Pets patch released

[Process Denied]

I just saw the Diva at a community lot and she has brown hair instead of black--I haven't noticed any other hair changes except for the toddler hair.  I am only growing up babies and adults right now and every toddler(about ten)grew up with a bald head even though their siblings who had the same hair didn't(pre-patch).  Something is screwy--probably due to the new hair changes that are coming up in seasons??  Better work on that before seasons comes out.

[V]

I'm just not touching this one. I'm not even really playing right now anyway. It doesn't fix anything important we didn't already fix, and if it ain't broke...

While I completely agree with this, didn't someone say that when Seasons comes out we will have this patch thrust upon us during the last step of the installation that checks for updates?


Ah, found the quote:

Arina: Most likely, at the very least, when you install Seasons, it may force you to update Pets anyway. The new EP doesn't patch the previous one because they, for a change, aren't trying to assume that you've installed every EP, plus, there's no requirement to install them in order, as there was with TS1. However, the last step of installation sometimes has been to check to make sure your entire game is updated, and forcing the patch then, if it hasn't been.

Of course we do have at least a couple of weeks before this is an imminent threat.

[vilia]

I've tried to fix Lucy Hanby's hair by shift-clicking on her, selecting 'make vampire' and then 'cure vampirism' as suggested and it does work temporarily but the changes don't stick. The next day when she comes to work her hair has turned blonde again and is still blonde when she shows up on other lots to clean.

Any other ideas? Please

[jrd]

The most important fix in the patch which no modder had fixed yet, is the stopping strays visiting downtown lots. I was growing so tired of having to continually chase them off because of furniture destruction.

Maid hair -- I'll take a look in my game if the changes stuck this time. Did you try making your selectable and having them change appearance after vamping/devamping (just change lipstick or whatever)?

[vilia]

Hi Jordi,

Yes I vamped/de-vamped Lucy (her hair turned red), made her selectable and gave her some eye shadow via a mirror. She left the lot early in the morning and when she came back for her daily shift, her hair had turned back to blonde again. I don't know if this helps but the eye shadow was still there when she came to work so at least part of it is working.

I have checked her dna and she is definitely still down as having red hair as her dominant and recessive genes.

[jrd]

That is disappointing... looks like the NPC uniform is somehow incorrectly set then.

I wouldn't be surprised if the fix for "Customer NPCs now change into new outfits that they have purchased." caused this....

[Kyna]

The most important fix in the patch which no modder had fixed yet, is the stopping strays visiting downtown lots. I was growing so tired of having to continually chase them off because of furniture destruction.

There's a "lady who hates critters" painting in TJ's Visitor Controller.  Doesn't that fix the problem?  I've only used it on home lots, and not had any strays visit the lots where I've put it.  I assumed it would also work for community lots, including downtown.

[ZiggyDoodle]

I finally bit the bullet and installed the patch about ten minutes ago.  Opened my game and checked my downtown cemetery.  Was delighted to see that Mikey Bisgrove's headstone sat next to the lot garbage can. 

Mikey had cowplant birthday cake for dessert last week.  But his headstone never showed up at Peaceful Dreams Cemetery and I thought it was lost forever.  He is now in the Bisgrove family plot.

One point in the plus column for Maxis/EA.

[MistyBlue]

Are those of you that are having problems playing with custom hoods or maxified hoods? Not that I think it matters, but I'm have 0 problems and play a completely custom hood.

And what are these "new hair changes with seasons"?

[purplehaze]

I've been running the game, heavily, for a few days post-patch and some fixes seem to have taken in my game. But, I too have the toddler hair syndrome. In the last case, late last night, a baby transitioned to blonde hair and black eyebrows. The genetics 'should' be black/brown.  I don't have SimPE, so I am not able to check the DNA.  My children still 'float' whilst chatting. BAH  Does anyone know if the dead parrot syndrome has been fixed?  Instead of installing the fix, I have just avoided parrots.

I have noticed a lack of strays on my community lots, though. Thank God for that.  I do not use maids on the lots I have been playing the last few days. I guess I will have to fire up the game and go to some lots with maids to see if the hair problem has also struck me. Question: is this only a problem with the female maids, or are male maids also infected ?

[J. M. Pescado]

....yeah, definirely not touching this one.

[miros]

Get TwoJeffs' caged animal fix to avoid dead parrots.

[purplehaze]

I had been mulling over installing it, but with the patch coming out, I just thought I'd wait and see if the 'brain trust' at Maxis would fix it.  I shoulda known better.

[miros]

Since Maxis has successfully broken other stuff, I'm glad I didn't patch.  I'll be recommending the "prepatch" hacks until Seasons comes out, and maybe longer if I can convince myself to wait til the hacks are fixed this time!

[Jelenedra]

Yeah, seriously. As annoying as the pets are at community lots, the whole random hair issue is a mess.

[blubug]

I just patched a few hours ago. The terrain paints problem is fixed, so I'm happy about that. But the game crashed in the first 10 minutes, now my second try and it's been running with no problems. Except for the whole gameplay being really really slow. The lots load much faster, but when they do, they crawl. It definitely wasn't like this before.

And to add one more thing. It seems my original Pets CD's exe file is sort of corrupt. Every time I fire up the game I get an error message asking me if I want to send the error report to microsoft. You know, the kind you get when you close an unresponding program.
I know it's the exe because I started playing with a no-CD exe a few months ago, and I never had any problems. Now as I've installed the patch I use the CD, and the original exe. And the problem is back.

[lingeringviolet]

Has anyone noticed any weirdness with household pets post patch? I have a family with three cats and one dog and everything was fine until after the patch. Now the cats sink into the floor/ground, they won't eat unless I call them specifically to do so and all of their motives are suddenly in the red all the time.

Also, I tried to visit a couple of community lots in build mode that have only EA content and they wouldn't load. I would get the loading screen for about an hour and after that I got annoyed and shut down the game. One of them was a community lot in Pleasantview and another was Fresh Rush grocery in Downtown. I've been to a couple of other community lots in both 'hoods before these and they were fine but now I'm nervous to let my sims go anywhere.

Like many of you, my redheaded maid is also now a blonde but I haven't noticed any problems with toddler toys and haven't had any new babies since the patch.

[V]

The most important fix in the patch which no modder had fixed yet, is the stopping strays visiting downtown lots. I was growing so tired of having to continually chase them off because of furniture destruction.

Lots of modders made signs that check for pets. Can't they be placed on community/downtown lots to prevent strays?

I stopped paying attention to strays on community lots when I realized that the damage they cause is only temporary.

[ZiggyDoodle]

Has anyone noticed any weirdness with household pets post patch? I have a family with three cats and one dog and everything was fine until after the patch. Now the cats sink into the floor/ground, they won't eat unless I call them specifically to do so and all of their motives are suddenly in the red all the time.

I've been in four lots this afternoon, all with pets.  No problems with any of them. I have one family with an infant and will play that later tonight to see if there is any issue with the kid's hair once she spins into a toddler.

Community lots are working okay.   Maid Lucy Hanby is now a blonde, although her thumbnail shows her as a redhead.  No changes in my male maids houseboys.

Have not noticed any decrease in game play speed, which on my system is pretty decent. 

Keeping my fingers crossed...

[lingeringviolet]

I just took Dina Caliente Downtown to the Crypt O' Night Club (which loaded just fine) and I still had strays running amok. I did install the patch with all my cc and hacks still in (except twojeffs' puppy/kitten parentage hack, took that out first) but it installed fine and everything else is ok (afaik) so *shrug* I guess.

[spookymuffin]

Since inatalling the patch Ive been getting a lot of "random" crashes(i.e game closes and I get the "this application has crashed. this application will now terminate")
The first happened when I was just in the neighbourhood screen.
The second when choosing a lipstick in CAS.
The third while a sim was returning from work.
And the last happened when I was moving a family into a new lot.

[Strangel]

Okay. Asked around with some people at the forum, someone with the patch and SimPE experience opened their maid file and the brow color IS showing as the genetics color, people are still reporting problems with toddler tossing. Most noticable is blonde brows with CUSTOM hair. A couple people have grown students to adult in custom/hidden clothes, as well.

[KatEnigma]

Okay, I finally braved a test on my game. Lucy Hanby is now a blonde, and her portrait showed her as a redhead. So I made her a friend and then took her to the vanity for a makeover. First, I turned her into a blonde, to see if her portrait regenerated, which it did. Then I tried to turn her back into a redhead, and her portrait changed, but she didn't. Obviously Maxis screwed up the uniform for the female maids so that they are all blondes- I've done it myself in OFB, when I've "set uniform" and then picked it for a new employee, and it made their hair change style and color.  But since, AFAIK, there was nothing wrong with the maid's uniform in the first place, I don't know how or why they managed to break it.  Anyway, so I changed her back to a blonde so now at least her portrait matches her face, and it didn't change back or anything the next day or when I (saved and) exited and came back.

I also sucessfully aged a baby to toddler and he had hair, but since I bin all my custom hair because I also hate how the children get stuck with that hair in every generation, I doubt I'll run into the problem anyway.

The only problem I had at all is that I'd removed my downloads folder before playing (but not installing, stupid me), and apparently removing the phone hack breaks the phones? No doubt this is my fault for installing the patch over it.  I discovered this in the middle of a Christmas tree fire (I hadn't played in a couple months, can you tell?  ) when my Sim couldn't call for the firemen and had to risk her life extinguishing it herself. I got an error on that, but afterwards, when I tried to have her call the nanny to test the problem, it didn't even kick back an error at me, she just jumped out of the action.  Replacing the hack fixed the problem, but I see I'm going to have to do a clean install before Seasons.   

[Larxene]

I removed my entire downloads folder before patch install and backed up my neighborhoods. The maids have turned blonde, as in most other games, but the one child I had transition had the correct hair color upon toddlerizing. No strays downtown for me plus my game is loading faster, both of those are bonuses. My game isn't jumping back to the desktop during title screen loading and pausing either.

[ZiggyDoodle]

Cassie Avio transitioned with black brows and brown hair.  Changed her hair color but the more serious problem is her face.



That's one sad looking kid (her older sister is gorgeous).  Guess I should be glad she didn't morph into a toddler with long ears and a snout.

I took my hacks out of my downloads folder before patching, then stuck it back in.  Phones still working properly.

Minus ten points to Maxis/EA