Crash to desktop on load screen - possible fireball?

[lowbart]

When I started up the Sims 2 last night it got as far as about 2/3 or maybe 3/4 through the progress bar on the big fancy loading screen and then, blink of an eye, dropped to the desktop. No freezing, no error message. I thought it was crashing on loading the Neighborhood Manager, but after trying it nineteen different times to test different variables, I realized it had not finished loading yet.

I have whatever the cheapest Athlon 64-bit processor is, I don't remember the model name of it.

Video card, ATI something or other, I don't think that's the problem anyway since Sims has been working for over... a pretty long time now and I haven't been messing with any hardware (I run the game at almost top graphics quality)

The information below is probably more relevant. This is a list of all the stupid-ass things I have done since the last time Sims worked.

ITEM 1: It was maybe 4 in the morning and I was messing around with test objects in a new clean neighborhood I had started. NPC/townie generator, etc. Probably the biggest mistake was trying to add the Therapist and the Grim Reaper to the family (Using the tombstone of life and death). All this was in one lot, I didn't save in the middle or anything, but it was maybe 4 in the morning and so when I exited I am pretty sure that I clicked "Yes" when it asked me to save, even though I had been intending not to.

Will doing that run the risk of making your game visible from space even if you don't save? Generally I have a superstitious belief (coupled to my dangerous curiosity) that if you don't save, anything you screw up will go back to normal. I learned the hard way that this is not always true that one time that I captured Missingno in Pokemon Blue Version and it went south even though I didn't save.

ITEM 2: I had finished loading up Photoshop and Body Shop, preparing for another session of making crappy stuff that I will not share on the internet for the benefit of humanity, when urgent matters called me elsewhere for a few hours. Not wanting to leave my computer running, I put it on standby, forgetting that the reason I hardly ever do that is that it tends to not want to turn back on again afterwards.

And so, when I came back and jiggled the mouse, hit some keys, pressed the power button, etc, the box stayed in standby. I don't know if something might have been caused by Body Shop not closing properly, or maybe I got bad sectors from shutting it off. I don't know. It's running checkdisk right now.

ITEM 3: I installed some new stuff, mainly FFS hacks, but a few other things (read: furniture and clothing) I got from links from this site and maybe some other places. It seems possible that one of them may be the problem but I doubt they would actually break the game like this, and the other scenarios seem more likely.


So: Bad sectors? FUBAR'ed neighborhood from doing stupidass stuff with untouchable NPCs? Broken downloads? Maybe it's something else I haven't thought of but I've told you about everything I changed and stuff.

What are happening?

EDIT: I should probably mention that I'm running Uni + Nightlife.

[ZiggyDoodle]

ITEM 3: I installed some new stuff, mainly FFS hacks, but a few other things (read: furniture and clothing) I got from links from this site and maybe some other places. It seems possible that one of them may be the problem but I doubt they would actually break the game like this, and the other scenarios seem more likely.

Start sleuthing with the simple approach: move your DL folder out of your game folder, stick it on your desktop, then try to load the game.  If it loads, you get to play pin the tail on the bad donkey in your DL folder.

[lowbart]

It'd be easier to just hunt down the last batch of stuff I installed and delete it.

I hope that's it, though, because I have a lot of houses and crap that I spent a lot of time on and aren't packaged.

Thanks

EDIT: Okay, found the problem. Let it be known to all that the duck that eats your poop breaks your game.

[Kyna]

Your link takes me to the search screen.

Are you talking about that fugly potty that was in the More Awful Than You furniture contest?

[Hegelian]

It'd be easier to just hunt down the last batch of stuff I installed and delete it.

Yes, this symptom is typically the result of some incompatible object—for example, an object made with Seasons installed when you don't have Seasons yourself.

As you've discovered.   

[lowbart]

Kyna, yes, that's the one. It caught my attention and I wanted to have its horrific awfulness on my computer.

I couldn't get it to link to the post properly so I just tried to link to the search result.

[Aggie]

Kyna, yes, that's the one. It caught my attention and I wanted to have its horrific awfulness on my computer.

I couldn't get it to link to the post properly so I just tried to link to the search result.

Is this the post you're referring to?

[Venusy]

I couldn't get it to link to the post properly so I just tried to link to the search result.

For future reference, to link to a post, right-click on the subject line of a post, and select copy link location (or the equivalent in your browser).

[Aggie]

For future reference, to link to a post, right-click on the subject line of a post, and select copy link location (or the equivalent in your browser).

Or click on the icon next to the subject line in the post and then copy the link in the address bar. Whichever.