I think I know why!

[ZephyrZodiac]

I think I know why some Maxis created Sims at Uni can't get a GPA of 4 and graduate Summa cum Laude, even if they make the Dean's List every semester and do more than the required amount of work.  I was looking at the Brights (for another reason) in SimPE, and I noticed that, unlike other students, they had a GPA token right at the very beginning of their memories, even before the Went to College token.  If anyone is thinking of playing one of these families for the first time in their current install, it would be interesting to see what happens if they check them in SimPE and find a corresponding token and delete it.  I think it must only be playable Maxis sims already installed in houses that it would apply to, and I wonder whether it's because they were in fact played and the token somehow gets moved (or earlier tokens and memories are deleted) when NL and/or OFB are installed.

[J. M. Pescado]

Sims which are already past their first semester would have a GPA already, and thus cannot improve that, having been set to be stupid by Maxis.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, it's still odd that these three have their GPA token before anything else, yet two of them are supposed to have only just started college.  The Went to College token is after the GPA token.

[Ness]

I've had a couple of maxis sims that were started in college that I actually had graduate with a 4.0GPA without cheating.  It is most definitely possible, just so long as you get the ones that are still in first semester.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Yes, but I've done it with some that others haven't, and vice versa.  All the Greek House ones will do it (apart from Brittany Upsnott), and I never had any problems in either La Tour or La Fiesta, and other people have had no problem with the Brights, so I honestly think that it's to do with something being misplaced, and these tokens were definitely in the wrong place.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, I tested out my theory.  I made a custom hood, added a Sim State and entered the Bright house.   I played them as is, tried everything I could with the college adjuster, and they still got low GPAs.  I exited without saving and went into SimPE.  First, I found the GPA token for each of them and removed it (it was even before the Went to college token.  I then checked other first semester sims, (which both Martin and Allegra are) and none had a GPA token, and all had a blank in the GPA box whereas Martin and Allegra had 0.0.  I removed this.  I also removed their major and set them back to undeclared. Jane of course is supposedly a Junior, but I think this was rigged as she doesn't have enough skill points to have made it thus far without getting kicked out!  So I put her back to First Semester too, removed her GPA grade from the box and then edited their memories again for the memories relating to Jane having fiinisihed the First and Second Years.

I then reloaded the game and reentered the Bright house.  Martin and Allegra now showed as having no GPA, I set them to gain the necessary skill points etc.  All went well until they went off to class and Jane did not return and I could not get her back with the debugger.  So, I exited without saving and returned to the beginning again.  This time when I started them off skilling, I found Jane's skill that she got did not change her college meter, so I used the college adjuster to move her to semester 2 and then back to 1, which cleared the blockage.  I also noticed the option to clear stuck kicky bags, which I did.  (I have all relevant hacks in place to prevent kicky bag playing at portals, so this must have had something to do with whatever Maxis did when they moved the students in.)  This time everyting went perfectly, all three students went off to final exams and returned with GPAs of 4.0. 

Just to be sure, I ran the second semester, and everything was fine again, although Allegra is the only one to have spun a want to select a major.  Oh, well, the other two will no doubt end up with philosophy, but I'm not going to do anything about that!

Anyway, for anyone considering playing this house, this is what I found and what managed to clear up the problem.

In my game where I was playing them, I used the College adjuster every semester to try to raise their GPAs, and each time after the exam they were back to square one, GPAs around the 3 level.  I also had to cheat after graduation, but of course their memories were unchanged.  When I went into SimPE to edit those memories, that's when I discovered  the GPA at the beginning, plus a spam of GPA tokens generated each time I used the adjuster.

[DrBeast]

Very interesting findings, ZZ. Although I don't remember having any problems when I played through and graduated those chums.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Oh, you can graduate them, just not summa cum laude.  and I'm not saying it affect everyone's game, but maybe there are other cases.  I can't see how it can be a random glitch, though, as it happens every time in my game, and I've done a complete reinstall since it first showed up.  But next time you attach a Sim State, just run them through simPE and have a look and see if those errors aren't there.