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Test Subject
#126 Old 30th Mar 2007 at 2:20 AM
Quote: Originally posted by Leo-SSA
Go to "Documents and Settings/YourName/My Documents/EA Games/The Sims 2/Neighborhoods/N002" folder
Inside it you should have a file named "N002_Neighborhood.package" it is the last saved file of Strangetown neighbourhood. It is probably corrupted. Rename it to "N002_Neighborhood.corrupted". You should also have a file named "N002_Neighborhood.bak" make a copy of it and rename it to "N002_Neighborhood.package". Start your The Sims2 game, and your Strangetown neighbourhood should be back. But it will be reverted to a few days before the last time you played in Strangetown.

omg you saved my life I love you!!.. I tried it and it worked now I got all my neighborhood back!!! thanks!!
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Test Subject
#127 Old 30th Mar 2007 at 11:01 PM
OS: XP Media SP2
Specs: Pentium D 3.2GHz, 1GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 6800
Games: Sims 2 DVD, Uni, NL, OFB, FFS, GLS, Pets; all patches


I have not lost any neighborhoods, only individual sims and lots. A couple of weeks ago I finally installed Pets, and since then I've noticed sims randomly disappearing. At first it was one sim I had recently created for the purpose of running an electronics store. His house was still there, but it was for sale and he was nowhere to be seen. His store still had an "owned" sign on it, but when I tried to enter it the game crashed. I had been having trouble stocking custom objects, so I thought that was the problem and just ignored it.

A few days ago I found four university students missing. Their dorm appeared empty in the neighborhood view and they weren't in the family bin. I loaded the neighborhood in SimPE and discovered that two of the missing sims have become townies. They still have the same relationships, skills, college grades and levels, etc., but they are evidently NPC's now. The other two are listed as normal in Simpe, but have simply vanished from the game. Today when I loaded up my custom neighborhood, an entire lot was missing. The hill it was sitting on has changed. In Simpe, the sims dwelling on the lot were still there, but again there was no way to find them in game.

This only started happening after I installed pets. Just before I bought pets I had a bad download that caused the game to crash, so I went through the process of searching the Downloads by moving files back and forth, and removing hacks. I installed Pets and installed updated hacks (TwoJeffs, J. M. Pescado, Crammyboy, and a couple of others). I left the careers and majors. Then I defragmented the HD, since I had also recently uninstalled some old games and junk I hadn't used in a while.

Now, I did just realize that I had the wrong version of Crammyboy's nudist hack, for Seasons instead of OFB (which is evidently the version for Pets as well). The only glitch I noticed was that it kept sims from using exercise machines, but I suppose it is possible that it caused other unseen problems. I suppose I will backup from the bak file, but it's from January. What's the use anyway if the problem persists, and will it restore the University neighborhood?
Test Subject
#128 Old 3rd Apr 2007 at 5:11 AM Last edited by micheleg1 : 3rd Apr 2007 at 5:18 AM.
Default Pleasantview Total Reset
I opened the game as usual only to find that everything was reset to original state as if I were playing it for the first time.

I did some investigating and found a folder under My Documents\EAGames named folder1. In that folder was all the files that had gone missing. I restored them to the downloads folder, played a while, all went fine... I quit the game normally, and again when I went back I had all new everything and another folder in the EAGames/TheSims2 directory.

I have the base game only and use several hacks, LOTS of custom content, and the building cheats, etc.

Don't remember downloading anything new but I may have and not remember.



My 'puter specs:

System Overview / Comparison
Your System Results Game Requirements

Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (Build 2600) Pass Windows XP/2000/98/ME

System Memory 1015.1 Pass 256.0

Processor Speed 3192.2 Pass 800 MHz

DirectX Version 9.0c Pass 9.0c

Display Device Intel(R) 82915G/GV/910GL Express Chipset Family Unknown Compatibility

Display Memory 128.0 Pass 32.0

Display Driver 6.14.10.4363 Unknown Compatibility

Sound Device SoundMAX Digital Audio Pass

Sound Driver 5.12.01.5246 Unknown Compatibility



Operating System Information
Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)

Internet Explorer Information
Version 7.00.5730.0011


System Device Information
Processor
Intel Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz 3192.2 Mhz

Memory
System Total 1015.1
Virtual Total 2047.9
Pagefile Total 2442.5

Snapshot
System Available 488.2
Virtual Available 1992.7
Pagefile Available 2067.4

Monitor Information
Monitor Name Plug and Play Monitor
Refresh Rate 60 Hz

Monitor Information
Monitor Name Dell E173FP
Refresh Rate 0 Hz

Network Card Information
Name Intel(R) PRO/100 VE Network Connection - Packet Scheduler Miniport
IP Address 70.238.241.230
Subnet Mask 255.255.255.0
Gateway 70.238.241.229
Primary WINS Server N/A
DHCP 192.168.0.1


System Device Information
Background Processes Information
Process Name [System Process]
Process Name System
Process Name smss.exe
Process Name csrss.exe
Process Name winlogon.exe
Process Name services.exe
Process Name lsass.exe
Process Name svchost.exe
Process Name svchost.exe
Process Name svchost.exe
Process Name svchost.exe
Process Name svchost.exe
Process Name spoolsv.exe
Process Name avgamsvr.exe
Process Name avgupsvc.exe
Process Name avgemc.exe
Process Name FreezeScreenSaver.exe
Process Name svchost.exe
Process Name ViewpointService.exe
Process Name explorer.exe
Process Name alg.exe
Process Name smax4pnp.exe
Process Name jusched.exe
Process Name tfswctrl.exe
Process Name hpcmpmgr.exe
Process Name CFD.exe
Process Name MotiveSB.exe
Process Name PDVDServ.exe
Process Name avgcc.exe
Process Name hkcmd.exe
Process Name igfxpers.exe
Process Name Weather.exe
Process Name ctfmon.exe
Process Name ViewMgr.exe
Process Name igfxsrvc.exe
Process Name msmsgs.exe
Process Name msimn.exe
Process Name iexplore.exe
Process Name WLLoginProxy.exe
Process Name EasyInfo.exe
Process Name wmiprvse.exe


Media Device Information
Mass Storage Devices
Type Removable
File System N/A
Total Space 0 Bytes
Free Space 0 Bytes

Mass Storage Devices
Type Fixed
File System NTFS
Total Space 145.6 GB
Free Space 70.6 GB

Mass Storage Devices
Type CD / DVD Drive
File System CDFS
Total Space 650.1 MB
Free Space 0 Bytes

Mass Storage Devices
Type CD / DVD Drive
File System N/A
Total Space 0 Bytes
Free Space 0 Bytes

Mass Storage Devices
Type Fixed
File System FAT
Total Space 23.3 MB
Free Space 15.2 MB

DirectX Information
Version 9.0c
Long Version 4.09.0000.0904

Display Device (Primary Only)
Intel(R) 82915G/GV/910GL Express Chipset Family
Device
Description Intel(R) 82915G/GV/910GL Express Chipset Family
Manufacturer Intel Corporation
GUID D7B78E66-66C2-11CF-9873-8121ABC2CD35

Driver
Version 6.14.10.4363
Module ialmrnt5.dll
Date 7-20-2005

Memory
Local 128.0
Local 116.8
Non-Local 0.0
Texture 116.8

Sound Device
Information about the device(s) on this computer could not be retrieved.

I know my graphis card is not so good, but I do have a GEForce 5500 w/256K RAM on the way... but note that I have been using my Sims game on this system for several months now with the video driver as listed (ever since I got this computer).

It sure would be nice to know what's causing these problems! I am ready to forget the neat furniture and gizmos and other objects from anywhere except EAGmes themselves. Then THEY can figure out the problem

Thank all of you for being here - I have been reading these forums for months and never had to ask a question yet - it's already right here in these forums! Thumbs up to all contributors to this site!

Michele
Test Subject
#129 Old 13th Apr 2007 at 6:47 PM
Operating system - VISTA
Computer specs - Genuine Intel(R) CPU - 1014 MB (RAM) - 32-Bit Operating System. [Hewlett Packard/HP]
Games - SIMS 2 with Family Fun Stuff and NightLife.
Details of Neighbourhood loss - I lost StrangeTown and I was playing it last... thenn when I reloaded the game it was gone. That is all I remember... Veronaville [Renamed TwilightTown], PleasantView and Oshma[Custom-Made] are all fine.
Neighbourhood File details If you go to Documents/ EA Games/ The Sims2/ Neighbourhoods are the neighbourhood files still there? Yes
Sim PE Investigation: N/A
What changed on your system immediately before the corruption: We were playing with cheats before hand but they've never affected us before... and we also played with the Audio settings but that again is all I remember.
Any other relevant information: N/A at the moment.

Sorry it isn't the best of imformation but I hope it helps.
Test Subject
#130 Old 18th Apr 2007 at 3:51 PM
I had the same problem. The other day I loaded the game and some Neighborhoods were missing.Strangetown,River blossom Hills and one of my own creation. Other than that the game works fine as far as I can tell.
Operating system : Windows Vista home premium
Computer specs: intel pentium D CPU 2.80Ghz 2.79 Ghz Ram 1014mb
Games:I have all the eps and stuff packs (except holiday stuff). I have all the patches.None were installed resently.The game worked fine after I installed the seasons patch this happened a while later.
The only changes before this happened was I downloaded some clothes From MTS2 using QXpress. I didn't download any hacks or mods.
Test Subject
#131 Old 18th Apr 2007 at 3:54 PM Last edited by Vladan : 22nd Apr 2007 at 9:54 PM.
Veronaville dissapeared on me. The last time I played I quitted without saving. Afterwards I downloaded SimPE and TS2 Enchancer to give them a try. I didn't messed around with SimPE too much because they say it doesn't work with Seasons yet (I have all expansions and addons).
But I did with TS2 Enchancer. But before doing anything I used it's backup feature to backup my neighbourhood. So I changed some sims' relationships, saved and started the game just to find that Veronaville is gone.
I tried reverting to backup but it doesn't help, so the error probably isn't caused by TS2E, because both it and SimPE can open the neighbourhood just fine.

I read some posts here and made a test. I cutted one of my other neighbourhoods and changed the folder name of the one that doesn't show up (eg. moved N001 and than renamed N003 to N001). That didn't helped. But after I restored both neighbourhoods to before the cutting, the one that I moved doesn't show anymore either, which got me extremely confused!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Leo-SSA
Go to "Documents and Settings/YourName/My Documents/EA Games/The Sims 2/Neighborhoods/N002" folder
Inside it you should have a file named "N002_Neighborhood.package" it is the last saved file of Strangetown neighbourhood. It is probably corrupted. Rename it to "N002_Neighborhood.corrupted". You should also have a file named "N002_Neighborhood.bak" make a copy of it and rename it to "N002_Neighborhood.package". Start your The Sims2 game, and your Strangetown neighbourhood should be back. But it will be reverted to a few days before the last time you played in Strangetown.


Unfortunately I don't have any *.bak files in my saves
The neighbourhoodmanager.package doesn't work either.

I don't think that it makes any difference, since this is clearly caused by game itself, but my specs are:
Windows XP Pro SP2, nForce 2, AMD Sempron 2800+, GeForce 6600, 1GB Kingston, 2x250GB Maxtor.

I have all expansions and addons, only a couple of downloaded packages (new objects only) which worked without probs all the time and NO hacks.


As a sidenote... Has anyone actually succeeded at restoring their neighbourhoods? I spent a LOT of time on my characters and I would really hate to loose them.


EDIT: I have just restored a backup of my first dissapeared neighbourhood which I made about 2 weeks ago and which I'm sure is/has worked properly. But for some reason it too doesn't show up. So first conclusion that comes to my mind is that the game is caching neighbourhood data somewhere else too. I don't have installation disks with me ATM so I can't test to see wether reinstalltion will restore default and custom neighbourhoods.


EDIT 2: I now tried copying default neighbourhoods from TS2 dir (../UserData/Neighbourhoods) and it still doesn't restore them ingame which mean that game is almost definately getting it's data from another location too.


EDIT 3: YES, I DID IT! I restored my saves! How I did it? Well, I managed to get installation disks again from my brother. Then I uninstalled all expansion and stuff packs. Then I removed EVERY single file and registry entry left after unstallation (took a while :P). Afterwards I rebooted and reinstalled the game, expansions and stuff packs and applied just the patches I had at the time I first started playing about a month ago. I then readded a couple of downloaded packages I also had when I started playing and restored the backup of my neighbourhoods. After that it was just a matter of starting the game and trying to get rid of a giant grin on my face from happiness that overwhelmed me when I saw that my neighbourhoods are back :D
I'm not sure if everything I did is needed or not, but it doesn't hurt to try. It might get your sims back
Lab Assistant
#132 Old 27th Apr 2007 at 10:45 PM Last edited by malthaussen : 28th Apr 2007 at 5:51 PM.
This will be a longish post. I may have found a work-around that will help in some cases of the Great Disappearing Neighbo(u)rhood scam. Please note the qualifiers: YMMV. For that matter, my milage may vary: I start each Sims session with my heart in my throat: "will my 'hood be there TODAY?"

First, the paperwork:

OS: Windows XP Home, SP2.
In the Box: 3.0 ghz processor, 1 gig RAM, NVIDIA GFORCE 5200 card (128 mb and it shows), 100 gig HD of which c 30 gig are still free.
Game: TS2, Uni, NL with the NL patch.

Hacks and things: many, but there is no reason to think they are the cause of the problem in and of themselves, as the game has been stable with them for many weeks. However, see below.

What did I do to break it: I'm not sure. I had a crash-on-shutdown (first time THAT's happened), but when I restarted the game afterwards, it played fine, so presumably that didn't break it. I used Christianlov's "Send an Adult to College" hack to send a Townie to college, and I'm guessing tentatively that this corrupted the save file, although the game played fine for hours after I made the transfer, and I coulda sworn I restarted somewhere along the line.

So what happened, already? I'm playing N004, which is the custom 'hood I've played since I got the game two months ago. The stock 'hoods have been examined and dismissed. N004 has about 350 residents, one college, and one downtown. Aside from a number of content-related crashes, hangs, and glitches that have all been resolved as they came up, the 'hood has been stable and run well, even given some of the odd things I've done in it (houses sharing photo albums, teenagers moving in with adults via "Control this Sim" hacks, etc). So yesterday I finished, shut down as usual, and went to bed. Woke up this mornin', feelin' sad and blue, and then I discovered that 'Hood 4 was gone. Disappeared. No longer on the menu.

Opened the 'hood in SimPE. Yep, it's all there, and looks like it always did: same number of residents, same thumbs, same people... same place. Looked in the Neighborhood folder, and yep, it's all there, and nothing screams obviously "I have been irrevocably corrupted by the Overnight Computer Gremlins!" I will note, parenthetically, that nobody else uses my box but me, that it is not networked, nor is it connected to the 'Net except by dialup. And a scan with Norton, made immediately after the Problem was discovered, turned up no viruses, which was no surprise, since I try to keep up with that.

Oh, well, strange things happen. Restored backup with SimPE. Hood not there. WTF? Well, maybe the file got corrupted somehow. Restored older backup with SimPE. Hood not there. Restored every bleeding backup I've made (one a day, but only dating back a week), and the Hood just ain't there.

So I threw out the N004 file, and manually restored a second backup I keep around for emergencies, made by the simple expedient of copying the N004 file in Windows. It still isn't there. As far as TS2 is concerned, it seems, there is no 'hood 4.

Okay, it's damage control time. Here's what I did:

First, toss the Downloads folder. Start the game. Hood 4 still gone. Okay, then it's nothing to do with the Downloads folder, including hacks. Didn't think so, but I strive for completeness.

Changed Hood 4 files into Hood 3 (Veronaville, never touched), using AntRenamer. Yay, hooray, it worked! My old Hood 4 is now Hood 3, but everything is back where it belongs. Cool! I must write MTS and tell them all about it.

But first, make a backup. So I did. And then I copied everything back into Hood 4, because I wanted to restore Veronaville. (Why I wot not, I don't play it) And... there is no Hood 4. Still. More amusingly, Hood 3, while still on the menu, is... empty? WTF? It was just there! Good thing I hadn't written MTS to brag, yet.

For grins and giggles, created a new hood in TS2. Interesting. New hood is Hood 5: as far as TS is concerned, there is a Hood 4 around here somewhere, if they could only find it.

Intermediate conclusion: there are at least two cases of corruption going on here. My hood 4 is corrupted (by the tooth fairy or something: who the 'ell knows?), and some unknown file that tells TS2 where the 'hoods are is also corrupt.

At this point, I jumped the 'Net, cruised here, read this thread. Tried the "NeighborhoodManager" file swap as suggested. No joy. Wherever the pointer is, it ain't there. Wonder if we could get Maxis to tell us? Wonder if that low-flying pig will hit me? Onward.

Okay, so I tossed N004 again, and replaced it with a copy of the old original N003 (Veronaville) from the backups in the Program Files/Yadda yadda folder of the TS2 install. Still no N004. There are definitely two cases of corruption here, since we know the Virgin Veronaville must be clean.

But just to be sure, I created a new hood (Hood 5, for those keeping score), and put those files in there. Yep, that's my Veronaville -- number 5 on the list (and in the Neighborhood folder), but the fourth panel on the Neighborhood Selector Screen. N004 simply no longer exists... sort of. Well, let's just say, the game knows it's there, but it can't find it.

Okay, but maybe I'm on to something. Put my N004 files into the N005 folder, used AntRenamer (useful program, that), to convert N004 to N005. Joy! It's there! Yay, hooray.

Or... not. It was there, briefly, but then it wasn't. Yep, I started the game, played around in the 'hood, and exited, then restarted... and whoosh! N005 was still there, but it was empty. All my lovely Sims and lots dead and gone. Intermediate conclusion: that N004 save is definitely corrupt.

Is all lost? Fortunately not, or this would not be so manic a post. I manually-restored a savefile from an earlier date and converted it to N005. And everything is there, and working fine, and set as of the end of that particular session, which was before whatever corrupted the game corrupted the game. I have saved/restarted several times, shut down altogether, rebooted, and restarted, and N005 remains intact, and playable, and hopefully will do so for the near future. Barring a complete re-install (which may or may not work), I can play, but N004 remains a phantom.

So, Summary:

1) There are two cases of corruption going on. In this particular case, the 'hood has been corrupted (somehow), and also some unknown file has been corrupted which tells the game the 'hood is there. Though N004 seems to exist, and can be manipulated in SimPE (changes made, saved, backed up, everything), though the files are there in the Neighborhood folder, and though the game KNOWS there's a 'hood around here somewhere, it cannot access it, regardless of what is actually in that 'hood folder, corrupt or otherwise. It is a ghost, a phantom, a pain in the blue-eyed butt.

2) Fortunately, an uncorrupted 'hood backup can be restored and converted to a new 'hood number, and will (apparently) play just fine. So keep those backups handy, and make sure you have AntRenamer around.

Caveats: as I said above, YMMV. I do not know what caused the corruption, I do not know why the game is acting as it does. Maybe a clean reinstall will restore access to the N004 "slot," maybe not. This is just a work-around. If your case is similar to mine, this may help. I sure hope so.

I agree with the posters above. This game is great fun, but it would be so much more fun if I didn't have to waste a day every couple of weeks trying to figure out what's broken THIS time. And I don't even have Pets!

Final note: I have had many assorted crashes, hangs, and blowups in this game, most often hangs either on loading or when entering a lot that require the power to be toggled in order to exit the game, and this is the first time that this kind of corruption occurred. However, neither the crash nor the hack appears to have immediately effected the gameplay. You go figger. Me, I'm having a drink.


-- Mal

"Of two choices, I always take the third."
Lab Assistant
#133 Old 28th Apr 2007 at 3:40 PM Last edited by malthaussen : 28th Apr 2007 at 4:23 PM.
When the going gets rought, the weird get weirder...

I'm going to describe what has happened since yesterday's post, and if it leaves whatever programmers and analysts who are watching this thread scratching their heads and saying "this doesn't make sense," rest assured, I've been doing that myself.

In the last episode, I had succeeded in making an "uncorrupt" backup (dated 25 April) to work as N005. N004, it appeared, was missing in action. So was my last couple of days play, but that was a small price to pay to keep my Sims, etc.

The last thing I did yesterday was copy all my N005 files into N004, and rename them with antrenamer. Sort of a backup, since N004 wasn't working. But also an experiment, since I can't leave well enough alone.

Today I started the game. The "four" 'hoods were there, my custom "N005" was fine, I could play. When I had originally made this save, one of my Sims was slow dancing with a Townie, and I had saved-and-exited in order to alter her height with SimPE. So I decided to do that first of all. SimPE persists in telling me that there are five 'hoods, but of course TS2 knows better. I opened 'hood 5, noting with puzzlement that it did not have the current date and time as all the other 'hoods did, and made the alteration to the N005 files. Then I restarted the game. It was fine, everything was working... except the Townie had not reset to the proper size. How very odd... I took a look at the N005 files, and noted that their "date modified" data had not changed -- nothing, it seems, was happening in N005. But -- and believe me, I didn't believe this either -- N004 had updated.

WTF???? I exited to the Neighborhood screen, and added a line of text to my neighborhood description: "This is Neighborhood 5." Then I saved-and-exited, started SimPE, and opened 'hood 4, REPEAT, 4. And what do my wondering eyes perceive but "This is Neighborhood 5." Huh? Are we confused yet? It gets funkier.

I changed the Townie's height again, and also changed the amount of cash the Sim family had on hand. Saved. Opened 'hood 5. The Townie was the right height, so I changed the Sim family's funds to a figure different from the other one. Saved-and-exited. Restarted TS2. All the changes made in SimPE to Hood 4 were present and accounted for. The Hood 4 files had been updated. Though this was, supposedly, Hood 5, it was accessing the files of the Hood 4 folder. I took a screenie, and it showed up in Hood 4. Something is very, very strange, here.

Now I got daring. I am thinking more and more that the problem lies, not with my neighborhoods, but with something in TS2. I tossed out the Hood 5 files altogether, and restarted. The 'hood was still intact, and playable, and in its most recent state, no surprise since the Hood 4 files had been continuously updated. Hood 4 is now working as Hood 4? And yesterday it was gone? I need another drink.

So I got more daring. And I don't really believe this, but here it is: I took my supposedly "corrupt" Neighborhood file and put it back in the N004 folder. And it plays perfectly, now, when yesterday it was "corrupt," unplayable, and had apparently poisoned the N004 slot beyond repair. Well, that was then, this is now. After a strange journey, it seems the backup is restored and all is well. Right? Nope.

I'm still curious. I'm not worried about breaking my game beyond redemption: I have backups out the ying-yang, and if worst comes to worst I can always re-install this dog. As a long-time player of the original Sims, I'm used to the game breaking, and doing all sorts of exotic things to test the envelope. In this case, I did nothing special: "What would happen if I created a new 'hood now?" I did so, and it was N005, as it should be.

Now, a clarification, a note, and an oddity. Yesterday, when I had this problem, at one point I tossed everything beyond the original three 'hoods and created a new N004. I entered, looked around, and exited to the Hood screen. Now, I have a custom .png I made for my N004 screen, of two Sims dancing. My "virgin" N004 was now displaying this .png as its 'hood pic, even though that particular .png WAS NOT IN THE N004 FOLDER. This means something. I'm not sure what, but it confirms that the game is drawing some 'hood data from somewhere outside of the N### folders. After creating this "hood 4" yesterday, it suffered the same "disappearing 'hood" problem as the others.

Today, with my supposedly-corrupt-but-perfectly-playable (for now, anyway) N004 in place, when I created a virgin N005, the same thing happened: it was created, after exiting displayed the custom N004 .png (even though that .png is not in it's folder), and upon restart of the game it has disappeared. So it seems all I have accomplished is to a) move the "corrupt" slot to N005, and b) restored my game to the state it was in before all this madness occurred. Oh, and btw -- Hood 4 does not display the custom .png in the Selection screen, but does when you click on the 'hood to enter it.

Conclusions: there is no corruption in my neighborhood files. Everything that has happened can be attributed to some pointer in the game getting completely screwed up. Where is it? Unknown, but presumably not in the Neighborhood Manager file. What screwed it up? How has it been screwed up? How can I fix it? You tell me.

Will my 'hood still be there the next time I want to play? I sure hope so. I'm tempted to reinstall anyway, but that is such a pain in the neck. I hate playing with a broken game, though, especially when I don't know what broke it.

Comments?

-- Mal

Addendum: re-reading my last two posts, something occurs to me. It seems that all cases of disappearing neighborhoods (in my case) apply to the last neighborhood in the Neighborhood file. As I recall, when I "fixed" the game yesterday, I had a N006 file sitting in that folder -- which had disappeared from the selection screen as usual -- and N005 was working. Then I tossed N006, copied N005 into N004, and N004 was the one working, while N005 was not. Currently, I have my "playable" hood as N004, and a freshly-created 'hood as N005, and it is N005 that doesn't show up. Time for another experiment...

Well. I was going to add a N006 to my 'hoods, to see if N005 would "magically" show up. Unfortunately, when I started TS this time, N004 had disappeared, along with N005.

Follow this. I put the files in the N004 folder. Started the game. Played. Saved-and-exited. Modified Townie with SimPE. Started. Played. Made a phone call, danced. Saved-and-exited. Restarted, checked 'hood. Still there. Yay! Got on Internet. Wrote this post. Started game again as the new experiment had just occurred to me. Hood gone.

What did I do to break it? I got on the Internet. Explain this one if you can.

Back to damage control. This is getting redundant. Continued in next post.

-- Mal

"Of two choices, I always take the third."
Lab Assistant
#134 Old 28th Apr 2007 at 5:35 PM Last edited by malthaussen : 28th Apr 2007 at 11:13 PM.
Damage Control, Volume 2. Boy, I love debugging. It's why I quit the computer business to begin with.

Okay, I tossed all the custom 'hoods, leaving N001-N003 in place. Started the game, created N004, N005, N006. Two points: when creating N004 yesterday, and N004 and N005 today, the game did not prompt me to add a Downtown, and the 'hoods displayed the custom .png as mentioned above. I am sure this is relevant, I'm just not sure why. N006 created normally, did not display custom .png.

Exited. Restarted. As expected, N004 and N005 had ceased to exist. N006 is still there. Started SimPE. All six 'hoods show. N004 and N005 are "unknown," have population 0, do not have the debug text I entered when I created them. (Basically, just "I am N004," and "I am N005.") N006 has population 171, does show debug text, in all ways appears normal.

Copied 25 April "clean" backup into N006. Renamed with antrenamer. Started game. Yep, there it is again... but I've passed this way before. The important thing here is that repeated steps have produced repeated, expected results. This is progress, if you like. Played around, exited, started SimPE. Hood 004 and 005 are still unknown. Hood 006 is now my custom hood, everything looks normal. Did the height/money modification as mentioned above. Restarted game. Everything is copacetic.

Took two more recent backups, put them in N004 and N005 slots. Started game. Neither shows, but N006 is still in the playable state. For now, anyway. Opened SimPE. Hood 004 shows text, Sims, etc in accordance with the backup. Hood 006 is as before. Hood 005, however, displays the debug text and title. Opened 'hood 005. It crunched along like it was, in fact, the backup -- one could see the names of characters running along the bottom, etc. Displayed message "Two Sims were found with the same GUID." I've seen that message before -- it may/may not be what is causing the problem. But this is weird -- after doing all that work, N005 opened as an empty 'hood. Not only were there no 350+ Sims (with two sharing a GUID), there were no Sims at all.

Intermediate conclusion: perhaps this Neighborhood is, in fact, corrupted. And if two Sims share the same GUID, it may be because of my bringing a Townie into college. Problem is, so many things happened on the 26th that haven't happened before in my game, it is hard to pinpoint one thing and say "eureka! This is what screwed everything up!" What things, for example? Crash-on-shutdown, brought Townie to college, as above. Also had Sim inducted into Landgrabb Society; I exited while on the lot (I wanted to see where it was), and the lot doesn't show in the University plat (is this normal?) and the char doesn't have a Llama blazer (is this normal?). Moved Sims from dorm to house -- I've done that before -- and had one of them con Heather Huffington from the Tri-Var sorority to move in with them. So, two cases of moving Townies. Maybe one of these things corrupted the 'hood. Maybe nothing is corrupted at all. It maddens me that I can play around in these 'hoods, and have everything seem to be working normally, and then they disappear. If the 'hood is corrupt, one would think it would not play at all.

The N004 files in SimPE appear clean. No duplicate GUID message. Ditto N006. But N004 doesn't show up when I start the game. Nor does N005. N006 is still there (for now), I just checked. Changes made playing that 'hood do, in fact, alter the N006 folder. Am I back where I started, with one more corrupt 'hood slot for my troubles? That would appear to be the case.

This is enough to make me want to play Sims 1 for awhile. Like, forever. I am getting a feeling that a clean reinstall is the only way to get my 'hoods back in order -- and that I better give up on any backups made on the 26th, and play the one I have. I'll see if it's there tomorrow, and let you know. Right now, I'm going to read a book. I'm sick of this.

Tomorrow came earlier than expected. After reading a book, having a meal, and unwinding a little, I fired up TS2 to see if my 'hood was still there.

It isn't. Instead, N005 is now the fourth 'hood available. This 'hood is completely empty, even though the Neighborhood folder has files from one of my backups in it. N006 has disappeared from the menu; N004 is still not there. Opened SimPE, and nothing has changed there from the last time.

What did I do to break it? Turned off my computer and read a book. I have come to the end of the road, it appears, and nothing is making any sense.

Therefore, I am going to reinstall the game (since obviously, something is screwed up beyond my Neighborhood files), and see if one of my backups can be made to work.

A final aside: at the start of all this madness, before I did the swap of the NeighborhoodManager file, I noted that that file was about 68.7 kb in size. The "default" size is 22.6 kb. The size now is 22.8 kb. This is a non-trivial difference, but I am not sure what it signifies.

-- Mal

"Of two choices, I always take the third."
Lab Assistant
#135 Old 3rd May 2007 at 12:48 PM
Just to finish up this saga:

I reinstalled the game, replaced my custom content, and dropped my most recent backup in as 'hood 4. After several days and a couple of (normal) crashes-and-restarts, everything is still there. Therefore, in cases similar to mine, there is a reasonable expectation that reinstalling will turn the trick. It appears nothing at all was corrupt in the data files, but rather something in the game itself, possibly due to the shutdown crash, but I won't rule out the tooth fairy. I have played quite a bit, modified Sim sizes with SimPE, and installed and uninstalled a couple of hacks, and basically done everything I've always done, and the 'hood continues to be there when I start up. So there is hope.

-- Mal

"Of two choices, I always take the third."
Moderator of Please Read the Help FAQs
retired moderator
#136 Old 3rd May 2007 at 6:44 PM
Thank you for the update both Vladan and Mal. We appreciate all the details that you've posted and hope that this will help others restore their neighborhoods.

Please do not PM me with Game or Site Help questions. Post them in the appropriate section after going through the FAQs.

"The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist." ~ Verbal Kint, The Usual Suspects
Field Researcher
#137 Old 8th May 2007 at 2:09 AM
Hi
My system info is
windows xp home edition - e-machines 8230 pc (never again lol)
intel penium (R) 4 CPU 3.00GHz - 512MB of RAM
Unpatched - i have most ex packs apart from glamour life, celebration stuff and xmas party pack i other all others

i installed all my games from fresh because my pc crashed and i had to reset my pc and had to get all my download files again (boohoo) twice this happened in 6 months,
anyway i just got to play the game after rounding all my files up, i only got as far as moving a new neighbour into strangetown (N002) is it town or hood? i forgot that long since i played that one properly,
i moved the girl and dog in a empty lot and all i did was put 1 item in the house, (a sofa) one from i think binessimsrevue, and then i had to close my pc down, and i cant recall doing anything else with the game
i started it up again the next morning and it was gone (strangetown N002) my other 2 were fine, i didn't have any custom n-hoods

i have looked in my n-hoods folder and it still seems to be there,
i do remember a similar thing happening a while ago and i was told, to go to programs folder thesims2 and get the backup folder for the n-hood, but i cant remember if there was anything else please help
i hve had no luck with my game at all, i just never seem to get far enough, because of my pc resets and losing all my familys now this

OF ALL THE THINGS I'VE LOST
I MISS MY MIND THE MOST
Test Subject
#138 Old 12th May 2007 at 8:24 PM
Hi I bought sims university the other day and for the first day it worked perfectly but the second day this appeared...




When I tried to uninstall it this appeared which I take isnt a good thing.



Anyone any ideas how to fix it?


Can I also state that university is the only EP that I have installed so far.
Knitting fiend
retired moderator
#139 Old 12th May 2007 at 9:01 PM Last edited by JLonier : 12th May 2007 at 9:03 PM. Reason: duh!
Click on Start->My Computer. Then right click on your hard drive and select properties->tools. Then select error checking. You'll probably have to restart your computer. It will find and remove corrupted files. I'm not sure if you'll be able to uninstall after that, but give it a go and post back.

"Evil genius is still genius." Asura NPC GW2
Test Subject
#140 Old 12th May 2007 at 10:06 PM
Hi
it took ages to do but I've managed to uninstall and delete the corrupted file. Thanks a lot for that =)

Do you think if I installed it all again the same problem will arise?
Lab Assistant
#141 Old 16th May 2007 at 9:30 AM
The only answer to that question is "try it and see." If everything worked normally the first time around, and there was no crash or you did not shut down the computer while TS2 was writing to data files, then it is hard to say what caused the corruption in the first place.

After you reinstall, make a backup of the neighborhoodmanager file, and if it breaks again, try swapping that in.

Remember that TS2 crunches along a bit after you exit, writing to data files. You have to wait until that's finished to shut down the computer, or all sorts of undesireable things can happen.

-- Mal

"Of two choices, I always take the third."
Test Subject
#142 Old 24th May 2007 at 5:16 PM
Operating system: WinXP Pro
Computer specs: AMD 64 Athalon Mobile; ATI radeon xpress 200M; 512 Megs of RAM (or is it 516? one or the other)
Games: base game and nightlife patched, and then seasons and pets not patched
Details of Neighbourhood loss: i passed up the maxis neighborhoods in favor of a personal creation. last november i let a friend play, she created a new neighborhood. worked fine, for a while. then i opened it and her neighborhood had vanished as well as the first and third maxis hoods (veronavillle and pleasantview?) mine was still there so i wasn't bothered. then two days ago i played, shut down, went to bed, started it next day and my neighborhood was gone!! however, her neighborhood was back, along with two other neighborhoods that i now remember creating but never really played so had never noticed if they were missing. have done the copy/paste thingy but to no avail. now in my folders, neighborhood 4, i created, doesn't show up - but all the files are there and it's in simpe. same with my fave neighborhood. the two missing maxis neighborhoods, same thing.
- i have plenty of downloads and hacks, and have dealt with problems from them, but i don't think this is related b/c all was working until i made the mistake of going to sleep!
- yep had removed my downloads folder and started it over, but that was a couple of weeks ago and i play a lot, but it's been working fine
- No problems with opening/closing/saving of the games at all.

What changed on your system immediately before the corruption: NONE

however - interesting point. the neighborhood package files seem to have issues - for instance, in the seasons neighborhood (riverblossom or something?) which is working, the the neighborhood package file (G001_Neighborhood package file) is like 1500 KB. same thing with neighborhood 2, which is strangeville right? both show up, both have huge package files. but veronaville (neighborhood 3?) and my neighborhood (5) both have a neighborhood package file size 1KB. weird b/c my neighborhood has tons of data. both of those neighborhoods aren't showing up.

so does that mean anything??
Test Subject
#143 Old 24th May 2007 at 8:58 PM
okay here we go... so it seems that i was right, it's the neighborhood file that's corrupted; i know this b/c i replaced it in veronaville (which wasn't working and was only 1 KB) with the same file from C:\Program Files\EA GAMES\The Sims 2\TSData\Res\UserData\Neighborhoods\N003 and now it shows up and works fine. of course if i had played at all in that neighborhood it would have gone away (i tried creating a sim and moving him in, saving, quitting, replacing the file again, and of course *poof* he goes away). So i have the basic unplayed maxis neighborhoods back.

sadly, this does not help me with my custom neighborhood; there seems to be no way to replace the neighborhood package. does anyone know how to make a neighborhood package source to the folder it's placed in? i tried making a new neighborhood (N006) with the same template as the one i lost(N005) then taking it's package file, renaming it, and sticking it in the damaged neighborhood, but it just ends up being an empty neighborhood; i think it sources to the data in the N006 folder even though i moved and renamed it. do any of you know how i could make it source to the folder it's in? or is this even possible?

right now i'm looking at doing a full reinstall, but i'm concerned that it won't fix my problem since when i put my old neighborhood back in the new game it'll still use the old neighborhood package file which is damaged.

or... does anyone know how (or know of a tutorial) to get houses/families packaged like to upload (or in this case to put in my houses/families bin) in a different neighborhood? so i could extract them and put them in a new neighborhood? it seems this must be possible since i really don't think the character and lot files are damaged. any suggestions would be lovely!
Test Subject
#144 Old 27th May 2007 at 12:44 AM
I'm pretty convinced that the "missing neighborhood" issue *IS* caused by missing and/or corrupted neighborhood files. The source of the corruption can be a lot of different things, from a corrupt save game, a computer virus, a faulty system file, system lockups, your anti-virus program kicking in at a REALLY bad time, or a corrupted downloaded object. Keep in mind that The Sims 2 does NOT like to be minimized (doesn't matter what Maxis says, your game HATES you when you do that!). It doesn't matter how powerful your computer is; TS2 has a notoriously unstable platform, so the danger of crashing or file corruption is always there, no matter what you do or don't do.

I recently did a full CLEAN re-install of TS2 (I also have all the expansions) and I usually load each expansion as I install it, just to make sure that all the files are installed correctly. What I noticed is that if any expansion is not properly installed, you will be missing sims, lots, and even entire neighborhoods from your game. In extreme cases you will get an error message saying that the "application has crashed and will now close".

For the people like me who are download-aholics and are constantly adding new modded content to their game, here are some of the lessons I've learned (the hard way) during my bazillion re-installs of TS2:

(1) make sure you package ALL your favorite sims and pets. If you have an entire family you want to keep, make sure you package the LOT they live in. Keep these backups FAR AWAY from your EA Games folder =)

(2) don't delete the original .zip or .RAR files for stuff you download. Try to organize them into labeled folders, so if you need to start over with your game, most of your stuff will be easily accessible

(3) when re-installing TS2 (and expansions) make sure you LAUNCH each application before you move on to the next expansion. This way, if one of your EPs fails to install correctly, you will know right away.

(4) most importantly: don't add all your downloaded content all at once. Add a little bit at a time, so if something is broken or not working as intended, you can fix the problem or remove the bad file(s) before all hell breaks loose.

Hope this helps somebody. I'll feel a lot better knowing my (painful) experiences has helped someone out.
Banned
#145 Old 27th May 2007 at 2:24 PM
Well , i dont even know what happend, but all my sims which were in contests were there and gone

Anyway.. i dont know exactly what happend i just clicked the ea games folder and i think i clicked something wrong and the like bar with the green thing going back and forth came up and i clicked cancel but then i went to check and like all my projects were gone and my N004_neighborhood package and reia and the photo thing so ..?
Could i have deleated it or something, but i pressed cancel so.. ugh

-shniveshnive
Test Subject
#146 Old 5th Jun 2007 at 8:42 PM
Default I have a similar problem to the one jodylee9 had
I only lost a few neighborhoods, but I don't need them anyway. My question is, is would it be safe to move the unneeded neighborhood files to my external harddrive, now that I'm not using them? Or would it corrupt my game? If I do this, I'm going to back up my files first, but what if I mess up and it's permanently corrupted, even if I use my back up files?
Test Subject
#147 Old 7th Jun 2007 at 5:26 PM
Okie... Sims 2 worked perfectly fine on my computer. But when I tried to install it on my laptop(windows vista business edition), all of the nieghourhoods and templates disappeared. The game doesn't even create a EA games document folder in the computer at all. Even though I tried to put it in myself, the game loads but there is nothing in the menu screen at all. When I choose create custom neighbourhood, no template, as in ground terrain etc, can be found.
Solutions anyone?
Test Subject
#148 Old 16th Jun 2007 at 9:57 PM
Default Help!
A long time ago (1 or 2 yrs.) I was playing pleasantview and it crashed and then the next time I went on it pleasantview was not there! then i re-installed all my games and there was something called Vedena_2 or something and there was no more pleasantview or veronaville or strangehood like there should be! Is there any way to get it back? Anybody who can help, PLEASE DO!-Bidi2

Bidi2
Test Subject
#149 Old 20th Jun 2007 at 3:49 PM
Hi I need some help in here, well the thing is that I had my neighborhood disappeared, with the advice of one of the members here I got it back, however I noticed that every time I do something faulty, like for example I had no battery and my computer hibernated or I minimized my Sims or my sims got frozen. Everytime things like this happen my neighborhood disappears and I have to reload my saved copy which is quite a nuisance since my game is never stable. Im wondering if anyone has the same problem or anyone can help me...
Im running Sims 2 Pets
Test Subject
#150 Old 25th Jun 2007 at 4:46 AM
Operating system XP Home
Computer specs Don't know
Games BAse, Uni, NL, Pets, Seasons, Happy Holidays
Details of Neighbourhood loss Riverblossom Hills, Strangetown. I played a custom neighborhood last.
Neighbourhood File details If you go to Documents/ EA Games/ The Sims2/ Neighbourhoods are the neighbourhood files still there? Yes
Sim PE Investigation: Dont have Sim PE
What changed on your system immediately before the corruption: Nothing
Any other relevant information: Had a male sim have three children using the InSIMenator
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