Hi there! You are currently browsing as a guest. Why not create an account? Then you get less ads, can thank creators, post feedback, keep a list of your favourites, and more!
Test Subject
Original Poster
#1 Old 7th May 2021 at 8:10 PM

This user has the following games installed:

Sims 2, University, Nightlife, Open for Business, Pets, Seasons, Bon Voyage, Free Time, Apartment Life
Default Female Sims suddenly have male voices
Recently I had to replace my neighborhood with a backup. After that I replaced the character files in the backup with the recent ones, since they were not corrupted. Since then my newer female Sims have male voices and body movements. Like they now have a male gender but still have their female body. Reinstalling them from my backup has not worked.I've never seen this issue I'm clueless on what to do
Advertisement
Field Researcher
#2 Old 7th May 2021 at 8:53 PM
So simply replacing the character files with newer versions will not work, as the game won't recognize them properly. Unfortunately, I think you've further borked the neighborhood by doing so. The proper way to have gone about this would be to extract the sims' appearances with SimPE and recreate them in CAS.
Mad Poster
#3 Old 7th May 2021 at 10:31 PM Last edited by simmer22 : 7th May 2021 at 10:45 PM.
Restoring from a backup is more of an "all or nothing" deal - you can't replace just the character files, because sim data is stored several places.

You have to replace either the individual neighborhood folder (N00X) for whatever neighborhood you want to restore (it's possible you have to update the NeighborhoodManager file too), or the entire Neighborhoods folder (if there are several neighborhoods you want to restore).

If you still have the backup you can use that one to properly restore the neighborhood, but replace it fully this time. remove the individual neighborhood folder you want to replace with the backup, and copy/paste in the backup (N00X folder). If you have issues with all of them, remove the entire Neighborhoods folder first, and copy/paste in the folder from your backup.

Never let one folder overwrite the other, because you'll usually end up with a mess of files that haven't replaced properly. Also don't manually copy/paste in the individual files unless you know what you're doing - the neighborhoods folder is usually not one of the places you want to mess about too much.
Test Subject
Original Poster
#4 Old 7th May 2021 at 10:37 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Modder
So simply replacing the character files with newer versions will not work, as the game won't recognize them properly. Unfortunately, I think you've further borked the neighborhood by doing so. The proper way to have gone about this would be to extract the sims' appearances with SimPE and recreate them in CAS.


I tried changing their gender with SimPE already but SimPE doesn't work on my computer. It always crashes immediately which didn't happen on my old computer, it's probably windows 10
Mad Poster
#5 Old 7th May 2021 at 10:52 PM
Maybe it's the version of SimPE or the setup - I have Windows 10 and SimPE works surprisingly fine (used to crash a lot more on Windows 7, but had a different version there). Try the 0.75.69 version, maybe? (I have the version before that, but I think the newest one may have some neat updates).

But restoring from the original backup like described in my post above is going to be less work (and much less bork-inducing, because I'm guessing that neighborhood is already quite borked as-is)
Test Subject
Original Poster
#6 Old 8th May 2021 at 9:31 AM
Quote: Originally posted by simmer22
Maybe it's the version of SimPE or the setup - I have Windows 10 and SimPE works surprisingly fine (used to crash a lot more on Windows 7, but had a different version there). Try the 0.75.69 version, maybe? (I have the version before that, but I think the newest one may have some neat updates).

But restoring from the original backup like described in my post above is going to be less work (and much less bork-inducing, because I'm guessing that neighborhood is already quite borked as-is)


Thanks for the Link, now SimPE doesn't crash anymore but whenever I click on "select sim" it tells me "this is not an appropiate context on which to use this tool" ??
Top Secret Researcher
#7 Old 8th May 2021 at 10:12 AM
There is nothing to do for that version of your hood, where you replaced the content of the "Characters" folder with files from another "Characters" folder, unless your goal is to have a completely corrupt neighbourhood.

Nothing you can change in SimPE, like changing genders to match the wrong voices, will clean the hood of the corruption you created.
Test Subject
Original Poster
#8 Old 8th May 2021 at 11:24 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Lili975
There is nothing to do for that version of your hood, where you replaced the content of the "Characters" folder with files from another "Characters" folder, unless your goal is to have a completely corrupt neighbourhood.

Nothing you can change in SimPE, like changing genders to match the wrong voices, will clean the hood of the corruption you created.


the thing is that I've been playing in that hood for months and nothing bad besides the voices has happened. I've already tried replacing the character files with the old ones but the voices were still male so that didn't fix it
e3 d3 Ne2 Nd2 Nb3 Ng3
retired moderator
#9 Old 8th May 2021 at 11:42 AM
Quote: Originally posted by shotshotshotshot
I've already tried replacing the character files with the old ones but the voices were still male so that didn't fix it
What we are saying is that it's no good replacing the character files, what you need to do is to delete the corrupt copy and restore your good backup, the entire thing. The files that are in the Documents/ EAGames/ The Sims 2/ Neighborhoods/ N00x folder go together; they cannot be interchanged or substituted. You need to replace the entire N00x folder with your backup, not just some of the files within it.
Top Secret Researcher
#10 Old 8th May 2021 at 11:56 AM
Quote: Originally posted by shotshotshotshot
nothing bad besides the voices has happened.

The voices is bad enough. It tells you that your sims data is all messed up, unsurprisingly since it comes from a different neighbourhood.

It would be wise to stop going Frankenstein on your hoods, picking files from one neighbourhood to transfer them to a different copy is not how backups work. Hopefully you did not modify your original backup copy that way.

Now for this corrupted version, you can still play it. Was it not possible to change the voice rather than changing the gender of the affected sims? It would have sounded easier to me.
In SimPE, when you are viewing your sim's informations in Sim Description (SDSC), in the bottom part of the screen, instead of "Overview", click on "Other", and you'll find the "Voice Type" there. Make note of it, and then replace it with the code from another sim that you know has the right voice that you want.
Does it fix the voice issue ?

Also, did you use the Hood Checker to clean the neighbourhood yet ? It can do wonders to help continue enjoying a corrupted neighbourhood.
Test Subject
Original Poster
#11 Old 8th May 2021 at 12:47 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Lili975
The voices is bad enough. It tells you that your sims data is all messed up, unsurprisingly since it comes from a different neighbourhood.

It would be wise to stop going Frankenstein on your hoods, picking files from one neighbourhood to transfer them to a different copy is not how backups work. Hopefully you did not modify your original backup copy that way.

Now for this corrupted version, you can still play it. Was it not possible to change the voice rather than changing the gender of the affected sims? It would have sounded easier to me.
In SimPE, when you are viewing your sim's informations in Sim Description (SDSC), in the bottom part of the screen, instead of "Overview", click on "Other", and you'll find the "Voice Type" there. Make note of it, and then replace it with the code from another sim that you know has the right voice that you want.
Does it fix the voice issue ?

Also, did you use the Hood Checker to clean the neighbourhood yet ? It can do wonders to help continue enjoying a corrupted neighbourhood.


No the backup is fine. I replaced the character files because plenty of sims did not exist on the old backup and I didn't want to lose them and their relationships. Unfortunately it's not just the voice but their entire gender. Male sims can not make babies with them and their body movements are dismatched.
Top Secret Researcher
#12 Old 8th May 2021 at 4:48 PM
I understand. As expected, it's not just a voice issue.

As The Raven said above, a sim's character file does not contain all the sim's data, far from it. Those sims that were manually moved from a folder to another are corrupted and incomplete, plus they corrupted the neighbourhood they were incorrectly moved too. At some point they will start disappearing anyway, from their households. You load a family and the son has just gone missing without a trace. Their lots will be impossible to load, or the game will simply crash when you try, and so on.

You cannot "uncorrupt" that neighbourhood, unfortunately.

You can fix what can be fixed, using SimPE, and the Hood Checker, going through complicated operations to delete the buggy sims for good, but you would first need to remove all their ties to any playable sims then make them townies then follow a tutorial on deleting them. That would be a lot of work and you would still lose those sims because they are already lost, the way they are now. Well, you could extract them first, note their stats, recreate them in Bodyshop then in CAS, then add them to the family and artificially give them family ties with the rest of the household.

You could also replay from the backup, as a challenge, with the goal of recreating the families as they are now (marrying the same spouses, having the same number of children with the same gender..).
Test Subject
Original Poster
#13 Old 8th May 2021 at 6:09 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Lili975
I understand. As expected, it's not just a voice issue.

As The Raven said above, a sim's character file does not contain all the sim's data, far from it. Those sims that were manually moved from a folder to another are corrupted and incomplete, plus they corrupted the neighbourhood they were incorrectly moved too. At some point they will start disappearing anyway, from their households. You load a family and the son has just gone missing without a trace. Their lots will be impossible to load, or the game will simply crash when you try, and so on.

You cannot "uncorrupt" that neighbourhood, unfortunately.

You can fix what can be fixed, using SimPE, and the Hood Checker, going through complicated operations to delete the buggy sims for good, but you would first need to remove all their ties to any playable sims then make them townies then follow a tutorial on deleting them. That would be a lot of work and you would still lose those sims because they are already lost, the way they are now. Well, you could extract them first, note their stats, recreate them in Bodyshop then in CAS, then add them to the family and artificially give them family ties with the rest of the household.

You could also replay from the backup, as a challenge, with the goal of recreating the families as they are now (marrying the same spouses, having the same number of children with the same gender..).



Yea you‘re probably right:/ but would it help to remove the family ties and then just kill them off?
Top Secret Researcher
#14 Old 8th May 2021 at 8:04 PM
I'm afraid it wouldn't, because dead sims are not really that dead, that is why we can resurrect them. They're just moved to an invisible family named "Default", and can appear as ghosts on lots where their tombstone is present. But they keep all their ties to the neighbourhood, they are still in the memories of other sims, in their conversations and in other references.

I mentioned the possibility of severing their ties to their family members because it's a mandatory preparation to a sim's deletion, not because it would in any way help in itself.

I mean you can already kill them off and send their graves to a community lot that you will never visit, but that wouldn't fix anything because they would still be corrupted and in the hood, corrupting other sims who think about them and talk about them. They might even still cause problems by being the (dead) "friend from work" for instance (I know a player who had that issue in a corrupted neighbourhood of hers).

Plus killing them off would kind of contradict the point of keeping that neighbourhood because you don't want to lose them.

I feel your pain, but again, there just isn't a way to "uncorrupt" that hood.
Maybe store it somewhere while you decide what to do, and in the meantime, restore a backup copy and start replaying from there, you might find that you actually enjoy retracing your steps ? I don't know, it's just an option. I've had to do it in the past and many of us too, I'm sure.

Giving up the current state of your neighbourhood is hard, but to keep playing it would also be very hard, with more and more bugs, it would require a lot of fiddling with external tools like SimPE, and at some point you won't even be able to load it anymore.
I'm sorry that we cannot give you the answer that you would like to hear
Back to top