Hi all, sorry for my recently frequent bombarding of questions about TS3. You all can consider me a noob when it comes to TS3. Mockery is understandable. Anyway, I have a question on early spotting of corruption. So here it goes... (see "tldr" at bottom if you want to skip my explanations)

I had an issue with Awesomemod's TS2-aging and Overwatch a while back (I've now solved it by using TS2-aging through StoryProgression), but before I caught the issue, a few Sims in my world aged up. I've been aging them down through "Edit in CAS" when I start playing their household to reset them to where they should be had they not been aging. I noticed a few glitches after doing so (skeleton stretching when idle), but didn't worry about it too much because I assumed TS3 was generally corruption proof, and the Sims were going to age up in the matter of a few days, so I figured when they transition it would all go back to normal. Of course, I now realize that aging Sims down is not OK, but the deed has been done (In my defense, I didn't think to check because it was ok to do in TS2). I know that when you make a mistake, like deleting a Sim in TS2, a neighborhood will seem OK at first, but eventually it's going to become unplayable. Is this how it is in TS3?

The reason I ask is that I seem to be having issues lately; mainly, while trying to save. I keep getting Error 12 even though I frequently save. when I try to go to "Edit Town" once this has occurred, the game crashes. "Save As..." doesn't work, either. Now, there is a possibility that this particular issue is because of other issues (haven't tested yet) - my Cache files had gotten pretty large. I also have not disabled the memory system, and I have Awesomemod to store wishes even after switching households. I have deleted the cache, and am going to turn off the wish-saver setting on Awesomemod to help with the issue. It'll be months or even years before I play a given household again, so that's not important to me. I'm sure it has started to cause a lot of bloat after having played 10 different households now in this one world. However, how important is disabling the memory system in TS3?

Either way, I am hoping making these changes will help with the Error 12 issue (it might be a week or so before I can play again to test this, is why I am making this post now), however, my original question still stands: should I give up on this particular world?

I think once I've gotten all of this sorted out for myself I am going to make a post somewhere for a How-to to set up your game to play as a TS2 game. I generally try to troubleshoot and figure things out for myself online first, but there doesn't seem to be as many resources for things like this as there are for TS2. Or maybe my search engine knows which TS2 sites are good based on my search habits, but doesn't know TS3 sites yet..

tldr:
1. Does corruption work like in TS2 - where you can do something to corrupt your neighborhood, but you don't see the effects/it doesn't become unplayable until later on?
1a. If so, is aging Sims down through "Edit in CAS" one of these corrupting actions?
1b. Could one of the signs of corruption be Error 12 while saving (and crashing when trying to enter "Edit Town" once this phenomenon has started)?
2. Does leaving memories enabled cause other issues than bloat (for which I could use Kuree's "Save Cleaner" program to clean it if it gets too big)?

1a) Possibly. I remember all sort of glitches when aging down a fully developed Sim (YA, A, E) to anything younger than YA (teen, child, toddler). Depending on your method of aging down you might end up with a broken Sim. If you really have to age down Sims below YA, use MasterController's CAS at least.
All live CAS changes in-game should be done with MasterController anyway and not the "Edit in CAS" cheat. You will need MasterController and the Integration and Cheats add-on modules.

And re: AwesomeMod. I have no problems with it. No error 12 ever (except for one case, which was my fault, though; I edited a nhd file in S3PE and made mistakes).

1a - What the others said, except such breakage should only affect the sim(s) upon whom you forced an age-down. The distortion is not like a disease that spreads throughout your game save affecting others. Sometimes they just grow out of it, sometimes we have to "rebuild" the sim in MC CAS.

2 - I like the memory system (setting the cue for some of your expected but won't really happen mockery to flow in my direction), but it needs to be reeled back. The max number of scrapbook memories per sim is 300. If your world's sims are carrying hundreds of memories each, then your save file will bloat and take much more in resources than the game engine can handle to keep starting it up and keep things flowing. I prefer to leverage this mod so that only a few life-changing events of my choosing get recorded per sim, no one needs 250 extra copies of Took a Walk in the Park and Sneezed or whatever. Births, adoptions, weddings, deaths, things like that I really do like to see there even if the blurry screenshot grabbed at the time is awful. And I still go in periodically and get rid of a some that I didn't really need to see captured as I rotate through my sims, but a dozen or two memories here and there shouldn't really cause the game to explode.
http://modthesims.info/download.php?t=446281

Error 12 and the ensuing crashes you describe are out of resources conditions. Typically this means RAM, but it could be video memory or other things more difficult to pinpoint in some instances. But on RAM, you must have enough total for the game to work with as it will keep reaching for more, and you can never let the game's usage spike above...it's usually 3.5 GB or so. TS3 is a 32-bit application and cannot possibly make use of more than 4 GB, although the real limit is more like ~3.7 GB. One spike into the danger zone and the game will lose its mind (for that session). I would suggest taking some readings by way of Task Manager when your game starts up after the game clock begins moving smoothly, and again frequently thereafter.

If you only have 4 GB (or less) total to begin with, or are playing on an integrated graphics chip, you will run into this kind of condition much sooner.

And, for those nursing along the (sighs) Mac version of the game, the limit for them will be 2 GB.

Thanks for the responses, everyone! I'd first like to note that I did age my Sims down using MC's Edit in CAS feature. Also, I have bolded my questions in this reply.

Is there a resource on things that may corrupt a save file? As far as I'm aware, the only thing I have done to cause corruption would be to age a Sim down. I did play for a good while without Overwatch or ErrorTrap, though. In fact, I had Overwatch, removed it for a while, then put it back in. My World File is an updated Sunset Valley from SnootySims, though, so it could have been corrupt to begin with.

To the re:Awesomemod: I have a good number of Awesomemod features disabled. I'll take a look and see how necessary I feel the mod is to me now that I'm not using the TS2-aging setting. I think NRaas's stuff might be good enough.

I have 8GBs of RAM and a good graphics card (I play Skyrim with mods that increase the quality of the graphics so we should be good there.) Actually, my game never really lags much (other than the lag at 3am for Overwatch). I'm a baby about lag, too, so I wouldn't be playing if so. Ill check the task manager and see how it looks. I know that it is reaching that point at the time of Error 12. Still confusing to me because the game is running fine otherwise.

By the way, my aforementioned glitches include a stuck socialjig, some unselectable items in inventories, and skeleton stretching for the Sims who have been aged down. That's about it. It's just that it has taken me over a year to play 9 weeks of in-game time, so this stuff is serious for me. I don't want to start over, and if I do, I want to know immediately (generally, speaking. Not necessarily for the current case in point).


So to your comments regarding Error 12, are there any things other than what has been mentioned here that could keep my RAM down?

Either way, I'll make these changes and report back when I have the opportunity.

Sure, plenty. Some of them come down to gameplay enjoyment tradeoffs, though it depends on the world and the player. But it would be really helpful to know what your starting point is for a typical session, again after the game clock starts moving smoothly, as you said you would check on. If you are starting out a typical session at 3.1 GB already, the steps to take and the relative urgency behind them, as well as how long you can expect a typical session to last before having to save as, quit, and reload, will be very different than if you are starting out at something like 1.3 GB.

Controllable things that will use more RAM, off the top of my head:
-- Overly long gameplay sessions, and not saving frequently enough.
-- The Hidden Object game on startup will start things off at a slightly higher level of usage.
-- Any in-game online features.
-- Large, very detailed worlds (number of lots total) vs. smaller or medium sized ones.
-- Lots with too much content on them like mega-malls and multi-purpose let's cram a dozen custom rabbit holes and every entertainment device we have on hand all onto the same lot.
-- Large resident populations, especially with NRaas StoryProgression running on Normal speed (the speed of progression is adjustable).
-- StoryProgression running at all. Sometimes in my busiest, most densely populated ongoing worlds I have to switch NRaas SP off entirely for a sim day (of course not invoking EA's as per the Game Options, but rather running with no progression) or maybe around 12 sim hours just to get things to calm down. Usually in these worlds I am running at the Snail setting anyway.
-- Not having done a MC Reset Everything run from City Hall for too many sim weeks in a row.
-- Too many bloated memories being carried (already discussed).
-- Larger active households.
-- Graphics options like detailed lots and water/mirror quality being set too high. Even some of the others, on overly busy and complicated worlds.
-- Having too many inactive residential lots open with MC> Open or using the HomeOpener mod on a medium to larger sized world.
-- This one is huge: running Dream Catcher on too many households at once. Even one (large inactive household) can do it. Several NRaas mods provide ways to switch active households easily. If they are set to be or are always Dream Catcher switches, that means while inactive the sims can still earn LTR points through attaining their promised and remembered dreams/wishes and opps and they are all remembered for when you return to play them again. This can call for huge usage of RAM and processor power, and sometimes the player doesn't even realize this is happening or why. You can see how many sims have Dream Catchers running on them by doing a harmless MC command like Family Tree and filtering to Has Dream Manager. Of course your current actives will show up, but the question becomes which other households do. Unfortunately the command Drop Dreams and Opps only exists within MC on the Town level, so if this is an issue one has to drop Dreams and Opps on the entire town at once.
-- Routing Issues. A world with flaws on the world map that cause sims to constantly be re-routed will cause lag, but also increased RAM usage as the game has to work harder to push them around. NRaas GoHere can help, as can not playing worlds with flaws on the world map.
-- Very long and frequent CAS and Edit Town sessions (where lots of editing is actually being done, not just poking around) will drive up RAM usage considerably.

And those are just the ones that came to me at the moment.
http://nraas.wikispaces.com/Tips+Fo...ame+Performance

Thanks again for your responses. I really appreciate your help and will be taking your advice to help keep issues from happening in the future. The most interesting thing I read is how big of a deal retaining wishes and opportunities is. I had this set on, and there were about 40 Sims that the game was retaining wishes and opportunities for (according to MC).

Anyway, I did the test and before making any changes, the game started at 1.9 GBs of RAM (it's important to also note there was a party that was still going on, albeit there were only 5 remaining guests). Then, I deleted all memories, turned the memory system off, turned off DreamCatcher (or whatever), removed all wishes and opportunities (which doesn't affect your active household, by the way), reset the town (which I have never done), switched households (from the Langerak family, which has 5 Sims, to the Bunch family, which has 6 Sims) to sort of further reset things, and then saved, quit, and restarted. the game still started at 1.9 GBs of RAM.

Something, also, to note is that when the game is at 1.9GBs of RAM, my computer's RAM usage is a bit over 50%. This is the same amount of RAM usage that I had noted when I was having Error 12. So, I overestimated how much RAM my computer uses while idling. The point is: I don't know that the RAM usage had reached 3.5 at any point in my game before I was getting Error 12, but it at least wasn't during the time I was trying to save, nor was it close.

So to further test things, I let the (cleaned) game play itself (I was too busy to actually play). I alternated between speed 1 (80% of the time) and speed 3 (the other 10%), I edited a Sim in CAS, and I didn't save the game for over two Sim days. The RAM usage slowly declined averaging at about 1.6 GBs the whole time, with a low of 1.2 GBs.The game saved properly and I shut it down. I then restarted the game and loaded my backupped, uncleaned save file with memories allowed, but apparently DreamCatcher was turned off (I had "Retain Dreams and Opportunities" turned on per MC but off per Awesomemod, but apparently MC's setting doesn't work). The game started at 1.9GBs but quickly climbed to 2.2GBs where it remained for the rest of the night. After that night, though, the RAM usage slowly decreased (without going back up), lowering down to 1.3 GBs by the end of the second day. I'd say the average was about 1.7 GBs overall (so a little higher than the cleaned version with memories turned off). Saving went fine and I played around a bit before shutting down. Since DreamCatcher (or whatever) wasn't actually on the whole time (and I found out at the end), I can't say with any certainty that my game was never spiking over 3.5GBs, but given that in my RAM usage never went above 2.2 GBs in either play-through, it's pretty safe to say (unless the "Retain Wishes and Opportunities" really does add 1.3GBs worth of memory usage.

One thing I would like to really point out now, (and I sort of mentioned this in my previous posts), I hadn't deleted my cache files in a while, and had added mods to the game without deleting the Script cache. Is there a possibility that this could have been the root of my Error 12 issues? Seems strange to me that it would, but I guess anything is possible?

MC's Retain Dreams and Opps setting only does anything if you use an MC command to change active households from the point of your changing it forward. It has no impact on already running Dream Managers or on household switches performed any other way. Afraid I don't know what Awesome's does.

Yes to running Dream Managers on 40 sims and not clearing the cache files both being potential RAM guzzling culprits. More so on the first one. Regardless, sounds like you are running a pretty clean game there now, at least as far as RAM usage is concerned.

Oh, well, then my second playthrough must have had all the dreamcatchers working until the very end, because I didn't switch households until after saving. If that's the case and all those things only reduced my RAM by .1 on average... wow.

Nonetheless I'll be enacting these changes in my game in the future just to be safe (I don't want to chance it). Hopefully the cache was it, then, and my issue is solved. I guess I'll report back if things aren't fixed.