverted.  I take it that you mean genetically but not phsyically? Physically, they  look nothing like each other. Olive specter has a memory of having woohoo'd with the Grim Reaper - but I'm not sure if that makes the Grim Reaper Nervous's "father".  Whewww... I'm going to start a thread on mixed up genealogy in Strange town.

[Cynarra]

So is there a file listing all the codes to fix Strangetown??  How about Veronaville??  I feel more comfortable cutting and pasteing something that is correct   

[RainbowTigress]

Yeah, the family trees of Strangetown are pretty messed up.  For one thing, PT#9 pollinated Jenny's father to have alien spawn, who then had Jenny and the Curious brothers with another woman.  PT#9 then ended up marrying Jenny, who is young enough to be his daughter.  Technically they aren't related, but that just seems messed up to me.  Jenny and the Curious brothers are half-siblings of Lola and Chloe, but they aren't even flagged as family.  So unless you change it in SimPE, the Curious brothers could have romantic relationships and marry their half-sisters.

[IgnorantBliss]

I discovered that it's a woman (how sexist can you get) fair, brunette and fairly normal looking. 

Why would it be sexist for the Grim Reaper to be female?

[RainbowTigress]

The Grim Reaper is male in my game.  But really what difference does it make?

[jmtmom]

Well, this looks doable, even for a SimPE retard like me.

Thank-you very much.

I have a probably very stupid question here, but will it make any difference if the default skintones and eyes are set to something else?  I use Sim-cribbing skins and Helanae eyes as defaults in my game.

[RainbowTigress]

Doesn't make any difference.  I use default replacements myself.  That only affects what you see in the game.

[altered]

Thank you, so much, baratron for this.  I'm SimPE virginal, and this was very easy to follow.  And now, I understand the genetics of my Sims somewhat. 

I have a question.  I noticed when I opened up a Sim, like PT #9, under Relations, every person that was known to PT#9 was also checkmarked as being Family...people like Gen. Buzz and Ophelia.  When I looked at all my Sims whose DNA I corrected in Strangetown, they were all like that...if they knew someone, then the family box was checked up, as well as the known box.  It's too weird to see this between Johnny Smith and Ophelia, since they are in love with each other.  Anyone know why this is?  Is this a weird way that Sim PE reads the files, or is this another example of Maxis "Oopsness"?  Is it ok to uncheck the files if they aren't related (I'm talking the ones that really aren't related, not folks like Chloe and Lola who are related to Jenny, but it won't show up)?

[RainbowTigress]

I saw the same thing in Pleasantview with Dustin and Angela and also Lilith and Dirk.  I don't know why, I figured it was another of those Maxis things that don't make much sense.  I removed the checkmarks and haven't noticed any problems.

[IgnorantBliss]

I noticed the family check in SimPE, as well, but I don't think the game still considers them family, or otherwise sims like Angela and Dustin would not have any options for romantic interactions.

[jmtmom]

Well I took the plunge and fixed all the Strange Town characters using the instructions here. My game didn't blow up and seems to be working fine. 

One question though, do the lines have to be in order? I did order some and not others, it didn't seem to make any difference as far as playing the sims, but I haven't had them have any kids yet.

[RainbowTigress]

No, they don't have to be in order.  In fact, all of my sims born after Uni seem to be out of order, which doesn't hurt anything, but makes it a bit confusing.