sims will not age

[aubreylaraine]

only my adult sims are aging. elder, teen, and child sims are stuck. i am not getting any errors either. and everyday, every adult sim on the lot gets the birthday message regardless of how many days they have until the next transition. i am not using any aging hacks or cheats, i feel they defeat the purpose of the game.

[jrd]

Unless you have aging set to off, you do have some mod which impacts aging, or a mod conflict that causes this somehow.

Run the HCDU, and if this doesn't show anything, do a binary search.

[ZephyrZodiac]

If the HCDU doesn't find your problem (Hack Conflict Detection Utility from Paladin's Placewww.simwardrobe.com) I would suggest removing all your mods and seeing whether the problem is solved by doing that.

[aubreylaraine]

took out my downloads folder. tried multiple lots, different age catagories. checked my userstartup. turned off aging, then turned it back on again. nobody ages. not even adults now.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Wierd.  Have you tried deleting groups.cache in your game folder?  If you've tried that and it hasn't helped, I'd suggest you move everything out and uninstall, reinstall your latest EP.  And when you've done that, be sure to make your objects.package file read only.

[aubreylaraine]

i obviously borked something big time so i am just going to un/reinstall. hopefully i won't have this trouble again. thanks for trying to help. i appreciate it.

[ZephyrZodiac]

You're welcome.  I know what it's like, been there, got the t-shirt etc!  Was there ever such a frustrating game?  I know Sims 1 had issues, but it was never like this....

But I'd definitely check all my downloads for a duplicate that might have snuck in, also check in SimPE - there's an option for checking your neighborhood.package, I think, also checks for duplicate guids and other things that could be a problem.  And if you haven't ever done so, check in the neighbourhood view in SimPE for such nasties as dangling SWAFs and the like. 

[Invisigoth]

Just so you know, if you have one or two borked files you don't need to do a complete reinstall.  You can grab clean objects.package files from the compressed archive in the CD. I've never had a problem with the neighborhoodmanager.package, but I bet there's a clean copy of that on the CD too.

[aubreylaraine]

i ended up grabbing my backup sims2 folder and trying again. one freakin' folder at a time. i figured out two things.
1. sims only age once a day. you can't set the clock back to 5 and get good results, you have to advance it to the next day.
2. inteen and i mix like oil and water. i guess my ya won't have "accidents" and have to drop out, never to fulfill their lifelong dreams. i just don't see how it impacted aging, or lack thereof i should say. oh well.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Try Two Jeffs Autonomous Casual Romance instead - it's never caused any problems that I've ever heard of.

[aubreylaraine]

that i grabbed up in the first stages of testing. it's one of the few things i couldn't play without. it's just that all my sims are exactly the same because i can't bring myself to intentionally holding them back from college or the top of the career ladder or the perfect mate. i was just using it for the spice of not knowing who was going to knock who up. then i was going to stick them together, for better or worse. my young adult are sluts, i wanted some of them to pay for it. 

[ZephyrZodiac]

Mine are sluts too!  And the knowledge sims are worse than Romance......much worse!  And some adult family sims are unbelievable!  I have one male (based on Slashmaster's Sylvia from MTS2) called Claire Walker.  He lives with a Romance sim called Hari, and they had a baby.  As soon as the baby was born, Claire makes a booty call to a female family sim (who is engaged to another family sim) and you can guess what happens.  So Hari gets angry (I don't like that the ACR makes all Romance Sims not jealous) and they fight, so then, after Claire beats Hari up (and he's the one with the body skill points) he's on the phone again, this time to a female romance sim.  Guess I shouldn't have made Claire bi-sexual.....So, anyway, Hari then tries it on with this other friend, who he has a 100/100 relationship with, and can't get any further than relaxing on the bed and chatting!

[aubreylaraine]

in uni i have it set to brothel and turn off the asperation restrictions. installed a photo booth, hot tub, and a few double beds. (i do that in my retirement homes too.) and all the sims are bi to boot. there is more woohoo on these lots than there is eating and sleeping combined. i always thought it was very odd that dormies came to the marriage bed virgins, or only having woohooed with playables long since dead from old age.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I've never used the brothel setting - doesn't seem to make much difference!

I have no dormies at all in this neighbourhood, and the only townies are CAS sims, and gradually they move into the game.  It just sort of fits the storyline - it's my "Urban Jungle" game, and the townies are obviously homeless and living in cardboard boxes, so even Cyclonesue's Container Park is a step up!  But although all my lots have the ACR thingy on them, none of my married Romance sims has ever tried making a booty call - they may prowl a bit around the neighbourhood, but they are basically more faithful than family sims.  A certain family sim who, as I said, is engaged, is likely to find herself suddenly unengaged if she's not careful!  And as for Claire and Hari, they are still furious with each other.....

[aubreylaraine]

anger and cheating. all the best marriages are built on that foundation.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, in that case - but so far Claire has shown no signs of wanting joined union with Hari!  And Hari is just completely obsessed with the baby!

[Strangel]

Just so you know, if you have one or two borked files you don't need to do a complete reinstall.  You can grab clean objects.package files from the compressed archive in the CD. I've never had a problem with the neighborhoodmanager.package, but I bet there's a clean copy of that on the CD too.

I tend to just delete the NeighborhoodManager.package on occasion. Clean slate and all that. Usually, same time as I wipe out the groups.cache and any BodyShop burps.

[aubreylaraine]

and that regenerates upon startup too?

[ZephyrZodiac]

I imagine it's like so much of the stuff in the game folders - like the thumbnails.packages too.

[Invisigoth]

Just so you know, if you have one or two borked files you don't need to do a complete reinstall.  You can grab clean objects.package files from the compressed archive in the CD. I've never had a problem with the neighborhoodmanager.package, but I bet there's a clean copy of that on the CD too.

I tend to just delete the NeighborhoodManager.package on occasion. Clean slate and all that. Usually, same time as I wipe out the groups.cache and any BodyShop burps.

Good to know, Strangel. What are the benefits of deleting it regularly? Does it tend to get corrupted like objects.package etc. does?

[ZephyrZodiac]

Objects.package shouldn't get corrupted if you make it read only as soon as you've installed or patched.  However, the groups.cache, neighbourhood manager, thumbnails.packages etc., are meant to change as your game grows, so there is always a chance of corruption.  The thumbnails packages will not always lose the thumbnails of objects that you have removed from your game, and can be much larger than necessary, too.

[Strangel]

Basically, what ZZ said.

Neighborhoodmanager, thumbnails, groups.cache, etc should be wiped periodically. From what I've gathered they CAN become corrupted quite easily since they are not intended for "read only" and are essentially overwritten every time you delete a hair/makeup/clothing/etc file or make any alterations to the houses, lots or neighborhoods. The game regenerates them the next time you boot up the Sims and yeah it lags for a bit while it's making them but I find my houses often run faster after the old files have been burninated.

Having said this, I'm entirely unAwesome, so your best bet is to back up my statements with a quick search for "neighborhood manager", etc. First time I deleted them, I was afraid of impending kerplosions, so I moved them all out to desktop and booted up the game.

[witch]

All thumbnail packages? I found about 10-12 different packages.

[ZephyrZodiac]

All thumbnail packages? I found about 10-12 different packages.

The ones that are in your game folders in the Thumbnails folder - there should be five.

First time I deleted them, I was afraid of impending kerplosions, so I moved them all out to desktop and booted up the game.

I did that too, just in case.  The groups.cache and neighbourhood manager should regenerate when you open your game, but the thumbnails only regenerate the Maxis stuff straight away, other stuff is re-entered in the file as you use your build/buy menus and CAS etc., so you get some lag as each page in the menu opens.  But if you move stuff in and out of your downloads frequently it's definitely worth doing, each file can easily be twice the size it needs to be.

[witch]

D'oh me! I forgot I searched on both my sims 2 folders, the vanilla and the modded. So there would be 10 then. So it's safe to remove all of those? I've been running this install for a while, so it's probably about time I did that then.