Missing Sims = Glitched Neighbourhood?

[kio]

Hi there,

Long time simmer and lurker - newish poster here.
So I've had a look around to try and fix this one myself - but before I proceed just wondering if you guys have any advice or wisdom you could pass on.

Basically I have a well populated custom neighbourhood - like 40+ families and then I recently installed University and Night Life and then a few glitches popped up - for example on a custom 1-tile house the NPC gardener respawned repeatedly.

Then I go to play an old family - my original self sim (all maxis content on her) who was preggo with her 1st bub too and the house is totally empty! For sale infact. The furniture is still all there and even some other sims who were visiting at the time are still there but my sim = GONE! It's not quite the $Subject glitch because I went to other sims and checked there memories and her thumbnail can still be seen. But then other whole familes are missing but thier home and family portrait are still accessible.

So my problem is missing sims.
My theory is my new install of uni and night life generated too many NPC's and townies and I've reached / gone over the neighbourhoods population limit causing glitches.

So my questions are:
1) Can I get the missing sims back? If so, how so?
2) Can I get rid of townies and NPC's not needed in this neighbourhood without restarting from scratch?

From what I've read J M Pescado has some fixes at MATY that decrease townies and NPC's

3) Could you recommend which hacks/mods might decrease townie/NPC spawnage for Night Life?
4) Once a neighbourhood is glitched is it fixable? Or should I just re-install with my back-ups?

Sorry for the book of a post and
Many many thanks in advance!

  kio

[gazania]

I'm surprised that no one has responded to this yet. I had the missing Sims problem, though I had the $Subject issue, and it was probably due to both overpopulation and/or deleting from the Sim Bin back before I knew better to do this. (Deleting Sims from the Sim Bin is bad ... very bad ... don't do it.) In my case, everything worked great until my population exceeded 900 Sims, including NPCs, townies, dormies, etc. Then things went very wrong. I had to reset my neighborhood. When I looked in Sim PE, those missing Sims were gone, replaced by another Sim entirely. At that point, there was nothing more I could do.

I read that somewhere, if the character file was still intact in Sim PE, you might have a chance of getting your old Sim back, but from what you're describing, this might not be the case with you. If you still find her, though, perhaps someone else here can help you figure out how to get her or others back. Making backups was very wise, indeed. You can try renaming your current file to something else ... and reinstall again, using the backup, to see if you can get your old Sims back. But it's been over three weeks, and if you're playing your current game, you might not want to do this now, anyway. Or if you reset, this is a moot point.

I'm sorry to read that you have ... or had, since you might have reset or reinstalled by now ... the disappearing Sims problem. If you did indeed have to reset, you might want to swing by MATY and download at least one of the non-redundancy hacks. It is simply amazing how many characters EA puts in your game before you even move in your first family! Installing at least one of these (I installed all three ... the NPC, townie AND dormie hacks) might help you keep those EA Simmie "bunny wabbits" from reproducing every time you turn around. But no, it will not get rid of your current townies, NPCs, etc ... only future ones.

As for where to go, you can start here, and find your most recent EP (NL):

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,8.0.html

If you take a look in the directory, you will see that there is an anti-redundancy hack for NL. For no spawning dormies, try the nodormieregen.package file, and for the townies, notownieregen.package. You do not have to install all three. Some people like lots of new townies or dormies. But do remember (tries to sound authoritative) ... use the version that applies to your current EP.

[miros1]

Are there any Sims actually living on the lot?  Try using Inge's teleporter (or TJ's Blender) to bring your Sim back to the lot (or to another lot).

[kio]

Hi guys,

Thank you gazania and miros1 for your replies!
I did go about investigating and trying to find a solution myself to the missing sims problem, and only didn’t post earlier as I didn’t want to double post.

So my questions were:
1) Can I get the missing sims back? If so, how so?

Basically I got them back by deleteing the glitched neighbourhood and re-installing from my most recent back-up before I installed uni and nightlife and the missing sims were still in this neighbourhood.

I also installed SimPE which I hadn’t previously used before and used it to export / package a few of my favourite sims (including the one that had gone missing) into my SavedSims folder and so they appear in the Sim Bin in CAS now.

From my research which basically involved a lot of scouring of threads on MATY and MTS – once a sim disappears because of a glitched neighbourhood – theres little you can do to get them back. That’s why it’s always good to back up your game.

2) Can I get rid of townies and NPC's not needed in this neighbourhood without restarting from scratch?

Not too sure – from what I’ve read once a Sim exists and interacts with other sims – memories are created and thus deleting them from the game is a VERY BAD IDEA as it confuses the game with “unknown” sims and associated memories.

So in other words if you establish a neighbourhood with NPC’s a townies spawning freely once they are there, they can not be deleted.

3) Could you recommend which hacks/mods might decrease townie/NPC spawnage for Night Life?

So I went to:
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/
And followed this thread:
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,10798.0.html
Which can also be located by using a search engine and searching for “Sims 2 Clean Neighbourhood Templates”

And went here:
 
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/samples/ffs/index.php?dir=nl%2Fhacks%2F

and downloaded and installed:
•   Anti redundancy
•   No townie regen
•   No stray respawn
•   No SS respawn* [You can get these 4 hacks from the FFS Hack Directory]
•   No dormie regen* [You can only get this one from the DC]

As recommended in the thread. I’ve started a new neighbourhood now totally Townie free and with minimal NPC’s. It’s grand.

4) Once a neighbourhood is glitched is it fixable? Or should I just re-install with my back-ups?

I’d still like to know the answer to this one. From everywhere I read – on here and other sims sites once a neighbourhood starts becoming really over-populated and glitchy it’s pretty well un-fixable and it’s best to restart it from an earlier back-up or restart an new neighbourhood completely.

Thanks again for the replies.
I hope this info helps others with overly-populated glitched neighbourhoods.

Cheers
kio

[miros1]

Glad you got it fixed.  A friend of mine lost a huge hood to a glitchy patch, with no backup....

[gazania]

Good job researching on your own. Sorry ... I did forget there were other no-spawn hacks because I didn't download them. And yes, you're right. Deleting any Sim from a Sim Bin, or simply from your files, can be a problem. Just kill 'em. That part can be kind of fun, actually. There are many ways to kill these pixel dollies.

Yes, in my case, I did have to reset because I made the problem so much worse by deleting several Sims from the Sim Bin back in the beginning. I was able to keep my Downloads and favorite unoccupied lots because of backups, though. It appears that your problem  was not caused by the same factors, and I'm glad they weren't for you! Good to see your lady is back.

Your example emphasizes that very important piece of advice that so many of us here post .... keep constant backups. You never know when something is going to seriously mess up. You were a wise player. I know I learned the hard way once. (Winces at the memory.)

And glad to see you're back in business again!

[kinnika]

I had a similar problem. I installed Pets (AFTER backing everything up and it still failed) and only one of my neighborhoods short-circuited, I guess you could say. I tried everything from trying to fix my NH to re-installing. Nothing. I spent weeks trying to find and fix my neighborhood and get my Sims and lots back through SimPE. Unfortunately, I am no Jedi master when it comes to that program and so I had no idea how to fix them. They are still in there. It's just restoring them that's my issue.

I had used a Sims terrain (no custom content) to create my own neighborhood. I had an attached city and college community. They were populated quite moderately, so there was no danger of a meltdown due to a problem in overpopulation (If I ever had a danger of that, there are many forms of population control). Every time I loaded the neighborhood, it had problems loading. Went back to an earlier time where all the Sims were a step-down in age (before most of my town was built, sadly) and it runs all right. Never did find out exactly how to fix it, or how to get any of the real hard work I've done back. I was too disheartened to even go back and replay and rebuild because I lost so much stuff (about 8 months worth of work). So, I kinda' just gave up on the whole neighborhood and started a new one.

I think the last response I got was somewhere along the lines of: "Well, sometimes it's the Maxis program that is at fault." However, I was told that I might be able to fix it if I knew SimPE really well. As I said before, I am just a Padawan at PE... if even that.

I'm telling you now ~ all the Sim experts on this site need to band together in each city and instead of "Geek Squad", they should have a "Sim Squad" and for a small fee, come to your house and fiddle around with the dang SimPE program and other files for people like me who are not exactly Sim experts, lol.

All in all, I am glad you figured out what your problem was. I'd have to say, my problem is still a mystery to me!