EDIT: As usual, I think I found the answer right after giving up and asking. I suspect it's related to the game choking on the file limit.
Short version: Mac Super Collection deleting character files all over (and not in a clean way). What the eff is doing this? Theories? Happened to anyone else?
More importantly, how can I keep it from happening again?
(The Mac Super collection only includes EPs through BV, plus the Holiday, Family Fun and Glamour Life Stuff packs)
Long version:
Got the Mac SC version of TS2 about a week ago. Playing in a cleaned (not empty) version of Pleasantview.
A few days ago the game crashed to desktop while loading the neighborhood. When I restarted, I found that an infant had disappeared from the house I was playing. It was not summonable by any means and the family's memories of infant were screwed up - her name was gone and replaced with "$Subject".
Figured something had gone horribly wrong. Wiped that neighborhood and restarted, this time careful to have *empty* templates of the stealth 'hoods / Downtown, etc installed so the families from later EPs weren't in my Sim Bin and I wouldn't accidentally add a bunch of Downtownies somehow.
Started playing Pleasantview again. Today I had another crash during loading the neighborhood. Restarted and found EVERYONE had disappeared except Alexander Goth (and his bagful of corrupt memories). Previously occupied houses were all vacant. Checked the Characters folder and sure enough, there's only one file in there (N001_User00000.package).
I had a lot of TS2 bugs back in the day, but this is the nastiest, and the one I've done the least to warrant (I barely played!).