I went into my game and was looking for a certain house I had created when I noticed that it and another house were missing from the game. I went into the college where the kids of one of the families are and looked to see if the family members in one of the houses were still listed, which they were. So I exited the game and restarted it. The houses were back but the apartments I created were gone. I think what happened was that I accidentally put the apartments on the same area of the map that one of the houses already existed but was not showing up that particular session for some reason. So I'm wondering how I can fix this since the lots in the game are not identified by the families or name of the lot when you go into the folders for the game. Any help would be appreciated.

Update: I was able to load the town that showed the apartments and not the two houses and move the family out of them and put the apartments into the lots. Then I reloaded the game and the two houses were showing up and I was able to put the apartments in a different location and move the family back in. Hopefully now the game won't continue to glitch.

It sounds like your neighborhood is corrupted; lots going missing is usually a sign of that. I don't think there's much can do about it.

Well, I fixed it for now. Don't know what I can do if it loads without lots again.

As Lord St.Croix said, it's probably corrupted, so you might want to start over.

Make sure you read all the information available on Neighborhood and Game corruption, which can be found here:

http://simswiki.info/wiki.php%3Ftit...Hood_Corruption

http://sims.wikia.com/wiki/Game_gui...ding_corruption

Also, make sure you avoid touching/playing with certain Sims that aren't meant to be played with. Read this to help figure out who they are: http://sims.wikia.com/wiki/Game_gui...safe_to_play_as

Hope this helps!

I had some problems with the game while playing on my laptop's guest account and certain downloaded objects have conflicts with items that came with the game. I may have to delete the game entirely and reinstall it using the game CDs if what some of what I am reading is the case. I had just been trying to avoid using problem items up until now.

After reading some of what you linked to, apparently I wasn't supposed to delete out one of the families that came with the base game the way that I did. The neighborhood must have been corrupted when I did that. So I may not have to do a complete reinstall. Too bad they could not have provided this information in the game instructions.

Don't reinstall!

Uninstalling is only necessary if your game installation files are corrupt - the ones in your Programs folder. The most CC and accidents in using a neighborhood will do is corrupt individual neighborhoods, which .don't affect your game files, or other neighborhoods around them, at all. If you lock your objects packages in the game installation files, you probably will never have to do a game reinstall.

Neighborhood corruption can make a neighborhood unplayable in five minutes, or in five years, depending on random chance and your degree of flexibility. All the base game neighborhoods shipped with corruption, but many people play them for a good long time with no major problems.

Am I safe to delete the entire town file or will that corrupt the game more?

Deleting the entire neighborhood file (whether in-game or directly from your Documents folder) is fine, it won't harm your game. It's deleting a family from the family bin is what's corrupting a neighborhood. And since you did that, that kinda was the beginning of the end.

Like Peni said, the premade neighborhoods are already corrupted from the start, which is why you should consider downloading cleaned up/fixed up versions of them. Here's a link to meetme2theriver's, aka tarlia's, cleaned up versions: http://meetme2theriver.livejournal.com/63030.html

Let's be quite clear about this - your game is not corrupted (or at least, nothing you've said indicates that it is).

Your neighborhood is corrupted.

Each neighborhood folder is a complete individual unit, including all the subhoods, character files, etc. Removing anything from this folder corrupts the neighborhood; but this corruption is not infectious - it does not affect the game installation files and it does not affect surrounding neighborhoods. Removing the folder in its entirety is like taking one can off a shelf - the remaining cans are still there and their contents are fine.

For some reason Windows 7 created backups of some of the neighborhoods, which is why I had two versions of the neighborhood, I think. But yeah, deleting the army family from Strangetown was a mistake. Thanks for all your help.

Have you read over avoiding corruption? http://sims.wikia.com/wiki/Game_gui...ding_corruption
make sure you are fully patched (unless you are using the UC which comes patched)
Make sure you have all essential mods. http://modthesims.info/t/532696 However much of the Directors Cut is NOT essential.

I deleted out the neighborhood and a few others which had duplicate neighborhoods for some reason. I am starting fresh by creating my own neighborhood without any lots already started. From now on I won't be deleting any characters or houses.

If you decide in the future to play Strangetown or any of the other neighborhoods that come with the game, you can either create another new neighborhood and "clone" the playables you do want (as in make Sims that look similar and copy their stats from Sims Wikia or wherever), or the cleaned-up version from meetme2theriver (already suggested/linked to my MMAA). The cleaned-up version will have all the Playables from the original neighborhood files.

Just to make sure I've got this right: if you make a new neighbourhood from scratch, there's no corruption (initially)?

Correct, assuming your game installation files are good and you're properly patched before you load the neighborhood. None of the bin families ship corrupted - not even the Ottomai or Critturs, regardless of what nervous Nellies tell you on that score.