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Mad Poster
Original Poster
#1 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 8:21 PM
Default My neighbourhood really *is* toast. Saving lots?
I just thought I'd poke around in SimPE and change some of my townies' names when I noticed some familiar names... Picaso, Gavigan, and a few more besides

This neighbourhood originates from 2009 - of course I deleted the bin sims back then. And had completely forgotten I'd ever done this. Well, this explains all the random problems I couldn't figure out.

I had been toying with the idea of a fresh start anyway. I'm not overly attached to the sims themselves. I liked the process of creating them, and I can go through all of that again. But there are lots in this world that I really like and would use again, I may even recreate the whole hood again since I really like the idea behind it.

So just a couple of questions:

Is the game environment toast too, should I let the game regenerate a new TS2UC folder, or would it be safe to delete this hood and start a new one?

Can I save the lots that I've built, and how? I am pretty sure I don't have the super duper hug bug and even if I do, I don't really care - I have no sim loaded which would nuke it anyway and if I build to share, I would fire up a clean environment. A lot of them are apartments, so if I understand correctly, they wouldn't save the sim references anyway, would they? But standalone houses might do.

I use the sims as a psychology simulator...
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Forum Resident
#2 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 9:43 PM
I don't think the entire game would have to be re-installed, from what I remember you only have to do that if you mess with universial NPCs or if the vampires bite Mrs. Crumplebottom, and even then I think it would throw up errors so often you'd notice something was up, so I think just deleting the hood would be fine.

As for the lots, there's a modded item somewhere that you can click in the catalogue and it would tell you if the lot was safe to delete. I'm not sure what it was, or where it was, but I think if you use that and it finds no problems, you could just package the lot in-game and install it with the clean installer, and make sure not to have it install anything suspicious.
Instructor
#3 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 10:28 PM
Before doing anything, why don't you try with the Hood Checker? It might be able to remove the references to those (I assume) deleted Sims. I realised my hood was gone when the family tree of my Sim would jump to a complete, unrelated Sim when clicking on one of their ancestors...
Also, unless you have noticed something particularly bad (as listed here ), I wouldn't worry too much about the hood and I'd keep playing.
Quote: Originally posted by sugoisama
As for the lots, there's a modded item somewhere that you can click in the catalogue and it would tell you if the lot was safe to delete. I'm not sure what it was, or where it was, but I think if you use that and it finds no problems, you could just package the lot in-game and install it with the clean installer, and make sure not to have it install anything suspicious.

I'd do this if I were you, you can always clean the lot from any CC and just leave the lot itself inside the package and then hit "save as..." and replace the lot with the clean version you've just made.

There's also this interesting guide by joandsarah77, although I've personally never used the method described (never needed to).
Alchemist
#4 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 10:28 PM
Quote:
Is the game environment toast too, should I let the game regenerate a new TS2UC folder, or would it be safe to delete this hood and start a new one?

Agree with sugoisama; you only need to reinstall if you have corruption/errors in your Program Files. You can just start a new hood, or, if you prefer, yes, deleting your TS2 folder and regenerating a new one should also do the trick. If you don't want bin sims, remember to replace your stealth hoods with empty templates.

Quote:
Can I save the lots that I've built, and how?

Click on the lot in hood view, there should be a 'package lot' star button on the side of the bubble. Instead of uploading to sims2.com, which you can't do anymore, save to file. The file is then created and saved in your PackagedLots folder.

If you like your hood layout (placed decorations, terrains, etc.), you can also use Hood Replace to copy that over to your new hood.

Quote:
I am pretty sure I don't have the super duper hug bug and even if I do, I don't really care - I have no sim loaded which would nuke it anyway and if I build to share, I would fire up a clean environment. A lot of them are apartments, so if I understand correctly, they wouldn't save the sim references anyway, would they? But standalone houses might do.

I don't think the type of lot matters; it could still carry SDHB. And if you're not sharing, no, you don't really need to worry about it, but that's no reason not to make the file as clean as possible--especially since Chris Hatch made some mods that makes SDHB even easier to find and remove. Chris Hatch's Super Duper Hug Test runs in the background of your game and looks for the super duper hug bug when you load a lot, and, if it finds it, removes it. You can also manually clean the lot up before you package it with Chris Hatch's Lot Cleaner. Just select it in buy mode to use it. (This is the mod sugoisama is talking about.) Alternately, if you already have a version of No Sim Loaded installed, you shouldn't experience the SDHB, either, as it suppresses it. (If you don't have any of these mods already, go with Super Duper Hug Test, as that actually removes it and is the least intrusive. If you ever want to share a lot, the Lot Cleaner is an easy way to clean up the file before uploading; it not only looks for the SDHB, but also other controllers and off-world stuff, etc.)

Finally, do use the TS2 Clean Installer (link here in case it doesn't auto generate) to clean up the package and reinstall your lots. Sometimes hacks get attached to the lot, as well as files you don't really need (phonehack, some TS2 store items, and recolors, for example). It's a good idea to remove those things from the file, since you don't need it and/or it could cause problems. I think I read somewhere that you should always "Save As" a new file, instead of renaming, after you edit.

"May the sunlight find you, thy days be long, thy winters kind, thy roots be strong." -Grand Oak Tree, DAO

XPTL Mod Archive | Change a Mod's Mesh into a CC Object | Increasing the Game Difficulty | Editing ACR 4 Your Age Mod
Bored? Read an unfinished legacy or sim story. | aka Kelyns | she/her
Mad Poster
#5 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 10:47 PM Last edited by AndrewGloria : 8th Apr 2021 at 10:59 PM.
Are you sure your neighbourhood really is toast? Chris Hatch, who is arguably one of the most knowledgeable modders active today, has expressed doubt as to whether deleting Sims from the family bin really causes corruption. He suggests that the so-called shredded files that remain when a Sim is deleted (I prefer to call them stub files) contain enough data (basically a unique ID for each deleted Sim) to ensure that all references to these Sims still have something to refer to. If you haven't done any other VBTs then I suspect your game may still be playable. What sort of problems are you having? The kind of things that may indicate terminal corruption are vanishing Sims, impossible relationships (your Sim's father is a stray dog!) or possibly such frequent crashing that it's impossible to make progress.

If you do decide to scrap the 'hood then you should still be able to save the lots. First move the Sims out and then move the (now unoccupied) lot to the Lot Bin. Then import it into a dedicated building 'hood (ideally one entirely free of Sims) and clean the lot there. Chris Hatch has made a lot cleaner, but I generally (being a believer in a belt and braces) manually delete all the Sim and Family relferences from the lot too. Finally delete the original version of the lot from the Lot Bin and replace it with the cleaned version from your building 'hood. You now have a cleaned version of the lot in your Lot Bin, which is safe to place in any 'hood.

I have an interest in the matter of deleted Sims possibly causing corruption, as I have a couple in my game that I deleted a few months after I started playing in 2012. I had just made them in CAS, but had forgotten to make them sisters before importing them into the game. Even then I knew I really should restore from backup, but that would have lost a couple of days gameplay. So I deleted them and remade them in CAS. (Not hard as I'd already made them in Body Shop.) Eight years later their stub files are still there in my Characters folder. Veronaville does have some glitches, but nothing so far to make it unplayable. One difference to you is that I really care a lot about the Sims in the 'hood. Ideally I'd want to keep all of them (townies as well as playables) but there are some that I'm so close to that I feel I'm emotionally dependent on them. If anything terrible happened to Andrew, Gloria or Julian, I think I'd experience it as a bereavement. So I'll keep going with my existing Veronaville as long as I possibly can.

All Sims are beautiful -- even the ugly ones.
My Simblr ~~ My LJ
Sims' lives matter!
The Veronaville kids are alright.
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retired moderator
#6 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 10:55 PM
Quote: Originally posted by AndrewGloria
Are you sure your neighbourhood really is toast? Chris Hatch, who is arguably one of the most knowledgeable modders active today, has expressed doubt as to whether deleting Sims from the family bin really causes corruption. He suggests that the so-called shredded files that remain when a Sim is deleted (I prefer to call them stub files) contain enough data (basically a unique ID for each Sim) to ensure that all references to these Sims still have something to refer to.
I agree with @AndrewGloria - this is how the game was designed to work. Might not be too bad.

But if you decide to start over, in addition to cleaning the lots, you could clone the neighbourhood using this method:
https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=468987
Mad Poster
#7 Old 8th Apr 2021 at 11:01 PM
If you have any potential neighborhood-wide issues, doing a "soft" reinstall by regenerating the TS2UC folder (in Documents) would probably be safest, although keep the old one as a backup if you want to pull sims, houses or other things from your old game.

Bin sims... Those could potentially have some neighborhood-wide issues, without saying it for sure. You may want to start fresh with clean stealth hood templates if you don't want the bin sims in your game, just to be on the safe side.

You can clean houses with a few methods, alongside Chris Hatch's lot cleaner (which you may want to use anyway to be on the safe side)
https://thesims2.livejournal.com/6049797.html
https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=609188

Bo's NoSimLoaded doesn't remove the Hug Bug, it only suppresses it if you already have it.
Big discussion and a couple links/fixes here (Chris Hatch has another tool that removes the bug from lots ingame)
https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=646976
Mad Poster
#8 Old 9th Apr 2021 at 1:27 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Phantomknight
Chris Hatch's Super Duper Hug Test runs in the background of your game and looks for the super duper hug bug when you load a lot, and, if it finds it, removes it. You can also manually clean the lot up before you package it with Chris Hatch's Lot Cleaner. Just select it in buy mode to use it. (This is the mod sugoisama is talking about.) Alternately, if you already have a version of No Sim Loaded installed, you shouldn't experience the SDHB, either, as it suppresses it. (If you don't have any of these mods already, go with Super Duper Hug Test, as that actually removes it and is the least intrusive. If you ever want to share a lot, the Lot Cleaner is an easy way to clean up the file before uploading; it not only looks for the SDHB, but also other controllers and off-world stuff, etc.)


I just want to clarify that "it runs in the background of your game and looks for the super duper hug and if it finds it, removes it" is actually how every SDH remover *except* Chris Hatch's works. Chris Hatch's is different specifically because it doesn't constantly run in the background, he actually hacked the super duper hug to delete itself, so the code only runs when the SDH is actually present. The other thing that makes it better is that it can run in build mode, whereas the other removers can only run in live mode, and it spawns a dialog. Otherwise it's the same as the other SDH removers. It's absolutely not true that NSL and similar hacks don't remove the SDH, or that they only "suppress" it. Either the object is on the lot, or it isn't. It can't exist in a halfway "suppressed" state.
Alchemist
#9 Old 9th Apr 2021 at 2:25 AM
Thanks for clarifying @kestrellyn. I didn't mean to imply that Super Duper Hug Test is always running in the background; at the time I couldn't figure out a better way to explain it, but you've done that well. And thanks for explaining "suppression" vs removal. I guess I got the impression that NSL only suppresses it because it didn't catch it in some of the lots I packaged--but now I realize that's probably because, like you say, it needs to run in live mode and can't do anything about it when I'm building.

To the OP, both Chris Hatch's Super Duper Hug Test and Lot Cleaner can be used from build/buy mode, making them better tools for dealing with SDHB. Super Duper Hug Test is more hands off and will specifically take care of the SDHB; the Lot Cleaner cleans up a bit more things and you have to manually select it to use it.

"May the sunlight find you, thy days be long, thy winters kind, thy roots be strong." -Grand Oak Tree, DAO

XPTL Mod Archive | Change a Mod's Mesh into a CC Object | Increasing the Game Difficulty | Editing ACR 4 Your Age Mod
Bored? Read an unfinished legacy or sim story. | aka Kelyns | she/her
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#10 Old 9th Apr 2021 at 4:24 PM
I mean, I've been playing it (on and off) for 12 years without serious issue, but recently I'm having more and more problems like apartments just completely breaking and needing to have the inhabitants moved out and in again, which resets all their furniture and messes up their finances. And then I started getting a weird community lot issue (community lot populator error) that kept coming up as though it was related to the visitor controller, which I thought was odd, because again, I've played with the VC for years and years and lots of people play with it without problems. I ran HoodChecker recently and let it do its thing but it hasn't really fixed anything. I found a Chris Hatch mod that fixed it but only on owned lots.

And I'm not that happy with how I originally set it up, I didn't know about the apartment townies back then so ALL my townies are apartment social group ones and very samey and it's annoying. I've been slowly catching them and making them over but there are about 200 of them. I didn't really want 200+ townies in the first place. I always wished I had it in a different configuration with the main hood as a sub-hood and a sub-hood as the main hood. I had some custom foods I don't really want any more. I deleted those knowing it was not recommended but I just kind of thought whatever, I don't care, but now I wonder if I caused more issues. I looked up how to fix that but to be honest it sounded like too much effort. There are a couple of other mods I'd probably delete for a fresh start, but I'm a bit worried about the effects on the sims I already have.

The main thing is, I don't want to have to spend ages going through and deleting loads of individual references, I don't want to have to work out endless mod conflicts or question whether this is corruption etc - I just want to play. I don't mind if it's a bit glitchy, but when the glitches make the game unplayable then it's more work than fun. I don't have a huge amount of time to play, and when I have to spend the 2 hours that I have in the evening trying to hunt down a bug rather than actually enjoying the stories, or building, or how my hood fits together and spending time with the families I've created, it's not worth it. Or if I am constantly thinking oh I'd better not send my sim to a community lot, or I can't hire a nanny or whatever, I just want the game to work. I would rather build new lots than have to go through and hunt for stuff and delete in the files - that's boring to me. But if I can bring some of my work over that I've done before without risking messing something up from the start, then I'd like to do that. I just wanted to check if that was something that was a problem to do or not I will definitely check out the lot cleaner. That sounds like the kind of solution I can cope with!

I'm not attached to my sims in the sense that I'd miss them if they are gone. I will probably keep the hood around as a backup. I just see it that they have moved on to other things and I'm reading a different story now - like when I finish a book and I don't know what happened for the rest of the character's life Occasionally I think of a family and wonder what would have happened with them, but I lost more hoods when my last hard drive died, this was the only one that survived in a state I wanted to play it. So I was sort of in a headspace of starting from scratch anyway.

I use the sims as a psychology simulator...
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