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Fixed Maxis Strangetown

by Dorsal Axe Posted 7th May 2020 at 8:59 PM - Updated 29th Jan 2024 at 2:37 PM by Dorsal Axe : New version with minor fixes
 
80 Comments / Replies (Who?) - 55 Feedback Posts, 24 Thanks Posts
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Forum Resident
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#2 Old 7th May 2020 at 9:52 PM
I remember that this project had already been underway when I first started playing the sims 2 back in 9th grade. I'm really glad that it was finally made a reality! Congratulations!
Top Secret Researcher
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#3 Old 8th May 2020 at 1:27 AM
Wow! That's an enormous amount of work; thank you so much for doing all of that!

I've actually never played Strangetown, because I'd heard it was broken. So after a zillion years, I can finally play it for the first time -- how cool!
Top Secret Researcher
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#4 Old 8th May 2020 at 2:03 AM
I'm sorry to be stupid, but I'm having trouble figuring out where to put this. I tried going to the place where the game is installed (which is the F drive on my particular computer), so I went here:
F:\Program Files (x86)\EA GAMES\The Sims 2\TSData\Res\NeighborhoodTemplate
That folder contained only a .png file, no neighborhood files.



There are neighborhood folders in my C:\Users\MyName\Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Neighborhoods folder, but I thought those were the saved games. So where are my neighborhood templates?

Thanks!
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#5 Old 8th May 2020 at 4:26 AM
Wow, this must have taken you ages, great job.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Space Pony
#6 Old 8th May 2020 at 7:53 AM
@Corylea The templates are in \TSData\Res\UserData\Neighborhoods.
Test Subject
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#7 Old 8th May 2020 at 9:55 AM
This is huge! Thank you all!

I didn't even know the Singles were supposed to have different surnames. I thought it was part of the limitation of the game only allowing same-surname people in a household in CAS.
Alchemist
THANKS POST
#8 Old 8th May 2020 at 1:27 PM
Finally! An official version! This is so awesome! I've been recommending your "tester" version as my favorite for ages! Great work. Thank you!
Top Secret Researcher
#9 Old 8th May 2020 at 4:04 PM Last edited by Corylea : 8th May 2020 at 5:41 PM.
Quote: Originally posted by Nopke
@Corylea The templates are in \TSData\Res\UserData\Neighborhoods.


@Nopke Oh, thank you!

After all, why would EA put them in a folder explicitly labelled "Neighborhood Template" when they could bury them under "UserData." *head desk* :-)

I've made some mods for The Sims 1 -- yes, The Sims ONE :-) -- which you can find at http://corylea.com/Sims1ModsByCorylea.html
Test Subject
THANKS POST
#10 Old 8th May 2020 at 5:44 PM
Thank you so much! I've been looking for so long for a Strangetown that was not only clean, but also came with townies and ancestors and such. Thank you for undertaking what I presume was a difficult project.
Test Subject
#11 Old 8th May 2020 at 5:44 PM Last edited by nosferatuman : 10th Jul 2020 at 10:39 PM.
Thank you, Dorsal Axe. I always assumed meetmetotheriver's releases were free of all these issues. It's also great to have the original townies back.

I do have a question, however. You said we should "allow the game to generate a new save game folder. From there you can move it to your existing save game folder," and that "copying the new N002 folder directly to your existing save game folder can result in losing neighborhood stories for all of your neighborhoods, as well as some other weirdness".

I'm guessing this is a newbie question, but the only instructions I found on a google search for resetting premade neighborhoods was to simply copy and paste the template files, which is exactly what you instructed us not to do. By "new save game folder" did you perhaps meant we should delete the entire TS2 folder found on My Documents and not only the saved neighborhoods folder?
---//---
And hopefully this isn't off topic and someone can tell me:
I'm about to start a Pleasantview save, and after seeing this post I decided to run the Hood Checker on river's templates. The analysis found "incorrect subject" for Dina's memories of Michael Bachelor and Darren Dreamer's memories of Darleen. (fixable with the "fix corrupt memories" function of Pescado's FFS Lot Debugger/BatBox)

As for the subhoods (Bluewater Village, Downtown and SSU), seems like all playable families' memories, including those of the dead Tricous, were marked as "incorrect subject". Besides adding the subhoods, I haven't even played with this save file yet.
EDIT: This is not an issue with MeetMeToTheRiver's templates, but with the game itself. As it's mentioned in her clean template releases, "adding any and all subhoods ingame partially corrupts the memories of added sims. Always run the Hood Checker on a neighbourhood after adding any subhoods to fix this." I just made this edit in case someone comes across my comment and thinks her subhood templates are somehow not safe, which is not the case.

Does anyone know is this could be a sign of serious corruption, or is it something easily solvable (hopefully with Pescado's BatBox)?
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Original Poster
#12 Old 8th May 2020 at 6:34 PM
Quote: Originally posted by nosferatuman
Thank you, Dorsal Axe. I always assumed meetmetotheriver's releases were free of all these issues. It's also great to have the original townies back.

I do have a question, however. You said we should "allow the game to generate a new save game folder. From there you can move it to your existing save game folder," and that "copying the new N002 folder directly to your existing save game folder can result in losing neighborhood stories for all of your neighborhoods, as well as some other weirdness".

I'm guessing this is a newbie question, but the only instructions I found on a google search for resetting premade neighborhoods was to simply copy and paste the template files, which is exactly what you instructed us not to do. By "new save game folder" did you perhaps meant we should delete the entire TS2 folder found on My Documents and not only the saved neighborhoods folder?
---//---
And hopefully this isn't off topic and someone can tell me:
I'm about to start a Pleasantview save, and after seeing this post I decided to run the Hood Checker on river's templates. The analysis found "incorrect subject" for Dina's memories of Michael Bachelor and Darren Dreamer's memories of Darleen. As for the subhoods (Bluewater Village, Downtown and SSU), seems like all playable families' memories, including those of the dead Tricous, were marked as "incorrect subject". Besides adding the subhoods, I haven't even played with this save file yet.

Does anyone know is this could be a sign of serious corruption, or is it something easily solvable (hopefully with Pescado's batbox)?


Ah, I haven't explained it very well. I'll rewrite the instructions to make them clearer. Basically you should temporarily move or rename your saved game folder (usually under \Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2), this will cause the game to generate a new folder and copy over the template neighborhoods from the installation directory (usually under \Program Files\EA Games\The Sims 2). Then you can move the new Strangetown to your old save folder, swapping it over with the old Strangetown, then delete the new save folder and restore your old one.

In my testing I found that directly swapping the old N002 out for the new one would wipe my stories in all hoods, but following this more cumbersome process didn't for some reason. I couldn't tell you why

Regarding the other thing, my guess is that it's because those memories are pointing to invalid targets. There is a duplicate of Michael Bachelor and one of Darleen Dreamer, who are not properly linked, so that's possibly why that error is being thrown. I haven't really looked at Pleasantview much yet, so I can't say for certain. I'm also not sure about the Tricous. Issues with memory subjects can easily be fixed in SimPE though.
Lab Assistant
#13 Old 8th May 2020 at 7:01 PM Last edited by bulbash : 8th May 2020 at 7:29 PM.
Thank you, Dorsal Axe! It's great to have a chance to try playing Strangetown more or less safely.

There's an issue that pops up though. When I play the Curiouses and after Vidcund gets abducted and then returns, the want controller is throwing an error (testingcheatsenabled is on). If I reset it then Vidcund has 3 out of his 6 wants blank (I got him a university diploma), and if I delete it then everyone's wants are messed up. Does anyone know a way of fixing this issue? When Pascal delivers a baby, he loses all of the wants and fears, so does Lazlo
Top Secret Researcher
#14 Old 8th May 2020 at 7:48 PM
I know that there's a "recommended" order in which to play the Pleasantview families if one wants to see all of the Maxis scripted events. Is there such an order for the Strangetown families?

I've made some mods for The Sims 1 -- yes, The Sims ONE :-) -- which you can find at http://corylea.com/Sims1ModsByCorylea.html
Mad Poster
#15 Old 8th May 2020 at 8:23 PM Last edited by RoxEllen1965 : 8th May 2020 at 11:42 PM. Reason: typo
Quote: Originally posted by Corylea
I know that there's a "recommended" order in which to play the Pleasantview families if one wants to see all of the Maxis scripted events. Is there such an order for the Strangetown families?

The Prima Guide recommends the following order:

1. Curious
2. Specter
3. Beaker
4. Smith
5. Grunt

I recommend you play the Beaker family before the Curious family. If you play the Curious lot first, you may end up satisfying some of Nervous Subject's wants (make friends with Pascal, etc.) before you even have a chance to play the Beaker lot.
Top Secret Researcher
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#16 Old 8th May 2020 at 9:32 PM
@RoxEllen1965, thank you very much!
Alchemist
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#17 Old 9th May 2020 at 3:13 AM
I converted this to a subhood. Seems ok to me, but would anyone like to test it?
Field Researcher
#18 Old 9th May 2020 at 4:09 AM
This is very nice but I'm very curious, what makes this different from Tarlia's clean templates? Not discrediting your hard work, I'm just genuinely curious. And will this make resurrecting Olive's "victims" be safe and not corrupt the neighbourhood?
Lab Assistant
THANKS POST
#19 Old 9th May 2020 at 4:37 AM
I've been playing StrangeTown for quite a while actually and i didn't know it was so buggy until now. Luckily I never resurrect dead sims.
Test Subject
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#20 Old 9th May 2020 at 6:36 AM
Awesome! i love this town and im glad you made a fix. Im curious however, do you plan on making a shopping district version of this so we can use it as a subhood?
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Original Poster
#21 Old 9th May 2020 at 12:12 PM Last edited by Dorsal Axe : 10th May 2020 at 11:26 AM. Reason: Comments based on old version of other project
Quote: Originally posted by bulbash
Thank you, Dorsal Axe! It's great to have a chance to try playing Strangetown more or less safely.

There's an issue that pops up though. When I play the Curiouses and after Vidcund gets abducted and then returns, the want controller is throwing an error (testingcheatsenabled is on). If I reset it then Vidcund has 3 out of his 6 wants blank (I got him a university diploma), and if I delete it then everyone's wants are messed up. Does anyone know a way of fixing this issue? When Pascal delivers a baby, he loses all of the wants and fears, so does Lazlo

I wondered if the expanded want slots were conflicting with the scripted scenario (since that forces certain wants on Sims IIRC), but I'm afraid I haven't been able to replicate this at all that on a clean game. Therefore, I can only assume it's due to a mod conflict.

Quote: Originally posted by kiddypatches
This is very nice but I'm very curious, what makes this different from Tarlia's clean templates? Not discrediting your hard work, I'm just genuinely curious. And will this make resurrecting Olive's "victims" be safe and not corrupt the neighbourhood?

Pretty much what's in the description and changelog.

[EDIT: Removed some comments as I was basing my info on a now very outdated version of her project]

Quote: Originally posted by Orpheus49
Awesome! i love this town and im glad you made a fix. Im curious however, do you plan on making a shopping district version of this so we can use it as a subhood?

I'm afraid I won't be making any variations of this hood, this was all a lot of work as it is. It looks like Sunrader up above has converted it to a subhood, so your best bet is to contact them about that or wait for them to release that version
Alchemist
#22 Old 9th May 2020 at 1:13 PM Last edited by Sunrader : 10th May 2020 at 12:53 PM.
Quote: Originally posted by Orpheus49
Awesome! i love this town and im glad you made a fix. Im curious however, do you plan on making a shopping district version of this so we can use it as a subhood?


As DA said, I converted it. I've tested it myself and it seems fine, but if you'd like to test it on a hood you aren't invested in, that'd be great. PM me for a link.

Quote: Originally posted by kiddypatches
This is very nice but I'm very curious, what makes this different from Tarlia's clean templates? Not discrediting your hard work, I'm just genuinely curious. And will this make resurrecting Olive's "victims" be safe and not corrupt the neighbourhood?


If you mean the new one released last year, MeetMetotheRiver does great work, but she doesn't list very many changes in Strangetown and she deleted all the townies, so if you want the hood close to the original, this is my fav.
Lab Assistant
THANKS POST
#23 Old 9th May 2020 at 8:10 PM Last edited by Biara25 : 9th May 2020 at 9:00 PM.
Awesome! Thank you so much! :up:
That's a fantastic job done here. Much appreciated. :gjob:
We can finally enjoy a proper Strangetown! :D
Lab Assistant
#24 Old 9th May 2020 at 8:56 PM
Quote: Originally posted by RoxEllen1965
The Prima Guide recommends the following order:

1. Curious
2. Specter
3. Beaker
4. Smith
5. Grunt

I recommend you play the Beaker family before the Curious family. If you play the Curious lot first, you may end up satisfying some of Nervous Subject's wants (make friends with Pascal, etc.) before you even have a chance to play the Beaker lot.


Wow very useful. I'll try that.
Lab Assistant
THANKS POST
#25 Old 9th May 2020 at 10:20 PM
Thanks for doing this... I am one of those few people that actually like the townies!
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